Goodbye 2015

Its that time of year again, when Christmas is over and has been put away and we start looking forward to the New Year.

Its bittersweet to say goodbye to this year, its been a big year. Vince and I got married back in March, after 2 degrees and 6 years I finally graduated in May, and we found out we were expecting Isaac.

Along the way we also had to buy a new car and redo most of the house (every room had something done to it!) Thankfully our desire to get out of debt, Dave Ramsey style, made the car buying a bit easier; and my desire to get out of clutter made the house projects easier.

I look at 2016 and think about all the changes about to take place and I am excited and overwhelmed all at once.

I sit here and think “in no time at all there will be another little person added to our family.” Then I cycle through joy, panic, and calm. God is entrusting us with this little one, which makes me stressed and frantic, but He is entrusting us, which calms me because He seems to think we can handle it.

Along with welcoming Isaac, we have other big hopes and plans for this year but we are just waiting for God to direct us along the path He made for us.

I have started setting little goals for 2016, but I can’t wait to see how the year unfolds for us.

Happy New Year!!!

My New Obsession

If you haven’t heard of MightyNest.com you should check it out, it’s a great site. They also have a thing called MightyFix, which is s $10 monthly subscription. Each month they send you a product (of at least $10+ value) that will help you achieve a greener home.

I had been thinking about trying MightyFix, but never got around to it. Then back in October, I saw on another blog that I could get my first month free, and that the item that month was Bee’s Wrap (one large and one small). Since I had wanted to try the Bee’s Wrap, I signed up for MightyFix and “patiently” waited.

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My Bees Wrap arrived and I was excited to open it. I must admit I was a bit disappointed, the problem is the wrap has a smell and I seem to be one of those women who is sensitive to smells the WHOLE pregnancy. Hopefully I will be able to use it after the baby is born. 

Well I kinda intended to cancel the subscription, but of course I forgot. I am so glad I did!

The next Mighty fix was two packs of Tidy DishCloths. I threw out my old stained cloths and started using these. They are the best dishcloths I have ever used!

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After that I decided to keep the MightyFix.

This month I got ReusableProduce Bags by Flip &Tumble.

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It is a little sad how excited this subscription makes me. I eagerly wait for the mailman and then rush out to get the package… I tell myself that at least I am helping the environment, it makes it a little less weird.

Last Minute Gifts

Despite starting to plan and make Christmas gifts back in September, I am still sitting here waiting for a few to arrive and waiting for a certain someone to decide what to get his certain family members… basically if they don’t get gifts this Christmas they can blame him because I tried.

If you are still looking for last minute gifts here are two that I highly recommend. They take only a couple minutes to make and since they use the same ingredients it makes them so much easier to make.

The first is HomemadeChapstick  from The Elliott Homestead. These where a huge hit last year and are now my favorite chapstick.

Image from The Elliott Homestead

The second is SuperEasy Hard Lotion Bars from Laurie Neverman. They are the most amazing things! I have super dry hands that crack in the winter and no store bought lotion has ever been able to heal them, these lotion bars did!!

Image from Common Sense Homesteading 

If you are a super fast knitter you could also knit up some washcloths and throw in a nice bar of soap (its way too late to make your own) and you have a spa basket. I did that last year for some of my friends and they really seemed to enjoy it.

Or you could settle and write a sweet card and tell the person what they mean to you and say you are moving away from materialistic things… they don’t have to know you ran out of time, and it the note is sweet enough they shouldn’t care.

Good luck, God Bless and a very Merry Christmas!

Tis the Season...

Sometimes I take joy in things I really shouldn’t.

Like today…

I ran to Walgreens to pick up a few things, as I was checking out, I was listening to the checkout lady get attacked by a person on the phone complaining about their photo order. I understand the person’s frustration, I'm still waiting on a photo order, but it isn’t the checkout lady’s fault. But what gave me joy was the checkout lady finally says, in a very kind tone, “I don’t know if they are ready, you said they were. If you want to see if they are ready, you will have to take your chances and come up here and see. Good day.” She then hung up and rang up my purchase.

It made me happy to see her remain “nice” but stand up for herself and go about helping other customers (we were all a bit shocked by the phone person).

But since this wasn’t enough Holiday cheer, when I walked out to my car the person parked next to me had put their cart between their car and my driver side. I'm not going to lie; my first thought was not a nice one. The person was still in the car, and the way it was positioned I had to move it to get into my car, so I decided to return the cart.

I returned the cart for two reasons: one, I thought it was the elderly lady and its cold; two because I was left with no choice but to return it. I could go on a very long rant about all the other places the cart could have been left, all of which meant I could have gotten into my car, but no one cares to read that.

So I waddle the cart back into Walgreens and as I come out I see the person finally leaving, so they weren’t in a huge rush. We met eyes and I saw that it was not the elderly lady; it was a young fit woman. I would have thought another nasty thought, but the look on her face was enough. She realized that by leaving the cart there she made a fat, pregnant lady waddle the cart back while she sat in her car on the phone.

Like I said I take joy in things I shouldn’t. It is wrong of me to judge and I should have just happily returned the cart and thought the best about the person who left it.

But I think the reason it got to me like it did, was its Christmas. It’s the one time of year where people are generally nicer than the rest of the year. But we are so caught up in material things and ourselves that we don’t think about others. So now I am reflecting on the joy these events brought me and how I am just as bad, if not worse, than the two people I thought were “bad” people.  

For the Love of Embroidery

Recently I had an idea for a Christmas gift, which involved me hand embroidering “something” (I found something better and now it will be that person’s birthday present). This reminded me of my love of embroidery.

Before I could knit, I taught myself to embroider and I’d spend hours happily decorating things. Once I learned to knit, I stopped. I think I stopped because embroidery was just decorative, while knitting was more practical. I kept all my embroidery floss and hoops, even through my countless purges of craft stuff… clearly I knew I would want it.

I made a few Christmas gifts that involve some embroidery and a cute onsie for Isaac… then I finished all my Christmas gifts and ran out of projects…

So I started a quilt for Isaac… that also will have embroidery on it.

I can’t wait to finish it and see how it turns out because it does not look like how I envisioned it.

I envisioned a simple quilt with cute animals embroidered on it. The fabric ended up making it a bit to ornate for cute childish animals, so along with his name I am embroidering his initials in Celtic Knotwork Monograms and historic looking crosses.

It was pretty hard to get photos with my phone, but you get the idea.

I have to say so far I like it much better than the version I started out to make.