Happy New Year!

Welcome 2017!

I hope you all had a really nice Christmas holiday and were able to spend time with family and friends. We had a very quiet Christmas Day with just my little family of four spent happily opening a few presents and having lots of laughs together while we did that. It seemed every gift needed an explanation, and I loved the comment my son made "I love gifts that come with a story". It's true isn't it? It's a lot more fun when we can share how we came to choose this gift (or in my case "make" this gift!). 

I was making signs this year as well as knitting scarves. I made a sign for my son to hang in his room with the name of his current-favourite lake painted on it.

I also painted (but could not finish due to technical difficulties) a sign for my husband painted on an old saw of my Dad's to put in his workshop. If anyone ever wants to paint on metal ... use enamel paints ... just saying. I'll share that when I get it finished.

We had an enormous turkey for just four people, and there are about 8 plastic boxes each with 2 cups of turkey stock in the freezer, and still enough turkey left chopped up in the fridge for one more turkey pot pie to feed four! Big turkey! None of us are complaining since we all love our turkey. 

The tree will be coming down today ... something I always do on New Year's Day. It gives a bit of a gentle flourish to end the holidays. We're still all home again tomorrow, and head back to work and school on Tuesday. I'm glad this coming week is a short one!

my old Christmas stocking from the early 1960s

We did only a few things this holiday. We saw the new Star Wars movie "Rogue One", and I just might have dozed off for a brief second there in the theatre. I was so tired after having a long drive to and from Mississauga to see Dad through terribly slow traffic. A 45-minute drive turned into an hour and a half each way! It just wears me out these days. I was so restless in the theatre seat because of it. I finally took off my shoes and tucked my feet under me and was more comfortable and able to watch the rest of the movie. Do you get like that when you're really tired? I get so restless when I'm tired. 

I gave my husband a few cards with "Christmas moments" written into each one. They were things that we could do on the holidays. One was the movie, and another was a trip to the AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario). I gave him the membership for his birthday in October. In the card I told him to bring his membership card and I'd take him to the AGO and lunch afterwards. We went to see the "Small Wonders" exhibit which was a display of handcarved prayer beads and miniature alters, carved from boxwood. It was amazing! The carved "beads" were anywhere from one inch to two and three inches in diameter. They opened up with little wooden hinges and inside were these spectacular teeny tiny 3D carvings of biblical scenes. Many were of Jesus in the manger, or of his crucifixion. 

Source: http://boxwood.ago.ca/object/heaven-judgement-day

source: http://boxwood.ago.ca/collection
All this detail in about 1 1/2 inches!

Source: http://boxwood.ago.ca/object/adoration-magi-0

The details were incredible. There were all kinds of people carved into the wood, and horses and soldiers with swords about the width of a hair. We were both fascinated with these art treasures. There was one set of beads on loan from Chatsworth, England that was originally owned by Henry VIII and his wife Katharine. I found that was just amazing to see something that had been in Katharine's own hands (as it seems she was the true owner of the beads). I really like seeing hand carving, and this exhibit was a real pleasure to see. You can go to this site to see the collection online.

This will mark the first year that we didn't have any large family gathering. I'm not sure how all that fell apart, but I didn't enjoy Christmas as much as I used to because of it. I didn't do much baking apart from the Christmas cake and a lemon meringue pie. I didn't make even one cookie! My little cookie stamps didn't get used at all. But there were lots of turkey recipes being cranked out, and I wore my Christmas apron that Mom made me many years ago.

I did get over to see my dad on Boxing Day and gave him a few gifts. It was a rather heartbreaking visit with his questions, "Why are you giving me these gifts? Have I ever given you gifts?"  He couldn't understand why I would give him these things. I don't even think he understood what I meant when I said "I'm your daughter". Oh well, it is what it is, and there's no point in pining for the good old days because they are gone for good now. I'm glad it's a new year, but I don't see anything changing with respect to dear old Dad. 

Dad poring over the photos of his family and not knowing even one person :(

I still have more things to knit and paint and carve in the next little while ... it's never ending these days! I'm looking forward to these projects though because there is no deadline attached to them. Well, the carving has to be done by July, but I'm not starting to panic (just yet!). I bought some yarn on sale to make a lap blanket. The only thing that has held me back in the past is having to buy so much yarn for it! I'm still not used to the expense of knitting in comparison to the less expensive sewing I have always done.

Well, it's getting late in the morning now, and I should tackle that Christmas tree and put it to bed. I like to take my time with this. I have my last hurray of Christmas music ready ...

Two of my favourite CDs

... the tea is brewed (Cream of Earl Grey by David's a gift from my daughter) ....

... I have a lovely scented candle burning ...

... the good china is ready to be put away until the next special occasion ...

... so goodbye little wooden snowmen and wooden Santas ...

... and goodbye beautiful snowy wintry scenes ...

... oh, wait ... what?! ... what am I thinking, I live in Canada and winter has only just started!!

Actually the above scene was taken on Thursday the 29th. I'm laughing at my son right now because he completely missed this snowy scene (he's sitting beside me as I type this). The snow was wet and had fallen off the trees by the time he got up that day. Today it looks like this ... crisp and cold and sunny ...

 Enjoy your day, and all the best to you in the New Year.

Thanks for stopping by!

Wendy

Five on Friday

Good Morning! Two more sleeps ... are you ready?! I'm not, but it's not for lack of trying. I still have two more things to finish up. One is a painting project for my husband and the other is stuff for my brother. Wish me luck in finishing them in time!

I'm joining Amy of Love Made My Home for her final installment of Five on Friday for this year.

This is just a sort of wrap up of all the Christmassy things the I've been working on for and with the daycare kids.

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I bought the book "The Mitten" by Jan Brett for one of my charges. I really like this book and bought it myself a few years before I had kids of my own. I bought the board book for this little girl, although the story is much condensed from the large hard cover book. Basically, the story is of a little boy who begs his grandma to knit him mittens as white as snow. Grandma tells him if he drops it in the snow, he'll never find it. Of course, that's exactly what happens, but all sorts of woodland creatures come and find the mitten and crawl inside it stretching it out of shape. 

I made eight felt animals to go with the book, and also knitted up one snow white mitten. I was in a frenzy of stitching these darned animals up all this week, and even when the girl's mother came to collect her yesterday, I was still stitching the last animal closed (I embroidered details on the front and stuffed them). Unfortunately, I did not get time for even one photo before I shoved the entire project into a gift bag and raced downstairs to hand it over. All I have to show you are the paper pieces I used to cut the animals out of felt. I use freezer paper for this, and highly recommend it for making felt pieces. You just draw your image on the paper, iron it onto the felt and cut out the shapes. It was a fun project even though I was crazy rushed.

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The kids have been happily working on some little Christmas decorations all through the month of December. I think this little guy was my favourite ;)  I had these tiny baskets on hand, and the kids painted them up. Then I made some very dense pom poms for the cardinal bird baby, and they glued in the paper beak, the googly eyes and the feather tale and added details to the basket. It's stuffed with Spanish moss inside.

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Other decorations we made were paper mache balls that the kids painted and decorated with glitter and beads.  Rudolph made with handprint hands and the face is their footprint.  Christmas trees made from jumbo popsicle sticks and other decorations. And jingle bell bracelets that we made up and then spent some crazy time dancing and singing Jingle Bells accompanied by Michael Buble!

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I finished up the two scarves for the older kids. I know the girl will love her scarf as she seems to wear a different scarf every day. The boy ... not so sure. I was about three-quarters of the way through making his when he told me he "hates scarves that you have to wind around your neck". sigh..... He's getting it anyway, but I wouldn't be surprised if I never see it wound around his neck. They turned out so nicely I thought, and they are very squishy! I knit the orange/grey scarf with a basket weave stitch, which looks really nice. It isn't reversible, but the pattern isn't too awful from the back (you can see it in the photo).

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Yesterday was my last day with the kids until the New Year. I'd had enough of crafting and knitting and sewing, so I took them for a very enjoyable, very quiet, magical walk in the snowy woods. We were the only ones there. I would very happily have laid down in the snow and watched the snowflakes come down through the branches ... something I did often as a kid when out tobogganing with my brother on our own hill. Simple pleasures :)

Instead I enjoyed watching the kids running and falling into the snow and giggling the entire time. The big white pines in this forest are my favourites, and I took a couple of panoramic photos to share. Apparently there is a great horned owl now living in these woods. I'll be keeping my eye out for him when I visit again.

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And that's my "five" for this year! It's been a real pleasure joining in with you Amy, although I haven't always had something to share. This is a nice meme to join in to share something simple that's happening in your week. Thank you for hosting.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

God bless you all and enjoy the time with family and friends.

Wendy

PS Just wanted to share a couple of pottery decorations I purchased at the Pottery Guild Show in Dundas back in November ...

Christmas Card Swap with Amy

Joining in with Amy of Love Made My Home and her Card Swap!

I was paired with Josie of Alcea Rosea 31, and she sent me this very pretty and very glittery card ...

I tried a couple of shots to get the sparkly effect, just click on the photo to see it larger.

It's really pretty, and the sun shines through the windows in the morning and really lights it up!

My Christmas cards this year are all from fellow bloggers. I don't know what happened to all my other friends and family, but I haven't received any cards from anyone else. I gotta say, bloggers are the best! You are a most reliable bunch of friends :)

Josie was a little sneaky and tucked in this beautiful tatted lace snowflake. Isn't it gorgeous! Even though we technically weren't supposed to send any gifts, I have to say that I was tickled to receive such an amazing piece of handiwork that Josie made for me. Thank you again Josie!

It looks so pretty on the tree when the sun shines through the front window in the afternoon.

Josie and I have exchanged a few emails leading up to sending and receiving our cards. It was so nice to meet yet another lovely lady through Amy's blog. Thank you so much for hosting the card exchange again this year Amy! I know you had to cut it short on the entries, so I'm glad I was able to get my name in there ;) 

On another note, since I think everyone has received their cards from me now in my card & tea exchange group, I thought I'd share what I made for all of them. These little felt decorations were the replacement gifts for the dolls that I made. 

Another cute design that I got from Pinterest. I just didn't have time to work up something of my own design, and these little foxes were so cute I couldn't resist!

I've got more gifts completed in the last couple of days ... and even more gifts started!! Will it ever end?! My brother and I have made a pact that we will now send our parcels to each other in the week between Christmas and New Year's (he lives in BC and I'm in Ontario). He's swamped at work, and I could use a little wiggle room there too. Sneaky of us I know, but now I can get his gift all together after all these other things are finished and out the door. 

A few more decorations in my china cabinet. I bought this cabinet a couple of years ago to hold some of the nice bits of china I received from my mom and dad. I've added some little nesting Santas (one set for each of my kids).

I really like this cabinet, and it has an interior light that glows nicely on these cold dark winter nights. I didn't turn it on for these photos as it was interfering with the shot.

My lovely carved loon that I picked up in Whitney this summer while camping in Algonquin. My very old advent calendar behind it. On the back is written "To Wendy, love from Grandma & Grandad, 1964". I'll never get rid of that, it is still full of childhood Christmas wonder and magic for me.

That's all for today folks! I'll take some photos of the scarves that I have now finished (thank goodness!) and another project I've started today which involves knitting one mitten and a bunch of felt animals. The mitten is finished ... now for the animals with some embroidered details. I enjoy doing these things, but I am getting a little tired of every moment spent working on them. 

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Merry Christmas!

Wendy

Christmas Looming

With Christmas looming, all my time is being manipulated to completing handmade gifts. I finished the scarf I was working on in the last post, and have started on the next one (nothing really to show just yet). I know I'll get it done, but at this point I think it's going to be tight!

My son helped me drag the Christmas tree and boxes of ornaments from the crawlspace early last week. He then helped me get the tree assembled and it sat unadorned in front of the living room window for a week. This past weekend I picked up some clear lights and set to decorating it in a style that we don't normally do. Normally we just pile all the decorations we have ever purchased onto the tree complete with many coloured lights with a programmable lighting sequence. Each year the tree looked more and more chaotic! I was determined to try something different this year with the hope that less really is more, and I quite like it! Although I do miss that personal touch of all those familiar decorations, and the clear lights seemed foreign at first, everyone seems happy with the result. Now I have added a few very special ornaments that have been gifted to me or have special meaning. I like it a lot better now.

One thing I have been working on feverishly were these little dolls to send out as gifts. They are fairly easy to make, and I got them completed a few weeks ago. The tiny flower pots weren't meant to be part of the dolls, I just popped them in the pots for the photo shoot. I kind of like the flower pot base though :)

The sad part about this story is that when I took them all to the post office to be mailed out, the bead I used for the head wouldn't fit through the slot to measure "letter post" which would have cost $1.80 for each envelope. Because of that the envelope was bumped up to "parcel post" and would have cost me $9.00 for each envelope I had to send out! I wasn't about to spend $45 on this. Needless to say I didn't send them, and I had to start on the gifts all over again. I didn't have the heart to rip off all the doll heads to rework them because they're very well secured onto the dolls, and I think it would have ruined the entire doll. Anyway, the new gifts have been made in a complete frenzy and are now off in the mail. Lesson learned.

I've been unable to post or visit anyone properly with all stuff I've been working on and I'm quite busy with the daycare kids as well. I also chose this crazy time of year to advertise for new daycare kids, and have been busy with interviews. The difficult part about having interviews for daycare is keeping my house really clean and tidy all the time! The whole house is open for inspection which becomes tricky when I have kids in the house all day and Christmas stuff threatening to take over. I don't know what I was thinking.

Anyway, yesterday I didn't have any kids in as two are sick and two were not coming because they had hockey games out of town. It snowed heavily Sunday night, so it was a good day to knit ... and clear the driveway :[  If I can squeeze a few photos out of the camera (which I mentioned earlier is not working properly), I'll share some Christmas pics and snow pics. I'm sure you're all dying to see those ha ha! Today is again going to be spent on my own with the two littles still ill at home. I can't say I'm sorry for another unexpected day off (who would!). Back to knitting and clearing away empty Christmas boxes and cleaning house and generally getting all ready for Christmas!

Thanks for stopping by today, and I hope to be able to visit everyone very soon!

Wendy

New Year's North by Northwest

Happy New Year Everyone!!

After a stressful start to the Christmas holidays, things have all calmed down now and I've had a very relaxing week off with my little family of four. We met my daughter in university town two days before Christmas and had a very enjoyable reunion with her at a boisterous restaurant full of other families and students doing the same thing. Delicious food in a wonderful old restaurant with exposed brick walls and creaky well-worn wooden floors. You know the type, right? The town is chuck full of these beautiful restaurants with just amazing food! Every time we pick her up for an extended time at home, she has searched out yet another restaurant to try ... such fun ;)

Pinecone decorations; December calendar art by Kananginak Pootoogook "Shedding the Velvet"; Santa & Snowman wooden garland

We all came home happy and full and the next day I ploughed ahead with cleaning up my house for Christmas. Some of you already know that I run a daycare in my home, and I had five kids (ages 2 - 11) in the house all day once school let out on the Friday before Christmas ... so you can imagine that things were not as organized as I like for my own family with ongoing crafts and activities! Poor Smudge bunny was a bit neglected and we kept rolling his cage all around the living room and kitchen in an effort to decorate. He let us know he wasn't happy and there was hay kicked out of his cage all over the carpet! My living room looked more like a barnyard than a home. I warned my daughter not to judge me when she saw the mess (it is her rabbit afterall!). After six hours of cleaning and organizing, I had everything in place and ready for Christmas ... including half of the Christmas meal ready to go. I was exhausted!

A few angel decorations with birchbark stars :)

Christmas Day was lots of fun of course, although we spent it just on our own. My kids and dog(!) still heap on our bed first thing in the morning ready to open stockings. I think that's the best part of the day for me. Everyone is so silly and excited, and the dog is ripping all our presents open for us and trying to grab our chocolates, it gets quite crazy! And it's freezing cold because no one wants to run and turn up the furnace, so we're all wrapped in woolly blankets cross-legged on the bed. Magic!

My siblings and I used to all gather together in my eldest sister's bed on Christmas morning and open our stockings together before my parents got up. Stocking gifts were always a kids' thing back then, not an adult thing. It was like a little secret present opening with my sisters and brother that our parents never shared. I loved it, but I also love the way my own family does it now too with all of us getting a stocking filled with little surprises.

Christmas morning; More pinecones in the decorating; Childhood crafts

Anyway! Christmas was lots of fun, nice gifts, great company and a great meal (even if I do say so myself!) of turkey and fixin's. We then headed out to see my dad on Boxing Day and one of my sisters and two of her girls were there as well. Dad didn't understand any of it of course, and would fell asleep in little cat naps throughout our visit. A few of the other residents drifted into our midst and would amuse us with their funny ways. This is the "Reminiscence Ward" (aka dementia) at the home, so everyone living on that floor is confused. One lady wrapping her doll up in the Christmas tissue paper from our gifts and questioning the doll "where's your mama?". She's a sweetheart, and none of us minded. The care workers were trying desperately to remove her from our gathering, but we kept insisting that she was welcome, so they finally let her be.

Dad & my sister; The Gang

We hosted my side of the family for a Christmas meal on Wednesday and had a very enjoyable time together with non-holiday food this time. My nephew's wife and my sister brought some amazing hors d'oeuvres, and we rounded out the meal with a few hot dishes and desserts. I had premade everything, and it was buffet style, so clean up was such a breeze! We were finished cleaning up an hour after everyone left!

The next day my husband and I were off to something we were both looking forward to, and also apprehensive about. We went to visit friends of ours that we have not seen in almost 20 years! My husband and his friend first met years ago when they both worked as salesmen at a Ford car dealership (almost 30 years ago). We spent years together travelling to their parents' cottage on Lake Huron (northwest of us). When we both started having kids, we both moved quite far apart, and that's when we stopped seeing each other. My husband has kept in contact with his friend over the internet and on the phone all these years, but we never met up again until this week for New Year's Eve. This couple have bought the same cottage we used to go to from their parents, and transformed it into a beautiful Cape Cod cottage inside and out. It's beautiful!! Darkened board and batten pine that made the cottage so dark inside has been painted over in about 6 coats of white paint. Worn out wall to wall carpets were ripped out and replaced with medium dark laminate flooring which looks like real hardwood. A completely new kitchen and new bathroom, and the place looks amazing! All the work was done on their own except for exterior siding.

We spent a couple of fun days together at the cottage and had a marvelous time. I've never talked so much in probably 20 years! It was weird that when we met up it was like no time had passed at all, but we both had entire lifetimes (all our kids are now young adults) to share.

Our old "renewed" friends (me on far right); Lake Huron

There were walks along the beach beside the crashing waves and bitter wind. And another much calmer walk through the woods behind their cottage. My husband made them a gift of a wine rack out of birds eye maple and zebra wood. His own design and I think he did a great job with it.

Friends (my husband on far right); wine rack

Yesterday we took our daughter back to university town and left her all alone in her rental home. Her roommates would be returning early this week. Seemed a little sad to hug her goodbye and close the door on her ... she looked so forlorn :( Ah well, maybe she'll enjoy some time to herself before her friends return.

And now we're at the last day of holidays. The tree is undecorated (started that yesterday afternoon), and the decorations are waiting to be shoved back in the crawlspace. There are more than a few leftovers in the fridge. I wouldn't say we indulged through the week, but the food has been richer! We did finally get some snow too ... not quite in time for Christmas Day, but that's okay. The white and the cold makes it feel like a proper winter, which I like ;) The temperatures dropped from 14C a couple of days before Christmas, to now about -5C and getting colder. It's snowing again as I write this, so I'm glad our long drives here there and everywhere are over for now!

Now into 2016! I think we started the year off right with renewing our friendship and spending lots of time with family. It's made my days much brighter than they were before the holidays. I hope everyone is doing well. I've read both happy stories and sad stories here in blogland through the past couple of weeks, so life does go on in its own way.

Happy New Year!

Thanks for stopping by!

Wendy

Christmas Tree Unplugged!

Linking up with Lavender Cottage Mosaic Monday!