Reason for the Season

"Someday at Christmas men won't be boys,

playing with bombs like kids play with toys.

One warm December, our hearts will see

a world where men are free.

Someday at Christmas, there'll be no wars,

when we have learned what Christmas is for.

When we have found what life's really worth,

there'll be peace on earth."

-Stevie Wonder

An Update Especially for Leisa

There hasn't been too much going on around here, just a whole lotta sick...
but since I have to appease the masses ::cough cough Leisa:: here is an update on some recent Grant happenings...


You know... just chillin' with Carter, enjoying the sights of Christmas, and some serious iPhone gaming with Sophie at the Bartholomay Thanksgiving

he's had a few precious one-liners recently too... here are a few recent Facebook updates:

I LOVE that Grant refers to me as "Princess Mommy" when he sees me in wedding pictures, I'm thinking about adopting the title full time...

::Grant sitting and staring at the tree:: "whacha doin' Grant", he answered "waiting for Jesus to come"... Priceless!

What a Mug!

I mean seriously?!? How am I suppose to get anything done around the house when Carter makes such cute faces all day long. I just want to sit and watch him so I don't miss any...

Grant the Smart Alec

I just caught Grant pushing buttons on Geoff's laptop (big no-no in the house since he's screwed up more than one thing before) When I told him he needed to sto pand move away from the computer he answered "but Mom, I need to check email"... Who replaced my 3 year old with a 30 year old?!?

Bazaar Success

This past weekend was a whirlwind but we had a blast! We all headed to Atlanta Friday night (our first time flying out of Fayetteville and Carter's first flight) spent Saturday eating -first lunch at Geoff's favorite Gengis Grill then an early Thanksgiving dinner with his whole family- then at the Craft Bazaar on Sunday.

Geoff's mom is a principal and every other year the school does a huge craft sale/bazaar. I set up a booth 2 years ago with platters & splatters stuff but since I haven't had a kiln this year was all things ribbons! bows, barrettes, headbands and tassels galore!

Then Geoff's Aunt and Grandmother got their craftings on too and we had a double booth, complete with decorative wine bottle lights, memo boards, jewelry, blankets and handcrafted furniture~

Like usual I forgot to take my camera out (probably the biggest thing that has changed since having Carter! I take pictures with my phone instead of lugging out the big camera) but snagged some pictures of the set up. The best part for me were the comments, people had never seen ribbon sculptures so they had fun looking through all of the designs. If I do it again I think I'll focus on tassels (no kiln to fire at and no girls at home to enjoy leftover bows) how cute would it be to get an old chippy door and screw in decorative knobs and handles to hang the tassels from?!? oh well, I have two years to day dream and plan that one in my head...

1,2,3

Say what?!?!?

How can it be?!?

Carter is 3 months old! (I've been sitting on the pictures for a week now)

He's wearing 3-6 month clothes and just moved up into size 2 diapers.

His colic has gone down (praises) but still has to be held or he'll lose it.

He recently discovered his laugh and has a definate smile/giggle time in the early evening, he just coos away and will have smiles back at you, I love it!

and only one thing comes to my mind when I see these pictures...

1-2-3

thats how elementary

its gonna be

come on lets fall it love

its easy- its so easy

like taking candy from a baby

Shutterfly Love

Its one of my most favorite times of the year, the calm before the storm of the holidays. Time to make plans and get lists together and one of my favorites... plan the christmas card!

Now, if you know us in real life, you know that Shutterfly is a staple in our big life events. We have used their photo cards for our wedding save-the-dates, birth announcements and 4 years worth of christmas cards! We even used their note cards for our wedding and baby thank yous. (I was thinking it would be nice to link back to the actual design that we used for each but they keep things so new and freah that those deisgns aren't even available anymore!)

So far we've always used the 4x8 photocards but since Shannon took such great family pictures for us in September, I'm thinking we might have to go bigger this year... there are far too many precious pictures to just choose one so I'm deciding between this:

and this:

but everytime I go back to the site I see more that I like and I get all confused again. What do you think? I love that they range from pretty and preppy all the way to classic and regal... decisions decisions.

I don't want to ruin the surprises but lets just say, I crossed a lot of people off the list with fun photo gifts this year. They have everything you could possibly imagine and their quality is great. Our fridge is covered with their magnets and we've been told by the Grandmas that their snapbooks make great brag books!

(In the interest of full disclosure I'm participating in a blogging promotion for Shutterfly but I want you to know that I mean every word that I typed and I absolutely adore Shutterfly and I think you will too)

Craftings: A Fluffy Coffee Wreath

As you can see, I'm STILL not finished with my current craft but people were getting antsy so here it is...

my newest obsession...

its a wreath...

made from

COFFEE FILTERS

(I chose the natural ones but classic white could give off a fun snow vibe if thats more your style)

isn't it just so freakin' cute?

my new christmas decor is going to be

burlap and fur; mercury glass and old sheet music
so when I saw this project floating around blog-land I just had to try it myself! Why do I always choose the wreath projects that just kill my fingers?!?

here are three tutorials if you are thinking this might be worth a try:

one and two and three

Craftings: A Sneak Peek

I've officially started my holiday craftings, this time its a new decor theme for Christmas.
I am SO EXCITED about this project but its taking a little longer than expected, so until I get it done...

heres a little sneak peek for you! any guesses?

We Love Our Vet

Katie made this little picture for Veterans day and I LOVE it!
Happy Veteran's Day to all of the service men and women in our lives! THANK YOU

We're Getting a Sister!

do you hear that?...

....its the sound of wedding bells!

Brian proposed to Kate on Saturday and she said YES! which means we're getting a sister

::insert every YAY, wooowhooo, and cheer possible here::

I could not be happier for the two of them, I know their future will be filled with love and a ton of laughs, I mean clearly you can tell by some of the pictures but these two are so much fun! I love it when people don't take themselves too seriously and they make it look so easy. I know all of the plannings and details for the big day will be fun but its the years after the big day that I am most excited about! Grant has already started practicing "Aunt Kate" and its got a good ring to it. We're getting a sister-in-law, but I'm just gonna drop the in-law part right off the bat, family is family and ours is ECSTATIC!

Start of Turkey-month

Grant had it ingrained into his head that October= Halloween so when it changed to November we naturally started talk about all things Thanksgiving. He was very sad when we had to throw away our Jack-o-lantern pumpkin (since I carved it 2 weeks early by mistake) but had been going out the front door to check on the other decorative pumpkins every afternoon -we had a white pumpkin, a smaller triangle-ish pumpkin and a green striped funky pumpkin/gourd/squash thing.

Well the start of Thanksgiving Turkey month was officially welcomed in on our front porch when Kate and Brian picked up this pumpkin turkey kit on their Halloween trip to New Orleans. These wooden pieces are made to be stuck into a typical orange pumpkin to make a turkey but I just couldn't resist putting our green guy's curves to good use:

Grant had so much fun sticking those suckers in! Thanks Brian and Kate!

(I know that I have been pretty "short and sweet" with the blog lately, there jsut aren't enough hours in the day. or should I say hours in the day when both kids are sleeping.... stay tuned for backdated posts to cover Homecoming and hopefully future posts about a new holiday decor theme of everything burlap, vintage music and white fur!)