everything i hoped for

posting from amsterdam!

hope everyone is enjoying the holidays as much as we are. we landed in brussels and spent a day barely leaving our hotel room as we tried to get our bodies to adjust to the freezing cold and snow!! sadly it's not even cold really, but sometime in the last 5 years since we moved west to california our blood became wuss blood and now we get cold at the slightest drop in temperatures. the snow is great though, it's been years since i've seen some and it's so pretty on the ground and in the trees. arrived in amsterdam yesterday and naturally are having a wonderful time. head to brugge, belgium for new year's eve and then home next tuesday. the main squares and streets in both cities so far are just as magical as i'd hoped! this area of europe really is perfect for feeling the winter holiday spirit! we've learned to tuck into a bar or cafe for a drink or hot chocolate every so often which is so lovely!

ok, must run.

surprise

I love good surprises!

magic

hot from the oven magic bars (can't wait for these to cool!)
ornaments for the kids next door
tree with so many presents

We're having a great holiday so far. Last-minute shopping yesterday and today with crowds that weren't unbearable so that was good. Fancy dinner tonight and a drive through the city looking for pretty lights. Later everyone opens a package at midnight of new pajamas. Tomorrow is presents and tasty food. And then an early morning flight on Monday for our vacation. Packing still needs to happen somewhere in there too! And I mailed off a special package that is late in sending but so filled with goodies I hope it makes up for it. I am guilty though of having two other packages sitting on my desk which won't be sent until January (one holiday one, and the other I'm embarrassed to admit - an August birthday present if you can believe it!). I am lucky to have so many understanding and patient friends I think.

Going to the birds

1. One of the felt bird ornaments I made last night. 2. All four felt birds I made, two have 'joy' on the back and two 'peace'. All have the same snowflake and wing design on the front. I made them because I needed a few cute ornaments to decorate gift packages with. 3. Awesome feathered bird ornament I bought with the hope of making similar ones which hasn't happened yet. Maybe next year.

Best wife award

This year I definitely get the award for best wife! Last week Greg told me about a baking contest they are having over at the World of Warcraft website. Normally if someone says 'World of Warcraft' or 'WoW' while in my presence I turn into a shewolf and have to be restrained from killing the person who dared uttered the cursed words, but since it's the season of giving and all that good stuff I thought I'd get into the holiday spirit and tell Greg I'd bake him some WoW cookies to enter in the stupid contest. I made two monster cookies, which Greg tells me are of a Kodo (the dinosaur looking thing) and a Tauren (the giants who ride around on Kodos). A bit of a larger photo here if you're into this sort of thing. So for a brief time yesterday afternoon when Greg and I were both having fun with these cookies I thought WoW might not destroy my marriage afterall, that it had even been the cause of a lovely experience with my husband, but no, as of 10pm last night we're back to the shewolf reaction.



Some more traditional holiday baking: Chocolate walnut fudge, peanut butter chocolate fudge, and the standard iced sugar cookies.

New friend

Work party last night was one of the best ever of the last 4 years, and the circus tonight was great. Take away the buckets of rain pouring down on San Francisco and all would be swell. Now if you please, here is my new best friend:





After my company holiday party Greg and I drove another couple home (not because they were drunk or anything) and they invited us inside for a few minutes, even though it was 1:30am and we'd all (except Greg naturally) been drinking since 7pm, to meet their parrot, Baby Bird. Yes, Baby Bird is her name. Baby Bird only likes women so I had the pleasure of holding her and even kissing her and having her groom my hair. She wanted nothing to do with Greg sadly, but I fell in love. She's the best, even though I was a little scared the whole time that she'd claw or bite my face.

And lastly, a parting shot of my awesome (straight, flat, swingy!) hair. This was me in our kitchen before we left for the night.

Merry christmas to me!

Flat hair for me! For the first time ever I went to a hair salon and had someone blow dry my hair all straight (well, mostly) and flat. It's awesome! I can't stop touching it (which is ruining it I know, but I have no self control) and am getting dizzy from moving my head around to feel my hair swing! I may replace my love of shopping with my love of having my hair straightened.

So the reason for the splurge is that tonight is my company's holiday party (read about last year's here here here here) and since I'm not comfortable with what I'm wearing (and we all know that icky feeling when you go out and aren't friends with your dress) so I thought I'd boost my mood with nice hair at least. The party is at Bacar this year, with delicious food and a (suppossedly) hot and sexy cuban band lined up to entertain us. Perfect for hair swinging!

Practice swing.



And then Saturday night I'm going to see San Francisco's Pickle Circus for the first time and I can't wait. I've heard it's amazing and quite a unique SF treat. I've been busy this year with holiday entertainment and haven't mentioned any of it here. I saw the Cirque du Soleil show in SF a few weeks ago which lived up to the best Cirque shows I've seen before. And I saw the Smuin ballet at Yerba Buena last weekend which was great; the most unique ballet performance I've ever seen, and one that is sure to be loved by those who think they would never enjoy traditional ballet. Next week we're all going to see the Count Basie Orchestra at the SF Symphony Hall. My mom is most excited for this one. And what else - oh, lots and lots of excellent SF food on the agenda too. I had a girl's champagne brunch last weekend at Foregin Cinema, dinners next week at Slanted Door in the Ferry Building and Absinthe in Hayes Valley, dined twice this week at the bar at Kuleto's after shopping in Union Square (three words: eggnog creme brulee!), and Christmas Eve dinner resevations at Michael Minna that I am so psyched for. It feels like I've had a different life this month, I normally never do this much or dine so nicely, but it's been so much fun, and a great way to mark the holidays having all these lovely evenings with friends and family.

Now it's just the last rush before Christmas and then the next day Greg and I are off to Belgium and Amsterdam! We've been so lucky this year.

(Don't worry, I promise crafty posts are coming in the next week before I fly away!)

Good red stuff

Made another Mollychicken-inspired hanging doll, using some of the tapestry samples I got from Hillary. And I tried shredding wrapping paper to make filling for some of the etched glass ornaments I've been making.

Gift bags

Decorating gift bags for a company holiday party where my mom works.

I stamped stars on the bags in gold and silver and added ribbon and tissue. She'll add candy and a gift card to each one.

Getting better

Thanks to your help! Now with some black eyes, and possibly contrasting stripes on the scarf (I love that idea) we should be out of the bloody rut.



You guys are great!

When good crafts go bad

So I thought I'd be all crafty and decorate the envelopes that came with my holiday cards (I did my usual annoyingly cute photo of one of the pets routine), and somewhere along the way things went really wrong.

I started with a simple snowman outline in blue. Looked ok, but way too plain. So then I thought I'd add a scarf or something, and since I had no scarf stamps or cookie cutters, I thought I'd be SUPER crafty and carve one from a potato. Can you feel the crafting going wrong at this point? It's pretty hard to carve a potato (or at least for me it was). So then without thinking I grabbed red paint to stamp the scarves (they are holiday cards after all), and it was only after the first handful that I looked at one and realized it looked like I'd created a bloody snowman to escort my cards to friends and family. Lovely. Bloody lovely!

So you tell me - do you see a bloody snowman or a cute snowman wearing a festive red scarf? (And don't feel bad, you won't hurt my feelings.)





Whatever your answer is, and do share it with me, you should know that it doesn't matter what it looks like because I sure as hell wasn't getting new envelopes. Bah humbug!

Friday Mix

This is the amazing package I received from Elizabeth in exchange for sending her some button covering supplies that she couldn't find in her area. I won majorly in this swap - everything in the package is SCRABBLE themed and if that doesn't make you want to cry with joy then you're crazy. Elizabeth this stuff is so great! The ornaments are so wonderful I can't even describe how happy they make me. Thank you so much.



Still working on my own glass ornaments for gifts. These I'm planning to fill with that fake plastic snowflake stuff.



More proof that great danes are SILLY!
The top is my Bella - I finally caught her sleeping on her back with her foot in her mouth! Remember I told you about this and have tried forever to get a photo? Well this one takes the cake because not only is she sleeping on her back with her foot in her mouth, but she's also laying right on a shoe! Another silly thing she does all the time. So I got it all on camera in one shot. The bottom is my friend Jen's handsome boy dane, Beau. She emailed me with this photo saying that he will stay like that for long periods at a time, enjoying the fire I guess! So now you're starting to understand how funny they are, and why Greg and I would want another one in the house to make us laugh.

Decking the halls

Little dose of felt

Things are already getting hectic around here and so last night after etching glass ornaments to give as gifts I decided I need a little dose of felt before I went to bed. I adapted Mollychicken's panda pattern to make this rabbit inspired by her adorable creations and also the kitty versions created by Bella Dia. I'm not sure why I added a big handle/loop but I like it. Softies with handles are kinda cool. Actually now that I think about it I bet the idea came because I've been making ornaments the past few days.




In other news, today Greg and I have to make a major decision and it's stressing me out. We're deciding whether or not to add a great dane boy puppy to our family and the idea is so exciting and scary at the same time I can barely stand it. The breeder that we got Bella from just had a litter and with Bella about to turn 4 it's the perfect timing since we've always wanted a boy and wanted to have them together for a while. But, puppies are so much work! It's a decision we've been discussing for years and more specifically with this litter for months, but we've reached no definite answer and today is the day we must let the breeder know. Every time I see one of the puppy photos or think of how cute Bella was as a wee one or imagine her having a friend at home it's an easy "yes", and I think we will decide in the end to bring the little guy home (he'd be ready to leave the nest at the end of January), but it's still overwhelming how different, and difficult in many ways, our life will be those first few months when we do. So, I'll keep you posted!

Making ornaments

I'm not really a fan of glass ball ornaments, but I wanted to try etching on them to see how it would look. So I etched "Merry" on both sides of this one, and then filled it with red feathers and added a red ribbon. Pretty cute, but I wish the cap was silver instead of gold.

New Ink

As I mentioned, Greg and I got some new work done while we were in Florida. One of Greg's closest friends of the past 10 years is an amazing artist who has his own tattoo shop in Tampa. He did my gorgeous (imo) back piece when Greg and I were there visiting 3 years ago for Thanksgiving, and this time did the work above. Just about everything on Greg (both arms, and both legs mostly) was done by him.

So mine is a red peony flower with a hummingbird and some clouds in the background. The plan is to cover my arm from this point up in the same style with the clouds continued throughout as the background filler. I haven't decided what type of creature will be the main design yet. Greg and I both love asian and especially japanese-style art and tattoo designs and that's pretty much all his friend will do now so it worked out well. The hummingbird is sort of a symbol for my grandmother and mom, all of the women in my family have a thing for hummingbirds. Greg's is a big blue crane with the moon and clouds above it and waves crashing below it, with a few cherry blossoms to match my back piece thrown in for good measure. He's planning to finish his arm and get some sort of japanese mask on the back of where the crane is. We couldn't be happier and naturally are beyond anxious to contiue the work on our arms.

A few more photos are on flickr.