Thank goodness it's a season and not a day...

I hope that all of you had a beautiful Christmas day full of love and time spent with those you love.

Mine was wonderful.

The last few days leading up to it...

not so much.

too much stress, even though I didn't want it that way, it seemed impossible to avoid.

all is not lost.

Christmas is not a day,

it is a season.

I will be spending the rest of my Christmas season reflecting on its meaning

and how my own life is a reflection of the love that has been given to me.

We have always celebrated "Little Christmas", the Epiphany, 

and so I will be celebrating Christmas

for 11 more days!

Lots of time for relaxing and taking it all in!

I hope that you all had a most blessed and joyful Christmas day and that the rest of the 

season brings more of the same!

fa la la,

Theresa xoxo

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keeping it simple...

keeping it simple this year.

My time for decorating has gotten away from me this year,

I had a busy time with my etsy shop (yay!)  and some of the other events around here and so I'm thinking that keeping it simple will keep the season in perspective for me.

In years past, I have pulled out tubs and tubs of ornaments and tried to recreate

the 'perfect' Christmas, only to feel deflated afterwards.

I have decided that for me the perfect Christmas is the one where I can 

look around the room and see the smiling faces that I love so much.

(that is truly enough ornamentation for me!) 

I love decorating this mantle most of all.

This urn of white branches has come in pretty handy...

It was used in the show that I did as an ornament display,

and then it became the Thanksgiving tree...

 I hung a piece of scrapbook paper cut in a scallop shape with

everyone's name on it and then left a bowl of more circles for 

us to write what we are thankful for.

I have enjoyed it so much that I decided to hang ornaments from it for Christmas!

My Advent candles from last year, the ex voto lockets that hang from them

are from none other than Rosemary from Ozma of Odds

they are truly a work of art and I have kept them out all year long.

I added some greens that my friend Julie and I scavenged from around town,

we had a fun time clipping greens from her friends house and from an abandoned building in town,

 and it is now a favorite Christmas memory...

thanks Julie!

I painted this angel for my mom many years ago and when she

passed away it came home with me.

I can't help but think of her, and when I look at this I relive the Christmas that I gave it to her.

my attempt at bringing a little JDA into the house...

This huge tree top was something that Julie and I brought home that day.

She knew of another friend that just trimmed the tree for their house and we picked up some

of the clippings... I have not seen their tree, but if this was a clipping it must be huge!

I dragged it to the truck and it was the first thing to get carried into the house!

I shopped the barn and put it inside an old galvanized cooler,

my family hasn't commented and that usually 

means that they think I have finally lost it, but I love it :)

I wish that I could tell you that these next pictures are from our excursion to get

our tree this week, but unfortunately it is unseasonably warm here in Michigan

and we have not had the snow that I look forward to for Christmas.

These are actually from last year,

we missed the horses and the snowfall, but we did manage to get a really

pretty tree and I finally got it in the house and put the lights on it last night.

Today will include getting some ornaments on the tree,

although Hannah says that she is good with just the lights!

I do love those old fashioned C7 bulbs...

sooooo pretty :)

and last but not least...

we were able to visit Santa this week too!

whew!

These people are so sweet and have this little shed

turned Christmas wonderland set up in their yard for the local kids to visit with Santa!

(not sure what the caterpillar has to do with Christmas and you know that I soooo

wanted to do a little restyling in the shed, but as for Mr. and Mrs. Claus...

they are perfect!

Danielle brought John home from the airport last night...

I had all 5 kids sleeping under my roof  and it would have been just perfect if Duane would have been

home but he had to go out of town on business.

I felt terrible for him, I know his heart was here with us.

He will be home tonight, not sure that I will be able to keep the 4:00am

bedtime that I did last night, but the conversation was worth every minute of lost sleep!

I hope all is well with you and yours, and that you are

enjoying every minute of this precious season upon us!

I hope to be back one more time before Christmas!

fa la la,

Theresa xoxo

linking up to:

White Wednesday

Primp Your Stuff Wednesday

Transformation Thursday

What's it Wednesday

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one ornament at a time...

todays mantra...

I seriously need to get more decorating done around here!

It has been so crazy that although I do have a little more finished than

putting an ornament on Louise here, it's not much, and certainly not photo worthy.

Plus, I absolutely couldn't take a wide shot,

cuz then you would SEE the crazy that is happening in my house!!!

(and in my head)

I just had to stop by and say hello,

I've been missing all of you and our little chats!

fa la la,

Theresa xoxo

linking to

White Wednesday

around the house...

we say this.

and seeing that everything becomes a competition,

even telling one another how much we love each other,

you must win the competition with

I love you most.

This was a special order for the shop

I loved making it and added the design to the rest of the "keeping Christmas simple" heart ornies.

I couldn't believe I didn't think of it first...

anyway I'm so glad that one of my shops visitors did!

*********

The last couple of weeks have been frustrating to say the least.

Danielle's car broke down and so I lent her my truck to go to work.

(she works 2 hours from her house-I work 5 min. from mine)

We got her car running over the weekend

(or so we thought)

Today I make plans to go see my dad, and am so looking forward to a long overdue visit,

go to get into her car and now there is something dragging from underneath it.

ugh.

really?

really?

so you know what this means, besides not being able to see my dad and miss out on a fun outing with him?

yep, I haven't done any shopping either, except for the things that I have gotten online, 

mostly from etsy I might add!

Looking on the bright side, 

(cuz that's what I do)

good thing we kept her car here for a trial ride to make sure that it was going to run for her,

or else she would have been stranded with no way to get to work!

(and she leaves in the wee hours of the morning)

things work out for the best.

for some of us anyway.

fa la la ing 

my way through this.

fa la la,

Theresa xoxo

take good care of this moment...

Lynn over at Blue Skies is having a wonderful new linky party.

The kind that makes you reflect

on a moment in your day.

I just loved this idea, the thought of keeping a moment

in a safe place, taking good care of it.

My moment happened as I was making the advent calendar with Hannah and Max.

The Christmas Carols were playing and we each had our assigned job.

As we were finishing the calendar, I stopped to look at each of them, all caught up

in the task at hand, and thanked God again for allowing me to be their mom.

I am blessed.

my family knows that they hold the key to my heart.

It is strange some days, having only the two of them home now.

If I could, I would go back in time and relive the moments

with all 5 kids home and make sure that I was taking good care of each

and every second that we were all together.

Good or bad, each moment that we have had has given us a bond

of love that I hold dear.

Sometimes as Hannah, Max and I do a project together,

I have flashbacks of doing projects with Danielle, John and Cam.

Hannah and Max weren't old enough to make cookies with us then,

or create a new Christmas ornament, so this is their time.

The circle of life so to speak... my life anyway!

Soon we will all be together for Christmas,

and we can wear our paper party hats and celebrate

our family and all that it means to us.

O.k.... truth be told getting everyone to agree to wear a paper party hat

will not happen, so I will just imagine them wearing them.

Kinda like imagining the audience in their underwear as you give a speech!

I hope you will go and visit Lynn and read her last few posts about

taking good care of this moment.

They are so inspirational.

Thanks Lynn for the party and the reminder to stop and take it all in!

just  click on the button to take you to the party!

fa la la,

Theresa xoxo

\

our new advent calendar...

one of Max's favorites

Hannah's favorites... the H for Hein (or Hannah) and the ballerina

I love the red shoe... thank you Barbie!

and of course baby Jesus... a favorite of all of ours.

My inspiration came from the Junk Drawer Advent Calendar over at 

One Lucky Day

the first time I saw the one that they made, I just knew that one day I would make one.

Well, that day was actually a few days 

and I didn't even make mine as detailed as theirs is!

I stamped the small tags with a script stamp in red and then stamped

the days onto them, and then I scrounged through all of my doodads to 

find the treasures for the tags.

I tried to make sure that there was a good mixture and that they would 

mean something to all of us.

I wanted our calendar to have pockets of some sort so that I could put treats in them for the kids.

(they would not have been so eager to help me assemble it today if there wasn't going to be treats involved!)

I folded an envelope in half and then I sewed a square of burlap onto the front.

Then I glued the tags on top of the burlap and the twine into the inside corner.

A friend of mine gave me the idea to string the tags onto a large frame,

and when I told Hannah the idea, she thought the chalkboard could be the huge frame.

So we stapled the twine to the sides and tied the tags to it.

We had an assembly line going as I glued, Max sorted and handed me the pockets and tags,

and Hannah cut string and tied them up.

family project for a sick day for the kids.

Hopefully they are good to go to school tomorrow!

We had our first snowfall last night, we only got 2" or so but the

communities around us got hit pretty hard with about 10"!

We were one of the only cities in the area to have school today.

excuse the screen but this is the view from my kitchen window,

I haven't put up curtains in a while and this is why...

it gives me the opportunity to keep an eye on Max when he is back there playing with his buddies!

fa la la...

Theresa xoxo

linking up to:

White Wednesday

Primp Your Stuff Wednesday

Transformation Thursday

Vintage Inspiration Friday

What's it Wednesday

etsy love...

'dear Santa' by theoldwhitehouse

I may need to make myself a bigger stocking!

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Treasury tool by Red Row Studio.

I

I promise...

I've been mostly good!

see you later so I can share some new Christmas goodies with you!

love,

Theresa xoxo

blog love weekend sale

FA LA LA

from me to you!!!

I have taken the pushing and shoving of the weekend out of the equation for you...

Stop by 

The Old White House

this weekend for these and more Christmas treasures

for you and those special people on your list!

and because you are the special people on MY list

use the coupon code

bloglove

for an additional 5% from the already 20%

I am offering for my

Black Friday-Cyber Sale Etsy Weekend!

( these are the items that I will be listing today 

so be sure to hop on over throughout the weekend to see them as soon as they appear)

Thank you for your friendship and blog love!

love,

Theresa xoxo