A new venture

This past Christmas, my sister in law, Jessica asked if I could help her out with some Christmas ornaments for the marines stationed over there with them in Poland.  She wanted a clear plastic ornament with the state they are from and their name on it.  I've had my Silhouette for a couple of years now, but haven't really done too much with it - just the occasional wall saying.  I thought this would make me work the machine and learn it.  I was pretty happy with how they turned out.

Well, this got me thinking about making additional ornaments to sell for Christmas.  I remember posting my first couple examples on Facebook and wondering if I was making the right decision selling these.

After a busy 5 weeks of making over 150 ornaments, I can say it was very successful and I had A LOT of fun doing it.  Here are a few of the style ornaments I made for customers.

I plan to make them again this upcoming year.  I will start as early as I can, so get your orders in early.  I have lots of cute ideas for this upcoming year as well.

It's beginning to look like Christmas

With such a busy first week of December, we were finally able to buy our Christmas tree on Sunday, December 7.

Finally getting around to decorating the tree.

Jason and I (well mostly me) have been wanting to have a few more front yard decorations especially a nativity scene.  We saw some last year that I loved and this year on his own he bought all of the materials and got to work on it.  I LOVE how it turned out - very simple but beautiful.

One night we headed over to Adam and Stephanie's and had our annual Polar Express party with pi's and hot chocolate.  We love doing this because it helps get us in the holiday spirit.

Brody's 8th Birthday Party

We arrived home after the Christmas parade around 1:00 to rush and get everything ready for a 3:00 birthday party.  Brody decided on a Nerf party so we created a course in our front yard for their Nerf war.

The birthday boy all ready for his Nerf party

I had orange and blue bandanas so we could have 2 teams along with extra guns, bullets, and eye wear.  We didn’t want any accidents.

The 2 teams started out this way.

The kids (and adults) were so funny running all around.

The kids soon lost interest but the adults had their chance to play and we had a blast.  We playe

We played guys vs girls and we girls actually one of the 3 games.

A little excitement from the female side.

The guys are worried and trying to come up with a scheme.

With such a busy week, I asked my uncle Chris to make Brody's cake.  The inside was camo colors so Brody was very excited.  I was very thankful that he made so I didn't stress over making the cake.

Present time.  A "Who Was" book - these are some of Brody's favorite books.

Brody thought he was something else with this Bortles jersey from Jude.

This is what a VERY busy week and a fulfilled birthday party looks like at the end of the week.

I can't believe we have an 8 year old in our house.  He is growing up way too fast.  I'm not sure I'm ready for this.

Here are a few things about our 8 year old:

• He enjoys all sports, however, he is still trying to learn that it is ok to lose.
• He does very well in school and thankfully so far the stuff is coming easy to him.
• He loves math and science.
• He can be such a helper when he sets his mind to it.  These are the times I am a proud mom.
• He and Trevor enjoy playing with each other (most of the time).
• He enjoys playing Legos, video games, and still loves to dress up in his super hero costumes.
• He is starting to feel that he is too big to go children's church, which is sad for me.

I am thankful for our very busy week, but SO glad it is over and we are ready to get ourselves prepared for Christmas.