Part of Chicago

Some photos from our Chicago trip.

The window displays at Macy's (Marshall Field's). It was a story about how letters get to Santa.

"Giant Shiny Jelly Bean" according to our group.

Our reflection.

Beluga at Shedd Aquarium.

The Disney Light Parade as seen from our hotel room.

Navy Pier as seen from our room.

Our view.

Urn Update

This is a stash of stuff I bought at some garage sales in June. See those fruit topiaries in the back?
I gutted them and they looked like this.

Then I spray painted them shiny silver to match my Christmas decor. I don't know if they will stay this way but they work for now! I really want to faux paint them to look like Mercury glass, but I'm still working out the kinks on how that is going to happen. I will keep you posted if it works!

By the way, just an update.....I STILL haven't done a thing to my fireplace or my bedroom makeover. Life just keeps getting in the way!

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!

This years version of the Christmas tree is inspired by this one. I still like hers better, but I'm liking mine too. If I could just get the boys to leave those sprigs alone......

O.K. If you read blogs, you have probably seen several people doing this ball wreath. You take a wire hanger and just string ornaments onto it. It is simple, but difficult. I had two problems, I used a heavy gauge wire which made it hard to bend, and the balls kept popping off because they had cheap plastic hanger things. Anyway, the trick is to go ahead and string a bunch on, but plan on hot gluing a bunch too. I spent $6.00 on ornaments at Dollar Tree and used a few I already had. I saw identical wreaths at Pier 1 for $50, so the effort was definitely worth it!

Thanksgiving cupcakes

I made these cupcakes that are supposed to look like little pumpkin pies. Parker didn't think they did. And he pointed out that it would have made more sense if they actually tasted like pumpkin. However, his critique did not prevent him from eating them!

K Visiting and Christmas Tree

Once again, I am busy, busy, busy. We are leaving for Chicago for 4 days TODAY but in the meantime, we had some things to do this week. First of all, it is National Education Week which means it's Parent Visitation Week at our kids schools. First up was kindergarten.

I know some of you might think your child has the best kindergarten teacher ever. But you are mistaken. This is the BEST kindergarten teacher ever...Mrs. Fitzgerald. Parker had her and now Jack does. We LOVE her. Whew...she wears me out though. Kindergarten is very, very busy!

The K kids do a performance. Uh oh. This little Indian boy is nervous.

He actually ended up doing very well and was obviously having fun being "Brave and Strong"

We wanted to put our tree up before we left so it was all nice and pretty for us when we got home. I'm a glutton for punishment, I guess.

I didn't take any pictures of 2nd grade visitation because it just isn't nearly as cute. Also, Parker would probably die of embarassment. We are headed out to Chicago soon--with the boys for the first time--so with any luck, I will have lots of fun things to post soon! (Although, last night Jack had a fever so............)

Happy Birthday Mrs. Wheeler!

Today is Parker's teacher's birthday. I have know this day was coming since August and, yet, I waited until last night to really start working on her birthday gifts. Why, oh why do I do this to myself!? Anyway, everything got finished and presented and enjoyed, so now I can breathe easier.

I e-mailed all the parents in Parker's class and asked them to have their child make two birthday wishes for Mrs. Wheeler. They sent them to me and I typed them up, cut them into strips and placed them in individual covered matchboxes. After Mrs. Wheeler opened the gift, she handed the boxes out to each kid and they read their wishes and put the box back into the jar. Of course, I cutied up the jar which is a plastic salsa jar from Sam's. Yes, I bleached it out.

I also made another project which the kids unknowlingly helped me with. I will post pictures of it as soon as she hangs it in the room. We also gave her a bunch of menus from local restaurants and told her to make her choice and we would bring her lunch. And finally, we brought birthday cookies for the kids. I'm blogging about this because I think people are always looking for ideas for teachers. None of these things cost very much but they were all fun and special. Now I'm going to go take a nap. :-)

Christmas Countdown!

This is the reason I haven't been blogging this week. I decided to put some of these Advent calendars at the Lil' Bow Peeps store which is opening on Monday. If you are local, you really must check it out. Lots of nice gifts for the girlies on you list. I have 5 of the girly version and 2 of the gender neutral version. I am also working on a Nativity version, traditional (red & green) and a primitive country version. I will be selling them for $28.00.

Just in case you didn't see my old post about these, they are muffin tins and you put a little candy or a little slip of paper that would say something like, "Go look at Christmas lights." in each well and remove them as you count down the days 'til Christmas.

O.K.. Back to work! I even made a Christmas playlist so it would inspire me to work on Christmas stuff and it seems to be working!