Happy New Gift

And now I bring you a photo from the signs we saw from our trip last month posted all over the Cancun Airport  - 

in Spanish it was "Happy New Year" but in English this is what it said: 

Hope you have a Happy New Gift as well!

Christmas and Craft Updates

I just have to show you two very special Christmas ornaments we received this year from my brother and SIL - and both were actually for our dog, Eco. The first one, a chocolate lab:

The second one, a squirrel! Isn't it adorable? I love his big bushy tail. What a unique ornament.

We have Eco so trained to the word squirrel that if we don't want her running outside and barking (crashing into a door if I don't open it fast enough), we just say the word "squee".

And here are two things that I made.

These litte chocolate ornaments are from a kit - I can't locate the card that came with it at the moment , but these ornaments look NOTHING like the photo. I don't think they look very good at all, and I don't necessarily think it was my craft skills to blame (not entirely anyway). Wait until I show you what they are supposed to look like!

And this little knitted bird called a "Chubby Chirp" - the pattern is from Danger Crafts  a very talented knitting designer, although I have to admit that I had troubles with the wings which start out with 8 stitches on double pointed needles, to be knit in the round. After about 8 failed attempts (including trying to do it with a crochet hook) I decided to do the first three rows as an i-cord instead of knitting in the round. It seems to have turned out about the same. I have never had a problem with knitting in the round on dpns before, but I've never tried with so few stitches. It just didn't look neat and I wasn't sure that I had not twisted it, which is glad I found advice from the book Teeny-Tiny Mochimochi* on how to start knitting in the round with only a couple of stitches.

I know the birdie appears crooked in this photo, but honestly, it's because he tilted just as I took the picture and I'm too lazy to set up my lightbox again to retake the photo.

And that's it for now. More tomorrow.

* I plan to knit  several items from this book soon, don't forget to return to see what I make!  

How to Make Everything Ok

If you're more frazzled now than before the holidays, I suggest you try this magic button. I'm sure it will help - a lot.

Things I Made for Christmas

Well I was going to post a picture of all the things I made for Christmas presents, but when I went to link them to this post I couldn't find them! I guess somehow I deleted them.

There was a reverse painted cake plate for my brother

There was a set of 4 hand embroidered napkins that match my mom's china pattern

And then there was this doggie balaclava for my brother's dog Tonks,  who lives in a very cold climate and my brother was concerned about her thin little ears freezing. I'm not sure if his dog will keep it on, as you can see by Eco's face, she was a very unhappy model and restrained herself from pulling it off long enough for me to take a photo.

This is the only photo I have because I had posted in on Ravelry and I had a copy in flickr. Dang it!

***

I hope you had a lovely Christmas and received all the presents you wanted. I look forward to cruising around Blogland to see what everyone made and received.

Things are quiet at our house today, as the kid has strep throat and a fever and so we had to cancel dinner with the family. I still cooked the things we said we'd bring and Jp drove them out for his family to enjoy. Remember when I posted about being sick at Christmas? It wasn't me who was sick, but still someone in our house - sheesh - do you think I jinxed it?

Merry Christmas

Well it's finally here. Christmas Weekend. If we aren't ready, if we didn't get anything done - too bad, it's showtime my friends! I was going to write all the things I was grateful for, but then I felt weird posting them so perhaps it's better I keep my list to myself. But I do want to say "thank you" to all the people who have to work and miss time with their families - all the police officers, firemen, nurses, doctors, pilots, all the "essential services" and of course those who look after the homeless people and the homeless animals. Thank you to everyone who works hard to help everyday of the year, but most especially on this holiday weekend.

Years ago in my twenties, I had a corner office on the 13th floor of a downtown Vancouver high-rise. The company I worked for paid most people quite well, and usually besides having a very nice Christmas Gala at a very nice hotel, we were given a Christmas bonus anywhere between $300 and $500. One year there was talk that we might not get our cash bonus and they may be giving us a Christmas turkey instead. One woman  I worked with was so furious she threatened that if she received a Christmas turkey instead of a cash bonus "she'd drop kick the damn turkey across the office". At the time as was surprised at her ungratefulness and being young, I was happy with any bonus (heck that bonus was sometimes 1/2 a months rent!). Fast forward to the company I work with today - there are no Christmas parties or lunches, there are few gifts and certainly no bonuses, and no matter how much we've helped a co-worker or how much money we've made for them - they do not provide any gift of appreciation. My direct boss  does give me a small gift certificate to a restaurant, and one generous co-worker and I exchange gifts. I'm not sure what other companies do today, but times sure have changed. I will never forget how ungrateful we were and how we expected the parties, lunches and bonuses "back in the day". At my current job, there  is no Christmas spirit and I am grateful for any gifts that I receive. I didn't realize how much the office Christmas tree or the 'secret santa' gift exchanges played a part in getting me into the holiday spirit; working from home, and being isolated makes it tougher for me to get in the holiday mood. What kinds of things happen at your office this time of year? 

***

Now switching gears, I bring you an image of a little needle felted snowman and Christmas tree that I made -

I finally had a chance to do some crafting for myself, so I picked up my needle felting supplies - it felt good to do all that stabbing.

Have a very Merry Christmas - thank you for staying with me and reading and commenting on my posts, it's really nice. All the best to you and yours.

Sniffles and Coughs

Remember when I told you that I had a cold and it was lasting longer than I thought? Well it took 3 weeks and remnants of it are still lingering! Wowza, that's a long time. At least it wasn't 6 months like my brother joked. But I'm grateful that I didn't get the flu that's going around, it sounds pretty nasty. Just before we left for our trip we had the flu vaccine. I found that this time the cold medicines didn't really work as well as they had in the past, but as the medical professionals say, there are 4 things that you need to get over a cold: fluids, rest, TLC, and time.

I'm very glad that I'm not sick for Christmas. When I was in high school and college, I used to get sick on the Christmas and Spring/Easter breaks. In fact I even had the flu for high school grad. Yes, that's right - while my classmates were out partying all night going from one house to another and staying up for the pancake breakfast, I was home sick. One of my girlfriends would phone me every couple of hours, to excitedly tell me where they were at, and to see if I could join them - I had to flu for at least 3 days and didn't leave the house. The effects of the flu started during the Grad dinner, and my poor parents had to drive to downtown Vancouver to come pick me up. Before they picked me up I was in the bathroom getting sick, a teacher made a snide comment to me saying something like "serves you right for drinking". But I hadn't had anything, I was 17 years old. The theory was that I had pushed myself so hard for finals and exams that when I finally had a break my body 'allowed' itself to get sick.

But I was always better so I could be the designated driver for New Years. I always seemed to "pick" the short straw - I swear my friends rigged it that way because I was the DD for 5 years in a row!

Wishing  you a  happy and healthy holiday season!

Daddy It's Cold Outside

I've been listening to the "all-Christmas song" radio station over the last couple of weeks during work, and I just love this version of "Baby It's Cold Outside" every time I hear it. I couldn't find a very good sample of it, this is about the best I could find:

The song starts at 3:11. Enjoy.

And if you're a dog, and it's cold inside, then laying in front of the fire, roasting your brain must seem like a nice place to be, don't you think? 

P.S.  New blog design - do you think I'm getting into the Christmas spirit yet? 

Supply and Demand

I went to buy a book yesterday, and was surprised to find the e-reader version was $20 but the actual physical paper book was only $10. The e-version doesn't need any human interaction - I pay for it, I have it transferred to my reading device and I start reading. A paper book involved paper, ink, printing, binding, transportation, etc and it's only half the price? You can read more here.

I guess that's how the music industry went - do music stores still exist? Can you still buy CDs?

Interesting lesson in business and economics don't you think?

Christmas Decorations

My biggest Christmas rush is at the beginning of the month when I have to wrap the presents for my family and get them into the mail before the 13th at the latest. I didn't do a very good job wrapping the presents  this year because I was in a hurry to get them into the boxes. Also, when mailing presents I leave off all the outside present decorations because they just get crushed. Hopefully my family forgives me for the crappy wrapping job and just remembers the presents inside.

So now that that's all taken care of, the week before Christmas is fairly quiet for me, so I have time to do some Christmas crafting. Yes, I actually have time to do crafts! Something I like to do but always put on the bottom of my list which means I usually don't get time to do it + a million other excuses.

But I did make this pillow which was the fastest Christmas decoration ever made I think. A pillow cover, cut out the square, four sides on the machine, pillow form inside, sew little opening, done! 5 minutes?

And, it's one that's received the most comments in my house. You can even read the names on Santa's list - I think it's cute.

I also crocheted this "Christmas Dove" but I'm not liking it too much. Maybe I'll toss it to a cat and let it play with it. Maybe I screwed up the pattern - but I'm pretty sure it just wasn't a good pattern.

What should I make next? I think it's time for an embroidered Christmas tea towel - I'm feeling stitchy!

Celebrity Endorsements Don't Mean Much

While Christmas shopping yesterday I picked up a toy which I was going to give to my brother's dog for Christmas, but I decided I'd test it out on Eco first. I bought the toy more for it's shape and novelty and I wondered what being a Cesar Milan dog toy really meant.

Well let me tell you that this toy didn't last more than two hours before it tore and soon pieces started to come off (including a very small piece that could choke a dog or cause blockages if swallowed).

For someone who runs a dog psychology centre and has over 40 dogs in his 'pack', I would have thought he would have tested this toy on a couple of his dogs before it went to market - but then others just don't think like I do and I'm pretty sure that 90% of the dog toys out there are tested on chihuahuas and pugs only because I have yet to find a dog toy that could withstand an adolescent Labrador - and if I have found said toy, no dog I know wants to play with it! (Except maybe a Kong  but then they are more for food delivery than a toy.)

I'm just glad that I didn't send this toy as a gift.

(P.S. I changed my banner and the background to something more wintery - do you like it? Is it beginning to feel a lot like Christmas? ) 

What I thought I saw

Have you ever gone on a trip and thought you saw an interesting, possibly exotic animal, only to return home and find out it was something rather  yucky?

While we were shopping on our trip, I was standing in the back of the Tommy Bahama Store looking out a window that faced a little ravine, when I saw a rather interesting looking animal. Unfortunately our camera was put away because we were clothes shopping so I couldn't get a good photo, but this is a quickie of it:

I thought it was something interesting.

And then last night while I was trolling the interwebs I just happened upon a photo of a Nutria or Coypu- which is basically a large American water rat, and rather unwanted and discovered that's what I saw in the little ravine behind the store!

Eeww. Not such a great discovery at all! 

*Picture from a random internet site, uncredited. My apologies

Just a couple of more days

I was asked why my background was so tropical - it's because I had a little tropical vacation and I thought you should too. So I thought I'd show you some more pictures from our trip.

Across the water we could see Cozumel, 

but we didn't take the ferry over there (not this time):

The ferry to Cozumel: 

And by the end of the weekend, I promise I'll change my banner and background to a more winter-like image. Sound good?

I am trying so hard -

- to get into the Christmas spirit. I'm quickly finishing some gifts and I have the lights on the house, and the radio is tuned to Christmas music at work during the day, but I just not quite ready to start decorating the house yet. I keep telling myself I'll do it on the weekend. Instead I keep looking at the shells we brought home and the brightly painted tchotchkes as I put away the bright swimsuits and flip flops and I just can't let go of the bright sandy beaches and the blue skies - maybe because a friend of mine is still down there and she emails me everyday telling me about the dolphins and the hot weather and....

(sigh)


Oh yes, and of course this dang cold is still hanging on. It's kinda hard to get in the mood when you're head's all full of crud.

"How long do cold last these days?"  I  asked my wise brother.
"Oh anywhere from a couple of days to six months" he tells me. What the what???!!! 6 months? I sure hope not. I'm into the second week of my cold and I'm about done with it, thank you very much! The only thing red and shiny around here is my nose!

And I really don't think anyone in my house is too eager for me to start the  Christmas baking when I'm blowing my nose and coughing - would you? I don't blame them one bit. Hey? Do you want to send me some homemade cookies?

How's your Christmas decorating and shopping going?

What follows the vacation...

...is a cold! Yup, I got one.

We had a national company event to go to following our mini vacation and I've since found out that at least 80% of those that attended are sick with either stomach troubles or colds. That's over 60 people that are sick right now. So despite taking all sorts of precautions, it didn't seem to help us avoid getting sick.

And besides being behind at work from being away, I'm getting more behind because I needed time off for being sick.  I'm almost starting to wonder if the vacation was even worth it.


But then I think of that lovely soft sand and the blues and greens of the ocean and the warm sun.... yeah, it was worth it!

Now my next task is getting into the Christmas spirit. I don't feel like doing much of anything at the moment so  I've given myself until next weekend to send out all the cards and mail the presents. I guess I'd better get crackin!

How's your Christmas (or holiday) preparations going?