Just Make Stuff

2010...

At the end of every year I've shared a photo collage with the highlights...the birthdays and trips...the big stuff.

You all know my blog turned five, I graduated, Mac turned 14, Sean ran a lot, I didn't get into grad school and then I did, we went on a big trip and I got a black eye. So I thought as 2010 ends today I'd focus on the little stuff instead...the favorite details...

There were the organizational projects...like a road trip binder, terracotta pots, a nightstand drawer and s'more basket.

There were various things around the house...like flowers from the backyard, the great paint debacle, a terraium, the chalkboard, outdoor furniture, and my favorite holiday decorations. 

There was craftiness...a favorite gift we gave, a layout detail I loved, the best thing I made with Mac, a new craft, and flowers with layered punches. 

There was the best stuff...one the best meals all year, a great gift from my mom, the prettiest views, a new huge calendar, a fun shopping trip and a wonderful dinner party.

From the biggest moment to the tiniest detail 2010 was very, very good to us...here's hoping we are just as fortunate in 2011.

Potage St. Germain

Which is the fancy way to say split pea soup. This is a favorite family recipe from Magic Pan restaurant which we all miss dearly. Easy to make and delicious...but nearly impossible to get a nice picture of.

MAGIC PAN RESTAURANT POTAGE ST GERMAIN 

1 (1 pound) ham bone
4 1/2 cups water
1 (13 ounce) can chicken broth
2 cups split peas
2/3 cup finely chopped leeks or green onions
1/3 cup finely chopped carrots
1/3 cup finely chopped celery
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon thyme
Bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon pepper
2 1/2 cups milk
1 cup whipping cream
1 cup chopped ham, cooked
1/2 cup chopped chicken (cooked) (optional)

Place ham bone in large pot. Add water, chicken stock and peas and bring to
boil over medium heat. Reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally for 30
minutes.

Sauté the onions, carrots and celery just until limp. Add them to the soup
pot along with all the seasonings and continue to simmer until peas are very
soft and mixture is thick - about 45 minutes. Remove ham bone. Gradually
stir in the milk and cream. Add ham and chicken. Simmer, stirring
occasionally, about 10 to 15 minutes.

Potage St. Germain soup should be served with a dollop of sour cream 
and a splash of sherry. The sherry was served on the side in a tiny 
glass pitcher, while the sour cream was placed in the bowl and dusted 
with chopped parsley.

Here goes nothing...

After Christmastime is rolling right along and don't forget I warned you that I might do something crazy this week...

Of course painting over the big red rectangle may not be as crazy as painting it in the first place...it's been a good four years, but we're excited for something new.

I also made my first scrapbook page in a long while...I made one this fall and that's it...so I decided I'd take some index photos from what I recently got printed and warm up with a page about not scrapbooking for months...

And the thank you notes went to comment  #20...

Jennifer said...gorgeous!! :)December 29, 2010 at 02:20 PM

Jennifer please e-mail me your address.

Hopefully I'll be showing you the new wall by 2011...

Thank you notes...

We make a concerted effort to send out thank you's soon after Christmas...especially since we are prone to getting completely spoiled by our family and friends.

This year Mac had  me totally beat and had his all written and sealed while I still had a pile sitting on my desk. For his cards he did a drawing that we re-sized and copied...

 

Since I cannot draw to save my life, my notes included this paper, stamp and ink pad...with an older text background stamp and of course some tape.

Thankfully I caught up to Mac and finished writing mine late last night.

I ended up with a few leftover...so if you need to do some post holiday thanking please leave a comment and I'll send them on their way to someone.

For my brother, sister and the police officer...

I get teased a lot in my family. Granted I can dish it out too...but this blog has provided an excellent reason for jokes at my expense.

So when Sean called me out of my sister's house on Christmas day to show me that we had a little problem it ended up as a "this has to go on the blog" joke.  

It went so far as Peg and Rory telling the police officer taking the report about my blog. Oh were they laughing as they searched for any evidence since we assumed it was someone driving down the road with a new BB gun Christmas present.

The only thing stranger than dealing with a blown out car window on Christmas day is having to explain what scrapbooking is to a very nice police officer. She must have thought we were all crazy.

And we are...but thankfully it means we can find humor in just about anything.

The great reorganization...

Sean and I have a tradition of opening our gifts from each other as the very last thing on Christmas night. After we tore through them he setup the camera on the tripod at the top of the stairs and ran down before the timer went off.

(I'm wearing the super cozy blanket my mom gave me for Christmas)

I came back downstairs this morning and decided we should pack away the decorations. This whole after-Christmas thing pretty much breaks my heart every year. Good thing I'm not dramatic, right? But it really does make me sad that it's over...so taking everything down is like ripping off the band-aid...get the pain over with quick. Then I try to concentrate on making the house clean and reorganized (and sometimes rearranged...or actually always rearranged). 

Considering the past trouble making I've done around this house during the last week of the year, who knows what 2010 edition has in store.  Wish poor Sean some luck.

I'll tell you tomorrow...

By the end of Christmas day I managed to almost burn dinner for thirteen people to the point of no return...and somehow the one of the small rear windows of our car was shattered as it sat in my sister's driveway...but I'll tell you about that tomorrow.

Today was well stuffed stockings...a fantastic brunch at my sister's...Sean Skyping in on his family's holiday party up in Oregon...and Mac trying to politely let us know what clothes we got him that he liked and didn't (Sean and I high-fived and cheered with every success)...

No matter what this Christmas was so much fun.

Merry Christmas...

We hope everyone has a wonderful holiday. 

Around here...

We started the 2010 cook-a-thon...I finished one last holiday craft...and we broke open the annual gingerbread house kit...

Now I'm heading into here to rest up for all the festivities...

Ten on Tuesday...

1. Mac said last week he couldn't wait for Christmas to get here...I tried to explain to him that the wait is the greatest part of the holidays. All the anticipation and activity...this really is the best week of the whole year.

2. Speaking of activity the main one from this point one will be cooking...one of the things we're making is peppermint fudge sundaes for dessert on Christmas night. It'll be the first time making my mom's mud pie fudge sauce...here's the recipe I have from when I gathered a bunch of family recipes a couple of years ago to make a cookbook for my brother and sister...

3. I think I'm going to have a couple of questions to ask her. 

4. I started working on my organizer for 2011...first task was updating all the monthly calendars. (you can download the other pages I've made here)

5. I made a PDF file in case you need new month pages too (you can trim them down to fit into a mini binder)  Download 2011 Calendar

6. Between our Christmas card and now the calendar I am officially obsessed with the Marketing Script font.

7. We made the same snack mix as we made last year to give as gifts for the volunteers at Mac's karate class all packaged it up in brown paper bags...

8. I wrote #1-7 on Monday night. At that point I had no clue that the power would go out on our street at 2am and be out for 14.5 hours. A blown transformer was repaired at 6:30pm.

9. I spent a good part of the day staring aimlessly around the house and mentally adding up the dollars in our freezers. Thankfully every one of them was spared. Not even an ice cube melted a single drop.

10. I have never appreciated electricity as much as I do right now.

A few good details...

I really attempted to keep our cards simple this year. Of course "simple" kind of turned into "Well, they have to have embossed backgrounds." Beyond that I reminded myself that every detail eventually had to be done 50 times..so just pick a few good ones...

I think my favorite part might have been using name tags as address labels...loved the bright red on the green envelopes.

But what I loved the very most was sending them on their way to our friends and family.

12 days strategy...

During the last week of school I very carefully chose our 12 days activities so they didn't take too much time on our last busy school nights...stop at Starbucks on the way home from karate class...hang one more string of lights in Mac's room...or cut snowflakes.

Now that we're all on break we have time to get to the extra fun stuff. Try a new recipe yesterday and holiday crafts today.  Yesterday we made chocolate mousse cakes...

And today we camped out in the dining room with a good friend of ours and crafted for hours...we tried to make star ornaments, but our wire wasn't thick enough to bend properly...we stitched little embroidery hoop ornaments...and we made snowman canvases.

 

Chocolate and crafts pretty much made for the best weekend ever.

Starred...

1. into the season, 2. love & peace garland, 3. December Daily - #reverb10 Journal Day Pages, 4. xmas, 5. The Treescape, 6. I think he can stay here all year, 7. 'tis the season..., 8. Love, Santa Tags

 So much holiday goodness this week...

• The gift wrapping ideas are killing me they are so cute...loved these on kraft paper, these super cute teacher gifts, oh my goodness these tape tags...these sewn tags...and these gifts wrapped with classroom supplies are the best idea ever. 
• Then there are so many other great holiday details and crafts...vintage stamps...crocheted trees...potted pines...snowflake place cards...and a December Daily book
• I want to make turkey pockets...candy cane pops and this bark sounds weird but kind of  wonderful

One those good days...

Today is the kind of day we dream about around here. We are all so darn lucky to get to have a Christmas break...and especially to have that first day when it all stretches out before us like it will never end.

We were supposed to watch a Christmas movie tonight for our 12 Days activity, but poor Mac fell asleep before 8pm...he's finally catching up from all the cruise fun and the last week of school busy-ness.

We have all kinds of fun plans for the next week...getting together with friends...yearly traditions and lots of celebrating. I really could not be happier.

And in other news I've moved on from Pantone 348...

I'm all about a shade like #321 for our holiday thank you cards.

The artist...

Tonight's 12 days activity was to cut out snowflakes...we tried it when we got home from Mac's school holiday performance.

And we found out it's actually kind of tricky...we aren't master snowflake artists quite yet...we had fun trying though...

However we do have an official artist in the house...Mac won the cover contest for the holiday program...

 

He certainly made his craft-loving mom extra proud tonight.

Pantone 348...

It seems I am always into a new color and this Christmas it's definitely a deep kelly green...kind of like Pantone 348. Granted I don't really know anything about Pantones, but it certainly sounds official.

So I used this green for our Christmas cards...which I'll share in a few days since they'll go out in the mail tomorrow. However, I do have some thank you gifts to share. We made hot chocolate mix earlier in the week and put it into jars for Mac's school directors and his tutors. When it came time to wrap them I ended up using just green...

Of course Pantone 348 isn't looking so hot in these photos since it was a really cloudy day around here.

To make something to cover the lid I used a 2.5 inch circle punch with some cardstock and a wreath stamp. How cute would this look with some patterned paper?  

That is when I'm done being infatuated with Pantone 348.

Ten on Tuesday...

1. Saturday night was the 7th annual holiday progressive dinner in our neighborhood. We hosted the main course house and made penne with braised short ribs and a bacon ranch salad with sourdough croutons. 

2. This means we broke out the "salad furniture"...a.k.a. the massive wood salad bowl that has it's own stand. My father-in-law insisted I needed it as a Christmas gift years ago. Have to admit at first I wasn't convinced, but he just might have been right. 

3. Especially considering I'm obsessed with making my own salad dressing and croutons.

4. Another thing I'm obsessed with is using 3M tape as dimensional adhesive...so much so that I have gone through an industrial sized roll (from the hardware store) in a matter of months...so now I'm onto my next one...

 5.  Teacher gifts were finished today...

6. I was kind of cheesy with a dish washing theme....dish soap, towel and a crocheted dishcloth.

7. I made the tag into a PDF in case you'd like to be cheesy too.  Download Lots of dishes tag

8. After I printed these tags not just one, but both of our printers stopped working properly. 

9. And it's not like I still have Christmas cards to finish and address...which completely requires a printer.

10. But on the bright side, the very bright side, I'm completely done with school and have 41 glorious days off.

The 12 days...

I mentioned last week that I was making Twelve Days of Christmas plans for when Mac got home from his cruise. As of tonight he is safe and sound and full of stories. Starting tomorrow we'll have a little family activity to do everyday through the 24th...

They're all tucked inside little sewn pouches to open each day...can't wait to have some holiday fun. 

Starred...

1. garlands, wrapped up, 2. Christmas Decorations, 3. package 02c, 4. Untitled, 5. Tree Runner, 6. felt shingle tree, 7. wishing..., 8. fabric bundles

Good stuff from this past week...

• There was so much craftiness...cute cards...detailed books...yarn trees...fantastic gift wrapping and a book of crafts
• Then there was great decor ideas...an amazing studio...organizing with crates...bright Christmas details...and inspiring holiday displays
• I would like to cook bacon pinwheels...french fries and a little layered cake

Okay just one more...

I have been wrapping and wrapping some more...and actually ran out of tags! So I made myself a few and have them as the very last kit for the season...

If you need a couple more tags too you can find them here.

Stamp winner...

The hello stamp went to comment #27

Maeghan M. said...I love that cute little hello stamp! TFS!   December 08, 2010 at 08:22 AM

Maeghan please e-mail me your address.

Some one asked about the table in my room...it's from Ikea. I bought it to have someplace in here where I can stand up to work.

Someone else asked about washi tape sources...I did get it locally from Oh Hello Friend...but I've also gotten tape from a couple of different Etsy sellers here and here.

Ten on Tuesday...

1. I keep thinking about Mac being gone as just one really long weekend at his Dad's.

2. And it means I can cook everything he doesn't like....and we can watch TV while we eat dinner...and I have an extra hour in my day since I'm not his taxi this week.  

3. Can you tell I'm trying to be positive?

4. One thing I'm sincerely happy about is while he's gone I can plan for fun things to when he gets back...there is definitely a growing Twelve Days of Christmas plan around here.

5. Another thing I'm sincerely happy about is the e-mail I got this morning telling me I could watch the bow of the ship on a webcam which is something I would have never known (thanks again Jennifer). 

6. Christmas cards are beginning to arrive around here...which means I'd better start on getting some out of here. I started the "maybe I'll use this stuff" pile on Sunday night...

7. I took that pile and made half a dozen rejects today...and one that looks promising.

8. A major goal this year is to make sure the card doesn't have two dozen steps like last year.

9. When Sean saw the "maybe I'll use this stuff" pile he asked with fear in his voice, "Are we going to use all those stamps?" Clearly he know me too well. (but no we are not)

10. And speaking of stamps I made little order last week and have an extra "hello" stamp to share...please leave a comment and I'll do a random drawing tomorrow evening...

The carrot...

I mentioned earlier this week about the schoolwork getting in the way of December fun. So I set myself a goal to be done with all the article reading and writing by Sunday.

It worked. Scissors, tape, tags and a lot of cheery patterns were the carrot I dangled in front of my face as I finished summarizing the last articles. I told myself when I was done I could wrap Christmas gifts. 

The best part was piling them under the tree...

Starred...

1. Molly's Sketchbook: Felt Christmas Tree PIns, 2. merry envelope, 3. Even a bit of Christmas in the loo, 4. My Bags..., 5. holiday embellishments, 6. My workspace lamp, 7. Untitled, 8. merry christmas from the madisons

I have tons of saved links from this week...

• Scrapbooking...this book's great details has me wishing I done a December Daily...and these layouts had me practically drooling.
• I want a chalkboard like this...this is a cool idea with Ikea furniture...love this party since we had a similar theme at our wedding...am super jealous of this typewriter...and this make me want to do more Etsy shopping
• Christmas preparations...love this stump tree stand (sent a joking e-mail to my father-in-law asking him to send one)...this is such a cute idea for a kids craft...I want to make these trees...this makes me wish I was wrapping more than writing for school this weekend...and this is inspiring me to plan fun holiday stuff for when Mac get's back.
• Sugar, sugar and more sugar...these cookies...these cookies and these toffee bars...oh and especially  this bark

He's all ready...

I have to leave soon to pick Mac up from school. He'll come home to take a quick shower, eat some promised pasta with butter & cheese (his most favorite meal) , and then I'll drop him off at his Dad's for them to fly and sail away. 

Everything is ready including bags of snacks with loving notes (or more like, "I'm begging you to be careful" notes) and a notarized letter with Mac's passport to try to ensure that there aren't any issues since he's traveling internationally with only one parent.

I will miss him...I'll worry...but I'll eagerly wait to hear that he's having the time of his life. 

And I will continue to tease Bryce about meeting someone named "Svetlana" in the Ice Bar that's on the ship.

My December Daily....

I contemplated participating with a December Daily book, but I knew all too well that that first couple of weeks would sound like a broken record...

Day #4 Buried in journal article reading for my Annotated Bibliography

Day #7 Sick of having to type the words, "studied, researched, examined and findings"

Day #13 Why did I save reading three books until the end...and why did I only leave myself a week to do it?

Maybe instead I'll do a Twelve Days of Christmas book for when we have time to do the fun holiday stuff.  

However if I were making a December Daily here are the other things I'm doing on Day #2 besides crying over a 3-inch binder full of Sociology...

Watching the packing pile grow on the guest bed and trying not to freak out that Mac leaves tomorrow.  

Finishing up the latest tag kits. (They are waiting on the "beast" that was featured today on Oh Hello Friend along with the rest of my little craft space.)

Running errands and coming right home to wrap gifts so Sean won't see what I've bought him. (meanwhile that cabinet is holding all the other gifts I need to wrap)

And enjoying Christmas decorations. I said on Tumblr that I wanted a woodlands scene so I took advantage of coupons over the weekend and was a happy little copycat (here's the original).