The best gifts of all

My husband and best friend, Chris aka Scooter

In case you're wondering, his shirt says "Your halls are gonna get decked".

Yesterday, my family made the two hour drive to my oldest daughter's house for our family Christmas get together. She lives in the mountains and we always have such a great time when we visit her. She might not have the wealth of Martha Stewart, but she does have the creativeness, the enthusiasm, and the energy for being such a wonderful hostess! She decided to make it even more fun by telling us she put a theme to it; we had to have corny/tacky Christmas sweaters/tshirts to gain admittance into the party. Lol I decided to hit the thrift stores last week to see what I could find for us, and lo and behold, this wasn't such an original idea after all. It seems that everybody else was doing the same thing, as witnessed by how many other women I ran into that said they were looking for the same thing, for the same reason. We all managed to pull it off though, and had a great time laughing at each other's inventiveness. Just about the time I would snap a photo of someone, they would move, but I have chosen a few of them to share. This is my little two year old grandson, who just didn't want to stay off the scooter we got him. It has a wide base with two wheels in the front, especially made for little guys like him. It was a chore trying to find a gift bag big enough to wrap it in, so instead, I made him a pillowcase to have afterwards. He loves trains, thanks to his Papa Chris, so of course, I used fabric with trains on it. It was perfect, and I now have my sewing mojo back! (Check out the two different boots he wore. LOL Well, he is two ya know!)

He also adores his older cousins, and is a little ham when it comes to the camera.

Philip, my 12 year old grandson (and older brother to little guy). As you can see, he wasn't going to take part in any 'theme', but hey, he at least wore red. In two months time, he will turn 13, so we didn't have much hope for him to wear a Christmas sweater, tacky or not. He's still my buddy though, and I'm so very proud of him! He has been a Naval Sea Cadet for almost a year now, and loves everything about it. He seems to be very devoted to it and says he will join the Navy when he is done with high school. It was only fitting one of his gifts I bought for him is the electronic version of Battleship.

Meet Alexandra (we call her Alex), my 16 year old granddaughter. Is she not absolutely gorgeous?!!? That is her with her boyfriend, Bo, in the top pic, and at 6' 5", he is way taller than her. She's all that, and brains too! Being the family fashionista, she has her eye on the fashion industry, but whatever she chooses to do, I will be the proudest grandmother ever!!! She calls me her "tiny grandma" because she towers over me at 5' 8" (I'm 5' 3"), or something like that. She obviously got the height from her dad's side of the family, as she has an aunt that is something like 5' 10". I might not have those numbers exactly correct, so we will just say she is tall and beautiful!!!

Oops, I missed my son-in-law Steve's head! It's no big secret that I'm not a photographer, but I wanted to get his "corny" tshirt in the picture. Those really are popcorn kernels. Clever, right? lol

My granddaughter, Kayahna, age 10, is the one who wants to be a veternarian. She is my little doll baby I bought the sewing machine for, so she can be like her mommy and nana. She is such a little sweetheart, quiet and shy until she gets to know you well, and like her cousins, excels in school, as well as Girl Scouts. Mostly, she loves animals!!! That is "Mousse" (pronounced moose), Maggie's father, she is holding. She's the one I love knitting for!

This is Kyler, my 7 year old grandson, and I thought it was funny he was being camera shy with me. He is a smart little dude, but can be feisty and hold his own all the same. He is a natural born athlete and we enjoy going to all of his sporting events. He already has coaches of some Little League teams asking him to join their team next season, he's just that good!

This is my oldest daughter, Aimee, who gave me three beautiful grandchildren (Alex, Emily, and Billy). I couldn't be any prouder of her, and her knitting skills exceed mine beyond measure!!

Emily, my 14 year old granddaughter, is a sweetheart like none other! What kind of a grandmother would I be if I didn't brag about how beautiful she is too?!?! That smile of hers is a knockout, and I worry for the young boys that try to cross her father's path. She's the typical teenage girl who likes hanging out with her friends, going to movies, and loves to ballroom dance! She has given it up for now, but she's also an excellent violinist.

My little 6 year old grandson, Billy, ran and grabbed his Papa Chris to come watch what he thinks is a scary part of the movie Ghostbusters, he was watching. He didn't say that was the reason, but we all knew it was. lol Papa Chris would never turn any of these children away. They have stolen his heart and he loves them all!!

This was just a small sampling of our festivities yesterday and doesn't include my whole family. There are some who weren't comfortable with having their pictures put on my blog, for various reasons (most of my readers know what those reasons are), and I don't pressure them. I understand and will honor their requests. I'm proud of them just the same, and love them all with every ounce of my being, unconditionally. Every single one of them are so very precious to me!!!

We all had so much fun, and everyone brought their specialty dishes to share, so there was more food than we could eat in one afternoon/evening. The hot apple cider, the Russian Teacakes my family has always loved me to make, the stuffed jalapenos my youngest daughter surprised us with, and my oldest daughter's famous peanut butter cups, are just a few examples of the goodies we munched the day away on.

My youngest daughter, as I have said recently, is honing her sewing skills and I am so excited about it!! She sewed me one of my presents, and hopefully, I will remember to share pics of it in upcoming posts. There were a lot of handcrafted gifts and it makes my heart swell to see that my children and grandchildren have learned what the really important things about Christmas is for, and proves you don't have to go into debt for the holidays. Just being with all of them yesterday was the best gift of all!!!!

I hope y'all are having a wonderful and safe weekend, and are feeling as blessed as I am to have family and friends all around you, especially this time of year! God bless all of you!!!

I'm dreaming of a white Christmas

In my last post, I promised to let you know about the surprise I had for my mom over the weekend, so here it is. My mom's favorite stories as a young girl, were Anne of Green Gables. Also, as a young girl, my mom spent part of her childhood growing up in a town about two hours north of where we live now. My grandparents were from Chico, California, so it's always nice for my mom to be able to occasionally visit relatives she still has there. They also have a small theater company that I happened to hear advertising on the radio a few weeks ago, about a play they would be performing, called Anne of Green Gables. My whole family loves live theater, and in fact, that's how one of my cousins got her dream job of performing with the dance troupe of Siegfried and Roy for 20 years! I knew my mom would love to see this play, so for part of her Christmas gift, I ordered tickets and Scooter and I took her to see it this past Sunday. We had so much fun as the cast kept us laughing. The story is a humorous one, about an older couple (brother and sister) looking to have a boy from an orphanage come live with them at Avonlea to help with the chores as they were getting on in years. What they got instead, was a young, talkative, girl, that endears herself to them. It was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon, and mom really enjoyed it!!!

At first glance, I had weeks to prepare for the holiday season. I woke up a couple of days ago and realized I now only have days. We are having our family Christmas tomorrow, so I've been using the past four days to get some shopping done. I got up yesterday at 4:30 (that should be illegal) so I could be at the stores when they opened at 6 am. One of my last stops for the day was Macy's, where I make sure I go every year to pick up Scooter's favorite cologne. They always have boxed sets of Giorgio Armani (his favorite and my favorite on him!), for the same price as a single bottle. I should have remembered also, that it's this time of year when they have free gifts for making a purchase of a certain amount. I had no clue until I arrived back home, that I had scored this awesome bag in my package, and I love it...it's going to make a great knitting bag!!! My daughter and I did the same thing last year, and sometimes we use our bags for knitting and sometimes, it's actually our purse! And sometimes, if it's a small enough knitting project, it doubles as both at the same time!!

Much to my relief, the shopping is done. I am not a mall shopper, and never really have been. I detest hanging out at malls, and if I have to go to them, I usually always know what I want, so I go in, get what I came for, and get out as fast as I can. Even better if the store I want has an entrance and exit that leads to the outdoors. Now that's not to say I don't like lingering in a particular store for a while to see all the latest fashions and trends, especially since I have grandchildren in their teens and it's a must...no, it's my pleasure to see to it that I'm up on all of the latest and greatest! I am also very fortunate to have grandchildren that will say to me, "grandma, I would much rather have you make that for me. That way, I know it will fit perfect and be sewn a whole lot better!" So, in the coming months, I will be doing more sewing than shopping, and that makes for one happy grandma!

Though, not as much knitting has taken place this week as usual, I have still managed to get some needle clicking in, mostly in the evenings. I wanted to knit one of my granddaughters a pair of leg warmers to match her mom's, and I completed one. I won't finish the pair in time for our family get together tomorrow, but that's ok, as they weren't intended to be a Christmas gift anyway. Her favorite color is purple, so naturally, I chose a purple yarn for her, and I think she will be quite excited with them. The pattern is called Spiral Legwarmers and is a free one on Ravelry.

This past Wednesday at knit night, my longtime gal pal Kathy, finished her scarf I taught her to knit for her sister's birthday present. She was so proud, as she should have been...it was perfect!!! It's good to see she is a bit of a perfectionist like me, (which I have always known about her anyway), so she doesn't have a problem with tinking once she has recognized a mistake. I started her out learning to knit with a sport weight yarn doubled up with an eyelash yarn. I was asked why I did that to her and my response was, "I figure if she can start with the hardest thing possible, from here on out, everything else will be a cakewalk for her". I look at it as a confidence builder and she did a fantastic job!!! It is so soft, and I'm sure her sister loved it when she gave it to her last night.

It's raining here in northern California again today, and it's expected to stay that way for the next four days. We will be heading to the mountains tomorrow to my daughter's, and I'm hoping for some of the white stuff. I love how pretty it makes everything, and my grandkids have a blast in it! I've had white Thanksgivings before, but never a white Christmas...maybe this will be the year for it.

Have a warm and wonderful weekend!!