Seven Days....

NO, I've never seen that movie, but I think it's fun to quote that line.

It's Seven Days til Christmas folks! Yes, I just said, "folks." Which when pronounced, does not have an 'L.' If it does, ya ain't from round here. "Here" is north Alabama. Where it's a sunny 59 degrees, and little chance of a White Christmas in sight. However, we can dream, can't we.

In all actuality, the one White Christmas we've had in nearly a century (2010), though amazing and a dream come true, was not much fun. You see, there are no snow plows in Alabama. We have no need for them. Therefore, when it does snow, we shut down. Entirely. And wait for the next day, when it will have inevitably melted. Nonetheless, shutting down on Christmas Day really wasn't all that much fun. Several gatherings were cancelled and couldn't be rescheduled. So, in all honesty, once was enough for me. I'd rather be able to actually go celebrate Christmas with family, than have a White Christmas while I'm stuck inside. Don't get me wrong, 2010 was our first Christmas as a married couple and was simply magical to have that special, get-up-and-it's-snowing, hey-it's-also-Christmas feeling together. But, it's not something I need every year.

What I do need every year, is Christmas music! And lots of it. So, while my cat tries to open the Christmas presents... or vanquish the terrifying train around the tree, I shall share with you some of my favorite Christmas songs. Maybe they'll help you get in the Christmas mood. You only have Seven Days...




First, an obscure song that's played at my parents' every year while we decorate the tree. Such a silly song, but SO much fun!

Yah Dis Ist Ein Christmas Tree- Mel Blanc

Because Karen Carpenter is Awesome, you get two from her:

Home for the Holidays- The Carpenters

Really, the entire Carpenters Christmas Portrait album is fantastic. It was hard to choose just two, and I can't really call these my favorites because almost all of them are favorites from this album.

Merry Christmas Darling- The Carpenters

For a little (law-abiding) joyriding...

Little St. Nick- Beach Boys

Because we all love Brenda Lee, whether we know it or not, and we all wish for a little snow.

Marshmallow World- Brenda Lee

And another... (See, I told you. You love her. You just didn't know it.)

Rockin Around the Christmas Tree- Brenda Lee

For a little romance... and duet:

Baby, It's Cold Outside- Johnny Mercer and Margaret Whiting

I love duets. And I love Bing Crosby:

Silver Bells- Bing Crosby and Carol Richards

For heartbreak... with a little bounce.

Last Christmas- Cascada

Straight out of the Rudolph movie. Brings back memories.

Holly Jolly Christmas- Burl Ives

My husband insists I sing the back-up on this song. He will sing his part over and over and over, until I chime in. He's really very pushy about it. It's tradition.

Snowflake- Jim Reeves

A little Judy Garland, anyone?

Have Yourself a Merry Little Chrismas- Judy Garland

Really, what music list can exclude Elvis? It just can't. Here's the King, without Martina McBride sticking her two cents in.

Blue Christmas- Elvis Presley

Here's a little energy boost to send you on your cheery way! (Be sure to try to hit that high note! Good luck!)

All I Want for Christmas is You- Mariah Carey

Clearly, these are not ALL of my favorite Christmas songs. How could they be? There are so many to choose from! However, if I counted correctly (and it's very possible I didn't), here's 14 of my favorite Christmas songs. So, you have 7 days to get in the Christmas mood. Take two and call me in the morning.

Merry Christmas!

My Christmas Card to You

I managed to wait until November 30th before sending out my Christmas cards this year. It's our first "official" year in our new home. We have a new Christmas tree. The house is decorated with lights (if we can ever get them to stay on). It's just never felt more exciting for it to be nearly Christmas. I just couldn't wait to spread my Christmas cheer! So, to those of you who received a card from me on December 1st, that's why. To those of you who didn't... well, send me your address, and I'd love to send you one next year!

Sending out Christmas cards, hopefully, means we'll be receiving cards of our own. So, in preparation, I decided to come up with a good way to display them. I just love looking at all the ones we get. I found these ideas via Pinterest, and decided I'd try my own version.

I used the same ribbon I used for my snowflake wreath and two more pre-made Christmas bows. I just needed a step-ladder, my glue gun, and my trusty staple gun.

 I measured the length of ribbon I wanted hanging down the center of each of my French doors in our dining room. Then, before cutting, I stood on a step-ladder and stapled the ribbon to the very top of the door (NOT the front). With it hanging the way I wanted, I just decided where I wanted the ribbon to end and cut the ribbon there. Then, I took my pre-made bow and hot glued it to the top of my ribbon, near the top, but not in the way of the door opening and closing.

 I then did the same thing on the other door. However, one of my doors has wood at the top, but the one without the knob is metal all the way. That meant the staple gun wouldn't work on that door. So, since the door is usually stationary, and I didn't need to worry about a hold that would withstand movement, I just used some clear packing tape to tape the ribbon to the very top of the door.

And just before I got started, the girl who lives next door hand-delivered our first Christmas card, so we had one ready to display! I used a scrapbooking glue dot roller on the back of the card to attach the card to the ribbon. Here's the finished product!

 So, this is how we plan to display our Christmas cards this year! Do you have any other ideas?


(P.S. Through the glass you can see our teal Adirondack chairs. We'll talk about them later...)

Happy Holidays!

I Have a Confession...

I have a wreath obsession. I think it stems from my maternal grandmother whose door has never been without a wreath and who uses them in the most unusual places... like the bathroom. Nevertheless, I feel like my front door is missing something if it ever happens to be without a wreath. It's a curse, really. Occasionally, I'd like to look out the door without having to look through a wreath. Yet, the wreath compulsion always wins. I love more than just having a wreath and looking at a wreath. I love making wreaths. With the holidays, I've recently made two (and a half) wreaths that I thought I'd share.

Because I like chronology, I'll share the Fall wreaths first, though I know the last wreath is more current. I love Fall, so I made my Fall wreath really early in the season. It was really more like late summer. So, I didn't want much of a Autumn-y feel quite yet. The inspiration came from Lindsay at what is now Makely School for Girls with her tutorial for this wreath.

However, I didn't really follow her instructions much. I decided I didn't really need my wreath quite that full, so I bought just one plain grapevine wreath at a local outlet store, Old Time Pottery. I also bought some late summery silk flowers to match some ribbon I found at Hobby Lobby and used a wooden initial that I also found at Hobby Lobby.

I simply laid the "S" on top of the wreath, while I cut apart the flower bushes and began poking flower stems into the grapevine here and there where I wanted my flowers. Nothing is glued onto the wreath so that I could reuse it later. Once I was satisfied with the look (and it had stopped hailing), I looped the ribbon through both the "S" and the wreath and secured the ribbon to the TOP of the door (as in the part touching the door frame, not the top of the front of the door) with my staple gun.

I loved the idea of not gluing anything to the wreath so that I could reuse it later, so my original plan was to use purple flowers for late summer and to replace the purple with Fall leaves and such. However, I just loved the purple so much that I couldn't bear to take it down. So, I just added a few Fall leaves and three floral pumpkins I found at Hobby Lobby. The pumpkins were great because that had a stem attached to the bottom of them so that they could be stuck into arrangements with ease. So again, there was no gluing, just a lot of poking stems into the grapevine.

I honestly love it both ways. I love the early version with the grapevine showing in places, but I also love the fuller version. Mostly, I love that it changed with the ripening of the season and was easy to make fresh without changing entirely.

Sadly, the time for Fall wreaths has come to a close. But that means Christmas/Holiday/Winter wreaths! I'm so excited to make another wreath! I considered continuing with the grapevine base, but this wreath I saw via Pinterest caught my eye. I have always LOVED snowflakes in Christmas decoration and thought how simple this would be. I found a box of large snowflake ornaments at Hobby Lobby (for half price!). You could use any size or color of snowflakes, really, as long as you have enough. I just laid out the snowflakes overlapping in a circle and began hot gluing them to one another. I glued each snowflake in several places for added support. I did have my doubts about needing something to glue the snowflakes onto for support, but they were unfounded. The snowflakes seem to be doing just fined simply attached to each other. I then layered more snowflakes on top of my original circle and continued hot gluing until I was satisfied with the look.

This was during the brainstorming phase, with my helpful kitten putting in her two cents.

 
 I then took some red ribbon that I had left over from last Christmas, looped it through the wreath, and stapled it to the top of the door. Once it was up, it looked a little too simple. So, I had a pre-made red bow from the Dollar tree in with my Christmas decorations. I just hot glued the bow to the ribbon used to hang the wreath (not to the wreath itself). The tails of the bow were a little long for my liking, so I just trimmed them a little. I love the way it turned out!

This was so much fun to make, and SO simple! I love that it isn't too Christmas-y to leave up for a while into the New Year... or until the itch to make another wreath strikes again! Stay tuned...

"Sweet & Spicy Chunky 'Spaghetti'"

John and I had not been married long. I worked my own day job, while my husband worked night shift, three nights a week at the Mental Health Facility of a hospital. I was tired, he was tired, we were out of groceries, and we were starving. In our cupboards were just the staples--things my mother taught me to never run out of, no matter what. Among them, that could yield quick suppertime results, were frozen burgers, but no buns; tomato soup, but we were hungrier than that; a can of Rotel, but no Velveeta; linguine noodles, but no makings for Alfredo sauce; and the emergency can of tomato paste that Momma insisted I would need someday, though I'd had no use for it yet. 

Growing up in the country, grocery stores were not just around the corner. When I was taught to cook, I was taught improvisation in the extreme. What do you do when you need buttermilk for the pie you have halfway mixed and just realized you don't have it? You mix regular milk with vinegar. What do you do when the chicken casserole calls for more chicken than you have? Mix in a can of cream of chicken soup. These are just a few examples, and I'm sure every family has their own versions. The point is that my mind has been trained to look at ingredients and compute the edible items I can make out of them. Call it a gift. Call it military training borne out of perceived starvation.

So, on that dreary day when my husband needed supper and neither of us had energy to grocery shop, "Sweet & Spicy Chunky 'Spaghetti'" was born.



Sweet & Spicy Chunky 'Spaghetti'

1 can of tomato soup
1 can of Rotel
1 (6 oz) can of tomato paste
4 frozen burger patties OR 1 lb of ground beef (for less chunky)
1 pkg of uncooked linguine noodles
1 tbsp dried oregano (optional)
1 tbsp dried basil (optional)

Begin boiling linguine in a pot of water with olive oil and salt until al dente. Brown burger patties (or ground beef) in a large skillet. Once browned, drain off grease and return to pan. If using patties, cut them into bite-sized chunks. Add tomato soup, Rotel, and tomato paste. Add 1 tbsp oregano and 1 tbsp basil. Cook on low, stirring occasionally, until warm.  Drain linguine (and if desired, toss with 2 tbsp olive oil, 1 tsp of salt, 1 tbsp of lemon juice, 1 tsp of oregano, and 1 tsp of basil.) Toss sauce with linguine and serve.



What I love about this recipe is not only the sweet flavor of the soup with the spicy flavor of the Rotel and the flatness of the linguine (I have issues with actual spaghetti noodles, blame my mother), but also the fact that each of these ingredients could be part of many other recipes. I've learned to keep these ingredients on hand at all times, so I know I always have at least one thing I can make. In fact, it's when I run out of one of these that I know it's time to grocery shop again... something I have gotten better at, you'll be pleased to hear. I think this is the perfect recipe for every young married couple, college kid, and bachelor with a stinky bachelor pad. So, "Stick with me, and you'll never go hungry again!" (Please, somebody, get the reference!)

Movie Review: Rise of the Guardians

Image via Google search

There aren't many movies I care to see, much less care to review, but Rise of the Guardians was worth every cent. This movie takes all your dreams and imaginary heroes, gives them validation, and then brings them to life in a delightfully fresh way.

The Rise of the Guardians is quite a hit, but I barely noticed this movie had premiered due to surprising and severe under-advertising for a movie with such a star-studded cast. Chris Pine voices the lead character, Jack Frost, and though I've been a fan of Pine's since The Princess Diaries 2, I believe the directors couldn't have chosen better. Pine's blend of vulnerable tough guy with a dose of sardonic humor is just the right touch for Jack Frost, an "imaginary" hero who can't remember where he came from and can't be seen (except by other "imaginaries"). Jack Frost struggles with finding his inner hero, all while doing what's right, though he doesn't know exactly why it is.

As Chris Pine's Frost banters with Hugh Jackman's Easter Bunny, the movie's audience gets a rare treat. Hearing action figure Jackman's quips in his rarely heard native Australian accent battling Pine's sarcastic volleys will bring more than a few rumbles of laughter (if only for the funny accent). And just like the real-life Jackman, Easter Bunny can pack a wallop. He is certainly not a Bunny-Foo-Foo to be messing with, most of the time. Yet, inside that boomerang weilding cottontail is a sweet chocolate bunny who just wants Easter to go off without a hitch, so children will continue to believe in him, have hope, and save him from...melting (?).

Helping Easter Bunny save, um, Easter, is ironically, Santa Claus, voiced by Alec Baldwin with a Russian (I think) accent. Tattooed guns of Naughty and Nice introduce this brawny character who seems to be the leader of the Guardians, if anyone but the Man in the Moon can be called such. Santa first sees the impending doom from Jude Law's Boogeyman threatening to steal all the joy from children everywhere, and thus the identities of the Guardians. Baldwin as Santa is brilliant, so much so that I had no idea the voice belonged to Alec Baldwin, of all people. Yes, Santa is jolly, but that big ole' belly doesn't just house a bowl full of jelly. His center is full of wonder and more than a little intuition.

As Law's Boogeyman threatens more and more of all that we hold dear, he really does own the market on fear. This disillusioned, embittered character can become quite dark at times (think Loki from The Avengers), possibly inducing in younger viewers the Night-Mares he's so fond of. However, if your child can stick it out until the end, we're all taught how to deal with such fears. Like Loki, the Boogeyman has deep-seated emotional issues rooted in his envy of all the adoration and trust bestowed on the Guardians by children throughout time. He's less of a bad guy, than a misunderstood child who's considerable talents are misdirected...and can throw a mighty temper tantrum. He spends his time, along with his amazingly animated Night-Mares, trying to see that the Guardians become exactly what he is: alone and invisible.

The final two Guardians are Mr. Sandman, Boogeyman's most direct enemy in the dream business, who has no voice, which is surprisingly comedic, though he's no pushover, and the Toothfairy, voiced by Isla Fisher, who rounds out the group with some feminine compassion and is a treat for all the little fairy fans out there. Though these two make less of an immediate impression, they bring a completeness to the group that would be lacking otherwise. By the end of the movie, there is no doubt that Mr. Sandman is not just a snooze-fest, and the Toothfairy embodies everything a fairy should be.

This movie is a fabulous family film, which spans all the holidays, despite a wintry setting. Not a curse word or bad attitude to be had (other than the bad attitude we're all rooting against, of course), though there is some violence.  The message is that there's a little bit of a hero in all of us and that we can only be harmed by what we allow to harm us. It even teaches compassion and understanding for the "bad guy." However, it's not just a family film. The mood lends itself to the adults in the audience who want to experience the innocence of being a kid again, or just want to watch something that will have them hanging on the edge of their seats...okay, maybe just sitting up a little straighter. After all, it is about heroes that are simply imaginary. Or are they? It all depends on whether or not you believe.

To check the appropriateness of this movie for children, a good break-down of the content is found here.

Black Damask Stool

As my husband and I have settled into our new house (which, after a year, is still a process), we brought with us several pieces of well-loved furniture. Starting out as a young, married couple, the funds are not readily available for brand new everything...which gives me the opportunity to exercise my crafting skills. One of our well-loved items was a Windsor back chair that was owned by my grandparents. I don't have pictures of the original, but it was similar to this: 

Courtesy: Random Google search

 This poor chair had seen it all. Five children, ten grandchildren, and several great-grandchildren. The back rods were coming out of the seat, the leg supports were dragging the ground. It had become so rickety that it was reserved as an emergency seat for the slim only, for fear of it crashing under any significant weight. But it's lines were beautiful and it held a history. So, as I'm bending over at the waist drying my hair one day, it occurs to me how nice it would be if I had something to sit on in the bathroom. And then I realize that I have the perfect candidate. We shall revive Mr. Windsor.

So, my husband so kindly took off the back of the chair for me and glued the leg supports back into their slots with wood glue. Then, I got to work. Here's a before shot:

As you can see, the dark finish had lost its luster. So, I gave the legs a coat of black paint. Since I knew I was going to cover the top, I went to Lowe's and got a sample can of black paint, and I have a ton left over. It cost around $3.99. This shot is mid-paint:

 After the legs were painted and had dried, I turned the now-stool upside down onto some foam we had left-over from another project. We originally purchased it at Hancock's Fabrics for around $7.00 per rectangular block, about 1 1/2 thick.

While the stool was upside down on the foam, I traced the outline of the seat with a Sharpie.

Once I had my outline, I used a box cutter and scissors to cut out the seat shape in the foam. I then placed the foam onto the seat and did some touch-up snips to make sure I had the correct shape.

At this point, I could have tried to secure the foam to the seat, so it wouldn't slip, but that didn't prove to be a problem. I also could have covered the cushion and secured it to the seat so that the wood edge would show around the seat, but due to the curved nature of the seat, I felt it was best to do it another way. Next, I turned both stool and foam cushion upside down on my fabric and cut out a large circumference around the stool to give me enough to work with. I then used my staple gun and began stapling the fabric to the bottom of the stool. 

Once I had everything stapled up. I could have just continued on from there, but this gaping hole in the bottom bothered me, though who but my cat would be looking at the bottom of my stool, I don't know. So, to fix that, I cut another rectangular piece of fabric and stapled it in place. Though, later I realized I should have checked to make sure the pattern all went the same way.

At this point, I was essentially finished, and I loved it.

But, as an experiment to add a little flare, I dug out some fringe I had purchased for some window shades that never got made, and decided to hot glue the fringe around the bottom of the seat. I began in the back, working my way around the front slowly, to make sure I got everything aligned properly.

With that final touch, I called Mr. Windsor finished, made over into a French boudoir stool with a name like Madame de Chevreuse...

After some time has passed, I'm still in love with my little stool. It's perfect to perch on in the bathroom, and raises the style factor in my soon-to-be black and white-ish bathroom. Here's Madame de Chevreuse in her natural habitat.

Excuse the kitty tail. She was just too curious.

So, I'm learning to revive well-loved items so that they can be re-loved by a next generation. With all the history and charm you just can't buy.