I love snowy mornings. The view from my front window feels unspoiled, quiet and calm. Have a great day!

My friend Amy Hamberlin has just launched her first fabric line–it’s so, so pretty! Go see her for a chance to win this stack of Marabella.

Yikes! Where is January going? Mine has been spent largely on family (yay!) and on a monumental work project (double yay!).

In the meantime, a couple of my posts were featured on Tip Junkie over the last few days, so “Hi” to anyone jumping over from there, so glad to have you!

Gotta get back to that project, I hope to have it wrapped up in the next week or so. Ta-ta for now!

Somehow, Christmas sneaks up on me every year. I have these visions in my head of perfect evenings snuggled around the fire with my family, doing sweet little yuletide activities…but reality is a lot more frenzied than the peaceful scenes of my imagination. There are gifts to gather, wrap, deliver, programs and parties to attend, work, church, bills to pay, dinner to make, dishes to do, music lessons and practice, homework, house entropy to stay ahead of…augh! Still, I love this holiday season, and have been making efforts to slide some meaningful traditions into the craziness of it all.

It may sound funny, but I’ve struggled with Advent activities in the past. I tried paper rings one year…and lost count somewhere in there (did I mention the days are busy?). The cute little cut-and-pasted Santa, where you glue one cotton ball to his beard each day: too much for me, I mean really– I’m expected to hunt down a cotton ball and glue every night?! Our fabulous Kindergarten teachers send the kids home with a Hershey Kiss version, but there are two problems with this: 1-not enough for every kid in the house! and 2-all chocolate is consumed within 30 minutes of arriving home–it’s an unspoken rule around here. I found a really fun advent idea I wanted to do with my cubby cabinet (it just happens to possess 24 compartments and would be awesome!), but that would require me to find, decorate, and fill 24 containers with some sort of advent treat or activity (in advance!). Maybe next year.

That said, the kids like to have some perspective on how far away the big day is, and I wanted to incorporate more Christmas Spirit into our routine, so I printed up a simple December calendar to keep in the basket of Christmas books parked under our tree and assigned a day to each child. As we gather for our nightly reading and family prayer at bedtime, the designated person chooses which Christmas book we’ll read. So far, it’s gone off without a hitch. If we have a late/busy night and miss our routine, we just read two stories the next evening. I love it!

How do you fit your holiday traditions into the whirlwind that is December?

Couldn’t resist snapping a shot of this pile of ruffles today…shh! Can’t say more!

Every holiday season for as long as I can remember, our community comes together to present a “Christmas Tree Fantasy” to benefit local charities, and I was honored to be invited to decorate a table for their first-ever Christmas Tea this year. Let me be clear here…we’re not too fancy about table settings at my house, and after several years of presence in my home, my ‘good’ dishes haven’t seen a lot of use. (I think I’m going to be changing that, though…why not enjoy them now?) Even so, we’ve managed to misplace a few pieces of flatware and nick a plate or two, and I had only eight settings to begin with. So a fancy eight-place-setting table was a bit of a challenge to conjure. The solution? Vintage, layered, and mismatched of course! Here’s how it turned out:

A candle centerpiece featured spunky vintage pixies (inspired by Wendy’s)…I love these old-fashioned-girls more every time I see them:

Mismatched dishes, glassware and flatware:

And for the favors, I attempted a new skill–soldered glass pendants…these were tricky, but a lot of fun to make!

The ‘Tea’ itself was charming–it was fun to sit down and enjoy all the prettiness in the room. Definitely worth hitting next year!

Upward and onward,
Audrey

I don’t even know where to start, I think I might have fallen off the face of the earth…does anyone else ever feel like a hamster on a wheel? So yeah, lots going on, not much to show for it just now, but hopefully next week I can get my mo-jo moving again. In the meantime, here’s a sneak of a project I’m currently frantically pulling together, as my deadline is looming!

I hope everyone had a beautiful, relaxing, grateful day of Thanksgiving. I know I did.

Back to the grindstone,
Audrey

This darling niece of mine is growing WAAAY too fast! Isn’t she gorgeous?

I get to make an exciting announcement today: my fabulous sister Kayla is now working with Paisley Studios here in Blackfoot. It’s an adorable boutique photography studio with tons of charm and a lot of great talent. To celebrate, they are having an open house this Saturday, the 14th from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The photographers will be there along with several local crafty vendors (there will be an apron or two…hint, hint), and they’ve got a bunch of tickets to the sold-out “New Moon” premiere to give away. So stop by and say ‘Hi’, we’d love to see you!

Of course, we got her dress here. I tried talking her into a Mom-made dress, and she vehemently declined. She’s loved this one since she laid eyes on it…