wrap roundup

Nothing heightens the anticipation of Christmas morning like beautifully wrapped gifts.  These would all be festive decorations as well, up until the big morning unwrap!  Links are below for more on DIY instructions, printables, or supplies.

Gorgeous wrapping inspiration from: 

Artifact Uprising; 

Jones Design Company; 

A Little Polkadot; 

Omiyage Blogs;

The Proper Pinwheel;

Hey Look;

Fabric Paper Glue;

Stephmodo

Happy Gifting! -Alicia

Hostess Gift and Free Printable!

Hello, friends!  It's that time of year for celebrating with family and friends and that means lots of invitations and fun events!  Alicia created this lovely DIY hostess gift, perfect for the holiday season.  I've designed a coordinating printable so you can recreate her project for the hostesses you're thankful for this season!  Enjoy!  - Jen

This hostess gift was pretty fun to put together.

 I filled clear ornaments with popcorn kernels, and I strung popcorn and wrapped it around a small rosemary plant.  I picked this one up at Lowe's.  The plastic planter it came in wasn't so pretty, so I used our Merry Christmas stamp and Encore silver ink on kraft paper to wrap the pot.  I printed out the easy peasy printable, cut on the lines, and tied it on with red yarn.  This smells lovely, and makes me want to eat gourmet popcorn every time I pass by.

And just because we love you so much, here's the hand lettered and hand drawn Printable Hostess Gift Tag - which also has a card you can cut out and fold.

Download the printable PDF at the link!

Printable Hostess Gift Tag and Card

If you're feeling a bit more ambitious, I'd suggest making a loaf of rosemary herb bread.  This would be a good way to get two hostess gifts from the plant.  Or just pass along this recipe with it, I've made it before and it is really tasty. It's Pastor Ryan's Herb bread from the Pioneer Woman's blog.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all who celebrate it!

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Hope your holidays are filled with family and friends and love and wintry goodness!

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Or - at the very least - adorably skinny reindeer.

We had planned a lovely feast with friends for this evening but had to postpone because of snow, snow and more snow. But, we're cuddling in, watching Christmas movies, drinking hot chocolate and enjoying ourselves anyway! Hope you are, too.

Christmas time is near.

It's been cold here in Germany. Very cold. Sehr sehr kalt. (Which I can't say without being corrected by Cheeseball. She still understands a lot more German than she speaks, but what she speaks sounds like actual German. Versus my French-y American German. And El niño's El Deutsch.)


I'm going to pretend I think this spider froze to death and fell off its web instead of the more likely migration INTO MY HOUSE.

Around this time of year, Christmas Markets spring up all over the country. These are heavy with warm, mulled wine (glühwein), potatos fried in various and sundry ways, beautifully carved ornaments & wreaths and the usual tourist junk that accumulates in any fair type setting. This past weekend, we caught the train up to Stuttgart for the Stuttgarter Weihnachtsmarkt. It was full of people, cold and crisp, smelled wonderful and was so much fun. I can't wait to visit other markets in different towns!

And now we set in to the Recovery Phase.

El niño keeps singing "Chinese, like a melody in my head that I can't keep out got me singing like na na na na na na na na...".

I finally decided to stop giggling at him and informed the tiny mondegreen maestro that the word is in fact shorty. Or, rather shawty. Of course he then asked me what is shorty? Well, shit I don't know. I suppose it isn't really any more nonsensical than Chinese, so hell, carry on.

Speaking of shawties, Cheeseball got a plethora of Barbies for Christmas. And she marched down to Target today with $50 in her sparkly, sweaty little hands courtesy of the GG's (great grandparents, let's not get into the whole hard ass Santa gang thing again.) Among other things, she picked out a little Barbie dress up costume with matching actual Barbie doll dress.

When we got home, I told her to go grab me a Barbie so I could put the matching dress on her and prime Cheeseball for some BY HERSELF PLAY at 7am tomorrow morning (please God, please). She brought out one of her Christmas Barbies and I shit you not in less than 24 hours, she has already dyed New Barbie's hair pink, glittered her forehead and painted makeup on and around her eyes. I haven't inspected the rest of her haul, but I suspect this particular New Barbie wasn't the only plastic princess in Cheeseball's makeover chair.

El niño hasn't glittered up any of his new stash, but he and I are both completely in love with a DS game he received. Scribblenauts is hands down one of the most creative games I've ever seen. The game presents you with little challenges ranging - so far - from getting your little Maxwell character up onto a ledge to collect his "starite" to protecting a picnic lunch from ants. At each challenge, you go to the notepad and write in a word, and that object then appears on your stage. You can use the object to solve your challenge and they have dillions of interactions programmed in! I love how it makes him think. On the aforementioned Get Up On A Ledge challenge, the obvious solution is ladder, right? I would write in ladder, it would appear and then I would climb up it onto the ledge. But, El niño wrote in kangaroo. Seriously. And it worked! Maxwell climbed up on the kangaroo and they hopped right up to stariteville. I LOVE that it rewards his imagination and creativity by allowing off the wall solutions.

I got some books that I will totally post about soon.

What is that? A warning? Ha ha, I guess it is. Consider yourselves warned.

Technorati tags: Christmas, Barbie, Scribblenauts

Sweet Sugar and Potatoes

Ok, I'm not going to lie. I make a killer sweet potato casserole. Among life's many talents, that has to rank somewhere between raising one eyebrow and picking things up with your toes - great for entertaining and a feat probably out of the reach of monkeys. Even with training. But, it's my big impressive talent. So, Internet, I share with you...

The original recipe.

Ingredients
8 cups sweet potato, cubed
1 cup white sugar
4 eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon salt
1 stick butter, softened
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup packed brown sugar
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
6 tablespoons butter, softened
1 cup chopped pecans

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Put sweet potatoes in a tiered steamer and steam over high heat until tender.

This is the secret trick that makes this SO delicious.  No wait, I'm lying.  The secret trick is A SHIT TON OF BUTTER AND SUGAR.  But, also the steaming.  Totally preserves the sweet potatoes' flavor.

When soft, toss in a bowl, add butter and mash. Mash well but leave it lumpy. Mix in the sugar, eggs, salt, milk and vanilla. (Eggs second to last, followed quickly with the milk so the hot!hot!hot! sweet potatoes don't cook your eggs.) Pour the mixture into a 9x13 inch baking dish.

In a smaller bowl, mix the sugar and flour. Cut in the butter until the mixture is coarse. (I start with a pastry cutter then say fuck it and use my hands.) Stir in the pecans.

Layer marshmellows over the sweet potatoes. Curse the ignorant louts who always request this. Sprinkle the pecan crust over this indecency.

Bake 30 minutes, or until the topping is all crispy and lightly brown.

A little tip from me to you: when you're measuring out your 8 freaking cups of cubed sweet potatoes (or anything else), aim the handle on your measuring cup like the hour hand of a clock to keep track of your count. Directly right for 3:00 when you're filling cup number 3, etc. Excellent for the mentally feeble.

Just make sure to place a paper towel under your cup so it doesn't spin around and make you lose track of your count so you have to empty your vessel out and count out the stupid cups again and then again and then maybe even one more time.

Internet, this is how good this shit is: this is the third time I've made it already this holiday season. And I haven't gotten to pick what I'm bringing to ANYTHING yet this year. Bring the sweet potatoes or stay home, Jen. Not that we don't love you. But, seriously. Don't show up without it. So, uh...my recommendation is to start making something that you will then forever be roped into making. I gives good advice.

Technorati tags: recipe, Christmas, cooking

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas and OMG THAT FREAKS ME OUT.

You guys, I'm entering Defcon Level HOLYSHITHOWDIDCHRISTMASSNEAKUPONMELIKETHAT!?!?. While trying not to freak out that the presents I ordered online didn't materialize instantly at my door, I'm soothing myself with the gauzy, feminine, vintage Christmas stylings of suzanneduda on flickr.

Source: suzanneduda, flickr.

So pretty! I want to invite myself in, snuggle up in grandma's quilt and sip a cup of tea.

Technorati tags: vintage, Christmas, flickr

One with the cups.

All I Want For Christmas Is My Own Wishlist G's

El nino wants a bb gun (beebee? BBee? TOY OF DOOM?) for Christmas and all I can think is YOU'LL SHOOT YOUR EYE OUT! And also, FRA-GEEEEE-LAY.

Cheeseball wants Barbie So In Style and Style Something Barbie and Style Barbie Style and every other combination of Barbies Whose Hair Is To Be Messed With. Which is cute, but then I find myself hunched over the bathtub trying to wash the OOH SPARKLY GLITTER PINK PASTE OOH out of the woolly matted hair of a giant Moxie Grrrrl head. Which is both uncomfortable AND creepy. And then it's all Cat in the Hat and oh boy! what's this in the tub? It's pink and it sparkles and Mom's gotta scrub!

But, whatever. It's Christmas, right? Stop being such a grinch, MOM. So I dutifully built their Amazon wishlists with them and sent them off to the G's. (Which is The Grandparents, not some generous cabal of gift-giving gangsters although that would certainly be more interesting. And now that I think about it, there really SHOULD be a gang of blinged-out, Santa pants lowriding, hard ass wish granters. Because what would make Christmas even more fun than thugs with hearts of gold?)

Where was I? Right, wishlists. So, two giant Amazon boxes have already shown up. (Thanks, Nana!) After I sent off the wishlists, I got an email from Nana asking why my wishlist always has 50+ items and the kids only have about 10 each. Well, that's because I've been building mine since before they were born and because their interests change and things come off and go on and also because NO ONE EVER BUYS ME ANYTHING OFF MINE because no one lufs me and also thanks for pointing that out. Way to call yourself out, NANA.

Technorati tags: Christmas, wishlist, kids

Ready For Their Closeup

We woke up to a beautiful, sunny day this morning after what seemed like decades of rain and clouds.  That might be a slight exaggeration.  It's possible it was only a few years.  I'd really hate to overstate the case.  Exaggeration really isn't my style. Maybe it was eight or ten months. 

In any event, we decided to hold our annual Christmas card photo shoot today.  Handy tip for free: when it's 50 degrees out, sitting on a bench right next to a lake may not be the best idea.  I'm really glad I grabbed the kids' hats and gloves!  I was thinking of them as props, but it turned out they may have saved the kids' lives.  (True story.)

For weeks I've been hunting for cute, plastic Christmas mugs for photo props. (Ha, now you're wondering if that's even true.  It really, truly is.)  When I spotted these little tumblers at Starbucks, I snapped them up with the quickness.  Even though they cost about $68 each.  (Possibly exaggerated.)





ADDED: Ha! I managed to grab the two pictures in which you can't see the cups at all!

She's (not) Crafty.

I love browsing the beautiful creations on Etsy - wishing I could buy most everything and wishing even harder I had half the talent and creativity of the broken hangnail on the pinkies of some of these sellers. Not that I think these ladies have broken hangnails, because that would be a weird thing to say. I'm sure they all have lovely nails on their crafty little hands.

More importantly, I'm going to stop talking and show you some pretty awesome things that are totally inspiring me. (Really it would take something more like a mack truck to inspire anything creative out the tips of my fingers. But, I likes to look.)

From cottonpurr.

Both from FaireHoure.

From pocketcarnival.

Just in time for Christmas, from PaperEclectiques.