Verbally Challenged

like…one month ago.

Yeah, I’m late with the photos. Believe it or not I JUST got around to editing these.

So Christmas morning wouldn’t you know, everyone decided to sleep in. So I had plenty of time to take this photo:

the loot. The reason why my house is bursting at the seams. But also the cause of a whole lot of smiles and laughter on Christmas morning.

And then we woke the kids up. Yep you heard that right we had to WAKE the kids up.

ON CHRISTMAS!

And the chaos began. I snapped photos here and there. Pulled wrapping paper out of the baby’s mouth. Cursed the toy companies for using 8000 twisty ties on their boxed toys. Made lots of piles. And enjoyed my family.

You’ll have to take my word for it.

After some breakfast and play time we got dressed and ready to head off to my parents house. And wouldn’t you know, I forgot about my own tradition – taking a family picture in front of the Christmas tree. That’s always an experience in itself involving the camera timer, tripod, praying…and maybe a decent picture.

This year we got this one, at my parents’ house in front of THEIR tree:

I promise you that we do really like each other. I wish that we were all squished together but this will do! And THANK YOU to my sister who did a wonderful job pushing the button (see I knew you could do it)!!!

And later in the evening we had a visit from a very special person…the great big man in red.

He was sooooooo tired the poor guy!

But he still made the kiddos happy:

and a little nervous if you’re this guy.

Or scared if you’re this guy:

Or flat out terrified if you’re this gal:

She heard Santa’s bells and flipped out! Oh the tears. Fortunately my gram offered to stay with her the whole time. She even had to go and retrieve the gift from Santa with her. Talk about a dliemma – gift and Santa or no gift and no Santa!

Are you seeing a trend with my kids? They don’t dig Mr. Claus up close and personal. They welcome the whole “he comes while you’re sleeping” bit.

My nephews on the other hand:

No problem!

I call this the grab and go!

But Santa wasn’t only for the kiddos!

Some of the adults had fun too!

We LOVE Santa and are so thankful for him celebrating with us every Christmas!

While I may not have shared anything art-wise for a few months, it doesn’t mean that I haven’t been creative! I’ll just stress again the October-December are CRAZY busy months and the blog took a good ol’ backseat to the million other things I had going on. So many folks ask me if I’m still in the loop – scrapbooking, cardmaking, sewing – and yes I’m still doing all of that!

In fact, I spent a good portion of those months creating projects for a certain something that I can’t talk about right now. But trust me when I say that it’s good! Details coming sometime in the next year (not to be vague or anything).

I still do projects for Sassafras Lass and most recently played with a few of their new lines to create these pages.

This one using the new Apple Jack

And this one using the new Nerdy Bird

Aren’t the papers so colorful and fun! Definitely the Sassafras style!

More later (like Christmas and Finn updates)!

Our party theme that is…

And YOU are virtually invited…

First birthday themes are always tricky to me because little ones aren’t really IN to anything (at least mine aren’t). L-man had a sesame street party that I selected because I thought that the cake was cute. He never took a liking to Sesame Street. With our gal I did a “sweet Adeline” theme with felt cakes, cookies and the most darling homemade banner.

For Mr. Finn I went with a vintage circus theme – not because he likes circus’ – or clowns – or even knows what that means. But because we were going to have other kiddos there (in a range of ages) and not have games or activities for them. I wanted my attention going to the birthday boy!

But don’t worry, the kids didn’t even notice that we weren’t playing games because they were too busy with this:

And that photo doesn’t even show all of it (yes the parents loved me)!

ok not really. Dentists probably won’t either. Maybe I should have given toothbrushes out as party favors but I digress.

I had at least eight large glass containers, small candy bins and small dishes filled with all kinds of tempting sweets and then lots of popcorn bags for munching. I would have had peanuts but we had to have the party at the snow location, my parents’ house and I didn’t think they’d appreciate the mess (mom/dad, you’re very welcome)!

I also decided to go with cupcakes instead of a huge cake for something different…

with really cute vintage inspired clown picks…

OK so maybe they’re a little bit creepy and poltergeist but still cute, no?

But I do have a question to all of you bakers out there. I had a local bakery make these cupcakes because I was lazy and it was easy and guaranteed to taste good. BUT I didn’t like how they turned out (visually speaking which we all KNOW is important). I have much cuter liners (polka dots ones) that would have been adorable and would rather the icing have been piped on so I’m thinking that I need to find a really good buttercream and make my own in the future. Does anyone have a really good bakery style buttercream recipe??? Sorry Betty Crocker but I need something GOOD!

Anyway like I said before, they tasted really good, my little dude even enjoyed them. That’s actually saying a lot since the first time he was given cake (on his birthday) he wasn’t sure about it. Stay tuned for a layout about that experience.

I even tried a cake smash session for his first birthday. I gave the dude a cake and he wanted to leave the photoshoot after putting his foot in the cake (yeah he showed me). Stay tuned for that one as well.

Perhaps third time is a charm? Maybe it was the chocolate. Or the spoon feeding…

because in no time he was making sure that every precious crumb stayed in his mouth:

and thinking just maybe it would be ok to not use the spoon…

and actually enjoy a bit of the cake.

Who knew that you’d have to convince a kiddo to eat sugar! If only he had more than eight teeth and the ability to chew we could have tried the popcorn.

He wasn’t the only one having fun at the party though. His aunt and uncle enjoyed some Foosball…

The wee miss worked on her air hockey skills…

in fashion of course. And perhaps scored on her daddy judging from this expression…

although I think he may have let her win a little. She kind of has her daddy where she wants him. sucker!!!

One of my little nephews “played” pool:

While my other nephew lined up his cars and took a moment to flash me a smile (perhaps my payback for providing him with copious amounts of sugar)…

Some folks took bets as to whether or not a golf ball could be placed onto a tee..trapped in a snow globe…

I should have put money on my father-in-law.

At one point there was even a band formed. Two of the members?

Cute!

And cute (original no?)!

I think that everything went REALLY well. And Finn was well supported and loved…

I even managed to remember to turn the camera over just once for a photo of me with the birthday boy (yeah pick yourself up off the floor now). These shots are rare and that’s something I need to change.

So that was the circus. I hope you enjoyed your stay.

Next up, ChristmaS! And yes I know that’s behind us but I’m still getting caught up! AND a little scrapbooking thrown in for good measure.

With the holidays behind me and deadlines met I’m going to have some time on my hands. Granted I could take that time and use it to clean my house, purge my playroom and straighten up…but that’s not fun. Instead, I’m going to take that time, edit some photos, tell stories, create and share.

Sounds better no?

So because I was MIA around the holiday and I wasn’t able to send EVERYONE in blog land a Christmas card, I decided to share it here. It was a trifold card that turned out really cute if I do say so myself, printed on linen.

This is the front:

Open the front and you’re met with this:

Open that flap and you have the inside of the card.

The left flap:

The center:

And the greeting:

And the back:

The two littles wore those outfits on Christmas Eve. Christmas day was a whole other story – with photos soon to come. My will gal wore the most adorable kimono dress with…ahem…bows.

Pure holiday cuteness if I do say so myself.

More later!