This Christmas

Mend a quarrel.

Seek out a forgotten friend.

Dismiss suspicion, and replace it with trust.

Write a love letter. Share some treasure. Give a soft answer.

Encourage youth. Manifest your loyalty in word and deed.

Keep a promise. Find the time. Forgo a grudge. Forgive an enemy. Listen.

Apologize if you were wrong. Try to understand. Flout envy. Examine your demands

on others. Think first of someone else. Appreciate. Be kind; be gentle. Laugh a little.

Laugh a little more. Deserve confidence. Take up arms against malice. Decry complacency.

Express your gratitude. Go to church. Welcome a stranger. Gladden the heart of a child.

Take pleasure in the beauty and wonder of the earth. Speak your love. Speak it again.

Speak it still once again.

A friend sent this to me in their Christmas card. I think it's a good reminder of what our Savior taught and what Christmas should be about.

Bells

My grandma sent us this book entitled "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day", it's new out this year. I imagine you can find it at Deseret Book if you have one nearby. I liked this book.

It tells the back story of how the song came to be. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was a famous poet in the mid 1800's. He had five children with his beloved wife Fanny. Sadly, one day she was injured severely in a kitchen fire, and died the next day. Henry was so badly injured from trying to save her that he was unable to attend her funeral. This loss was devastating to the family. Not long after, his son joined the Union army and was badly injured while fighting in the Civil War. These events inspired the poem (published in 1866) that was later put to music (by someone else) around 1871. There are two verses of the poem omitted from the song, they directly mention the Civil War.

Included with the book is a dvd with an excerpt from a performance by the Tabernacle choir, it features actor Edward K. Herrmann doing a telling of this story with the choir singing the song. It's absolutely beautiful. I had a hard time not crying while watching it, it was very touching. Longfellow believed in the Savior and his Atonement.

The little white church in Sparty rings it's bells on the hour, they chime Christmas music. In honor of this carol and story, I want to drive down to Sparty (5 min from our house) and hear the bells on Christmas day.

Very Merry

So as of today I'm all done with the semester! I'm very excited to start break and have some breathing time to enjoy Christmas time. It's been a good semester, but there's always some crazy business going on.

So after teaching an RS lesson about being prepared and recently teaching a YW lesson about time management, you'd think I'd be all set, right? {snort}

I got a late start on this final painting- my teacher explained the project options to us and then only gave us basically a day to come up with a fab idea and gather all your materials. That's a tall order when you want to do something good, not cliche. It took awhile to gather everything and glue the still life together. So I found myself finishing my painting at 2 am this morning. Other painting students stayed even later!

And even though yesterday started off with no snow, by the time I left school there was three to four inches on the ground. I didn't have boots or a heavy coat with me because it'd been so nice out earlier when I'd left for the day.

Oh, and I had to be at school at 8 am this morning for my other final. And and keep in mind I live nearly an hour away from school.

The best solution was to get a hotel room in Edinboro, by the time I got McD's and got checked in it was 2:40 am. So there I was- no pj's, no toothbrush, no change of clothes, no makeup or hairbrush. I'd taken my other clothes out that had been in the car. I made do, got up at 6ish, showered and picked up a couple things (like a toothbrush) at Wal-Mart. There are few things grosser than having to put back on socks that you've already worn!

And I'm having to walk around campus in my tennies when I should have had boots. Blech.

So that's a lesson to me to 1) manage my time better so I don't have to do projects at 2 am and 2) to be more prepared in all this snow.


Anyhow, on to my painting. It took a long time to do because I wanted it to be good. Things went well in critique today and I got an A! I was also asked to bring it back for display at school next semester.

Am I painting bubbles? Nope, Christmas ornaments!

Normally you would work your entire painting from general to specific, but since I had so many colors and a large canvas (18x24) that was pretty impossible. It became kinda like paint by numbers! You had to look at each ball and separate the reflections into shapes.

A good start:

A little more progress...

and then it was done! It's even more colorful in real life. My teacher liked how they gleamed like vintage ornaments, that was the look I was going for. I really like how the colors popped against the dark. The trick in painting is not to use black but a very very dark color, like blue. If you use a true black then it becomes rather dead looking.

So act surprised....this will likely be used for next year's Christmas cards!

Season's Greetings

I wanted to share my holiday greetings with everyone, Merry Christmas!

I decided to go a different route this year with my card- normally I like to handstamp and create my own cards but there was no time for that this year, what with school and all the party planning and stuff. So I designed my own postcard using the freebies that come with Photoshop Elements (you can re-color them to your liking). I found a place online that prints postcards for fairly cheap (I probably spent less than I would have if I had crafted cards) and voila! Instant Christmas card.

So I still did a crafted card this year, it was just digital instead of analog, that's all. The postcard also served another purpose- I've had a good year and done and grown a lot (and I'm pretty happy) but on paper I don't seem all that different from last year. Still a bum college student, still in PA, still in YW, still no man nor kids, etc. Writing a short greeting on the back of a postcard was much better. And postcard postage is much cheaper! Not to mention I'm starting to have an aversion to sending out a mass mailing of little white envelopes to people...too wedding-y.

Anyhow, I'm in a merry mood, it's a wonderful season. I'm so thankful for everyone in my life. I wish the best to you and yours this season, and hope you all have a wonderful new year! Here's to a wonderful 2010 for us all.

Nativity

On the first Sunday of December, our little Corry branch had our own Nativity open house for two hours before the broadcast. Our stake back home did this on a large level, and it was something that I'd enjoyed going to the last few years before we moved. So we took this idea to our leaders and did it on a smaller scale in our little building. The Corry branch had never done this before and everyone was excited. Mom put an ad in the local paper- it was open to the public. We put a sign out front of our building too. It was a lot of work to find all our sets and to set up/take down the event, but people from the branch really enjoyed themselves and we even got a visitor from the community. Our visitor turned out to be friends with one of our members, that was nice.

In all we had 55 Nativity sets from the members of our branch, including all the little ones. It was fun to see all the ones that everyone owned. It was also fun to dig out all of ours, we don't always have room to display them all in our home at Christmas.

My porcelain one I brought home from Utah (one of my faves):

Thought this simple little wooden one was cute:

This set is from Africa and it's owner didn't know why Mary was larger and not to scale. I was all "I know! I know!" because I learned in art history that often size denotes importance in African art and that is why Mary is larger. This set is carved from soapstone and I really liked its style.

This set was pretty, too:

It was a challenge to find this one of mine, but a lot of people liked it:

We had the nearest missionaries come as well (Corry has not had its own missionaries for a year now, please appreciate yours if you have them!) and one even played the violin for us, it was beautiful. Mom was pretty much in charge of this event and relied on me to help her (while I was helping with the two other parties!) so I was busy. People really liked it and I wouldn't be surprised if we did this again in the future.

One of our members works at the local paper, he is having a story and photos about it printed in the community page of the local paper. An event like this is a great way to try to involve the community.

We watched the broadcast from Salt Lake that evening too, it was so nice to hear the speakers and the choir. Last year church was canceled on that day due to snow so we missed the broadcast too. I've come to really enjoy the broadcast in recent years.

I feel very merry this season, I love it. I love singing Christmas carols. The other day I was in Sparty and the little white church's bells were ringing Christmas carols on the hour. It was so beautiful that I just wanted to cry. I feel so blessed.

Ame's Shower

I've been doing a ton of party/event planning lately, as you can see- last Saturday I threw a bridal shower for my friend Ame (pronounced Ah-May, there should be an accent over the E). You may remember her from the Preception party. Anyhow, she is staying around longer than the others did so I had the opportunity to throw her a shower. I've been to many but never thrown one before, so it was something new. I have fun doing things like this, and Ame made it easy- she loves butterflies as much as I do so I used stamps and punches that I already had. I have fun being crafty, and it's always fun to make things with someone that you enjoy in mind.

Ame has been a good friend to me since I moved here; she was one of the first YSA that I met out here and we had an instant bond since she is from the Bay area like my parents. We've had some fun adventures since, so it was a pleasure to do something for her.

I was responsible for invites and decor, Ame's mom did the food and helped out with the games. I used my little vintage bride doll on the top of a cupcake tower, each cupcake had flower and butterfly paper punches for decoration. Mom and I collect pretties like cake plates. I was pleased with how things looked and how the day went. Everything was lavender and yellow which are Ame's wedding colors when she marries in California in January.

Cupcake tower:

I hemmed a long strip of lavender fabric for a table runner and I made a paper punch garland for the food table, all you have to do is string random punched paper onto a long length of crochet thread. I knotted the thread about every six inches so that the punches didn't clog up in one spot.

The tables had paper punches too, and everyone got a little candle. I stamped the yellow cards for people to write advice/wishes for Ame, those will go into a book when I have some time.

We had the shower in the overflow room in the Meadville building because my home was too small and far away and we didn't really know where to have it. I wish the curtain looked better, but the room was fine. Here's the room:

After munching and mingling, we got started playing games. For the first game, I had Ame's mom enlarge a bunch of photos of Ame at various ages. People had to guess how old Ame was in each photo. Since she's only 21, it's hard to tell how old she is since she looks about the same after age 15! It was cute to see the photos of Ame, and the person who got the most right won a prize.

After that game, yup, we did the toilet paper bride thing. You have to, it's the law. We had 4 teams of three and Ame would choose the winner (despite being wrapped up herself). It was hysterical, easpecially watching a team of three elderly ladies! They actually had the best craftmanship. Everyone was a good sport. Ame's mom Shirley and I wrapped up Ame, that was funny.

Ame had an 80's/Pocahontas vibe going on:

What good sports: Ame's Mom-in-law, My sis Laura, a friend, and Ame:

Then it was time for presents! I didn't want to do too many games because I have been at showers that took forever. It's no fun when people have to leave before they get to see their gift being open.

My mom and I like to be a little creative when it comes to shower gifts. One thing we've done in the past is to divide the gift into four: Something Old, New, Borrowed, Blue. I decided to do that for Ame. Each gift was in a white box with lavender ribbon, lableled on a white butterfly punch. Something old was a vintage tea towel in her wedding colors along with a butterfly plate that is the same discontinued pattern that I collect.

Something New was personalized kitchen goodies.I made a hotpad and embellished towels and an apron for Ame. I've never done a hotpad before, it was a bit wonky but not bad for the first try. I tihnk I'll use a different binding technique next time- the bias tape i bought was so stiff and hard to work with. I'd never used Insul-Brite (a batting made for things like hot pads) before. Embellishing kitchen towels with a strip of fabric is super fast and easy, I imagine I'll do some more. It's fun to create a personalized gift by matching the fabric design to the person.

Made a ruffle and used binding tape to embellish a pre-made apron:

Something Borrowed was a butterfly pin from my collection that I knew Ame would like but that I wouldn't mind if it flew away. When it came to Something Blue, I just had to embarrass Ame- she gets mortified easily. I decided to fake her out by making her open a Victoria's Secret bag (what were people thinking of me when I was walking around with it at the mall? haha) that contained.........Victoria's Secret brand lotion.

But then I got her with the box that the bag was attatched to, muh ha ha ha ha!

Not bad for $3 at Marshalls, eh?

Ame got a lot of other sweet gifts from the other ladies and her mom. Laura helped out as the gift scribe and I had her put the gift ribbons on a plate as a "bouquet". Found the cheesy butterfly tiara at Wal-mart for a BUCK...and it lights up too!

It was a little nervewracking because I was not totally in control of everything- I never had the opportunity to see the room before we set up, etc. But I think it went well- people seemed to be having a good time. Most important, Ame had a good time cause I got lots of thank you hugs.

Several have commented that I should do weddings- and yes I've thought about that. Doing stuff like this is fun for me- it's a good mix of my planning/crafty skills and I have fun being creative. Not to mention, it runs in the family-my grandmother used to do weddings. Maybe one day I will. I think part of me might feel too J-Lo in The Wedding Planner....always the wedding planner, never the bride. School, YSA and YW also keep me quite busy now, though. For now I am content to do things like this, though I would like to sell my wedding wares, etc on Etsy. I have cake toppers floating around in my head (instead of sugarplums).

And no, that's not the last of the event planning that I've been doing lately....stay tuned!

Big Kid

Did you have these blocks at school when you were a kid? I loved playing with these geometric blocks when I was in kindergarten, it was so fun to make patterns and designs. I always was fascinated with how all those shapes fit together and all the things you could do with them. These days we've been using them in math class while doing stuff with fractions and while my teacher blah blah blahs, I like to horse around at my table and make patterns. And since I have a camera on my person 95% of the time, I can share these patterns with you.

With and without the orange blocks:

I liked this "flower":

Funky:

I liked the "wheat" coming off the corners:

Some of these would make interesting quilt patterns (especially the "wheat" one), though they'd be impossible to sew! Nowadays these blocks are made out of plastic instead of wood like the ones I had in kindergarten. One of these days I'll totally get a set for myself, just gotta find an educational catalog for kids. It's fun to play around and see what you can make- totally a creativity booster!

I'm totally a big kid, playing with blocks...