Monday, December 21, 2015

Christmas Card 2015

Now that our Christmas cards have officially been sent and delivered, I can share this year's card as a virtual Seasons Greetings to all of you here on the blog!


We set up a little photography studio in our basement, collecting old doors and crates from the barn and a local antique store to make our "set".  A huge thank you goes out to Daniel for being a dog trainer extraordinaire. He was waiting in the wings with lots of treats to get them to stay in place and pose for our card!

For the text portion, I knew what I wanted the card to say and decided a Chalkboard would be a cute and fun way to add it to the card. I absolutely love how it turned out!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays from our family to yours!


Saturday, December 19, 2015

I'm BACK!

It's been quite some time since I've updated this blog.  With the end of my Master's degree nearing, things at our house just got a little too busy and something had to give.  Unfortunately it was blogging, but there's good news: I'm back now! In a true reflection of the craziness of my past few months, I'm going to post a Five on Friday 
on Saturday.  

Here are Five things that have happened since the last time I updated the blog:

ONE - I Got a Master's Degree!

Image via Clemson University Facebook
I finally did it!  After 2 long years I've reached my goal of getting a Master's Degree and I couldn't be more excited about it!  Working full time and going to school is no joke.  There were some days when I was working on my thesis, classwork, Etsy shop orders, and real job, that I thought I was never going to make it, much less the bed.   A big thank you goes out to my family and friends for being supportive and patient with me!  Now I can have my free time back and don't want to look at a textbook for a VERY VERY long time!

TWO - We Have a New Foster Dog Who Has Stolen Our Hearts!


Meet Chewbacca or "Chewy" for short.  She's an 8 year old Shih Tzu with some special needs that we decided to foster about 2 months ago.  Chewy doesn't make her own tears, has some skin allergies, and has a low functioning thyroid.  Despite all of this, she is the sweetest dog I've ever met and is so easy to love and care for!  She came right into our house like she's always been here and quickly went from sleeping in her kennel to sleeping with us on the foot of our bed (which is her favorite spot in the whole house).  

Chewy had a minor surgery earlier this week and was pretty upset with me for leaving her at the vet where she lived as a rescue for a long time (being adopted and returned several times--which breaks my heart).  She gave me this look when I dropped her off for the surgery that could only be described as saying "Et tu, Brute?"  I have given her lots of treats and snuggles to make up for this betrayal and am trying to convince her that she is 
safe at home here with us!

THREE - We Built a Giant Hogwarts for Halloween!

Daniel and I as Luna Lovegood and Dumbledore!
Our town has an annual trick-or-treating event for the local kids.  This year (in addition to everything else that was going on) I got it in my head that we had to transform the front of my Dad's store into Hogwarts.  Daniel and I used styrofoam sheets from Lowes to build a castle front that was over 12 feet tall and my entire family dressed up as a different character from the book series to pass out candy in front of the castle.  The kids (and their parents) were so excited to see Hogwarts and would jump at the chance to guess which character we were.  This night was probably the highlight of my fall!  I loved being able to do something fun for the kids of our town, while getting my nerdiness out for Harry Potter!  I can't wait to add on to it next year (que Daniel's groan here...hahaha).

FOUR - We Hosted Our First Annual Thanksgiving Oyster Roast!

 



Daniel and I have pretty large families and our Thanksgiving Celebration is always huge!  Many of my extended family members come for Thanksgiving from out of town, joining us on the farm the night before.  Daniel and I thought hosting an Oyster Roast in our backyard (look!  we finally have some grass) would be a fun way to kick of the Turkey Day festivities.  

Since we live in the country, it gets pretty dark out in the fall/winter months.  To help give some light to the party I asked Daniel if he would string up some Italian Cafe Lights over the yard and I LOVE how it turned out.  The effect was so romantic and festive--if only we could figure out a way to keep them up year round!  We had 300 Oysters for our party and all 300 were quickly consumed by our crowd!  It was a fun night of laughter, cozying up by the heaters, and eating.  I can't wait to do it again next year!

FIVE - We Decorated for Christmas and Went a Little Griswold!

As our first official Christmas in our new house, I've gone completely Griswold.  From making Daniel drive an hour to a Christmas Tree farm in the mountains (IN THE RAIN) to cut down our own tree, to going to a million stores to find just the right decorations for our mantle, I wanted to really feel the Christmas Spirit in our new house.  I just love the magic Christmas Decor brings to your home and wanted to do it big for our first year!  I'm sure Daniel thinks I'm just a little bit nutty, but thank goodness he just goes along with it, getting on ladders, hanging wreaths, and getting everything just right.  I will share more pictures of the rest of our decor soon!

So there are just 5 highlights of the past few months!  Tonight, Daniel and I are off to see the hilarious Amy Schumer in Charlotte and I CAN'T WAIT!  
Happy Weekend Everyone!



This post is linked with (AprilKarli AmandaTifAndrea, and Rebecca) for Five on Friday!