One of the awesome gifts I got for Christmas from FIL was a gift card to build my own bag at Timbuk2

My husband has one of their messenger bags from a couple of years ago, and I’ve been jealous of it for quite a while.  I’m kind of a bag addict (just like I’m a coat and shoe addict) – I’ve had at least three different bags in the past few years that I use to cart my laptop and work stuff around.  I’ve never really loved any of them, though, and I was starting to get really irritated by my current bag.  It has this weird elastic opening on the top that is just barely too small for my 15″ MacBook Pro, so it’s just a pain in the butt to use!

So I hemmed and hawed over buying my own bag, but with Christmas and birthday coming up, I figured, why not put it on my list?  And bless my lucky heart, we live out of town from all relatives, so online wish lists come in handy!  Score for me!

The super cool part is that you can customize your own bag!  How cool is THAT?!?  But you know me, I’m indecisive and picky and take FOREVER to make decisions  So I still haven’t designed my bag.  But you all know I’ve been having fun with their little design a bag feature and coming up with countless different options, right?  It’s fun being a bag designer

Go check it out if you get the chance, and if you come up with a favorite style or design, definitely share!  Maybe you’ll inspire me and I finally order my new bag.

I finished decorating our dining room this weekend.  I only have 5 days left to enjoy it, but it will likely stay up until well past the New Year.  And I’m perfectly fine with that!

Here’s what it used to look like:

Perfectly wonderful and festive, but I wanted a little more.  So, I rummaged through a box of framed pictures that have been waiting to be hung since June *ahem* and wrapped a few in pretty paper, hung a few ornaments, and displayed them all with everything that was already there.

Cute, yes?  I especially love that we have wedding pictures of me and DH, but also from DHs parents wedding, way back in the 70s.  Now I just need a copy of my parents wedding picture, and we’d be all set.

I also printed and framed a little home-made DIY “artwork” – it says, “Jesus is the gift”.  DH and I both are Christian an believe that Christmas is truly about celebrating the birth of Jesus, the greatest gift that God ever gave.  It’s so easy to forget what Christmas is about and think it’s just about presents, or food, or family, or decorating or whatever else.  And sure, each of those things are important and wonderful things to focus on or celebrate.

But the first “Christmas” was simple and poor – a young woman and her husband traveling home with no place to stay, no decorations, no family, just faith that God would provide and be faithful to them.  And God was just that – he provided us (and them) with the gift of Jesus, and there was much rejoicing in heaven over him!

Let’s celebrate Jesus this Christmas, the greatest gift I ever received.

Even though I will only be at home for less than 14 days out of the entire month of December, I still wanted to decorate.  I wasn’t going to let anything stop me!

A few years ago, I got a bunch of random ornaments and a small fake tree off of Free Cycle (those were the single days) but when DH and I got hitched and moved cross country, I left most of the stuff with my old roommates.

All we had for Christmassy stuff was stuff our parents had given us, which is actually quite a lot!  A couple of years back, my mom gave me a bunch of adorable stuffed Santas and angels (she used to decorate the mantle with TONS of Santas – it got a little out of control at one point, and that’s when I think she decided to give some of them away), her old Christmas tree skirt, a nice wreath, plus a few ornaments I’ve collected over the years as gifts that she was keeping safe for me.  DH also had a few ornaments from his parents.

But most of it was kind of hodge-podge and not totally my style – well, that’s not true.  I think I could do rustic-country if I really tried, but I’m resisting.  :-)

After I found a little inspiration that I posted about yesterday, I decided to head to the store and stock up on some simple round ornaments of varying colors, plus some garland.  Here’s what became of it!

9 ft of (fake)garland for $4, people!  I thought that was quite the steal.  I tied silver, green, and teal ornaments onto the garland with string and hung it from the wooden bench in our foyer.

I also decorated our piano a little

I’m not quite finished yet – I still want to wrap a few frames and put up a few more pictures and hang a few remaining ornaments.

I put a few more ornaments inside our cake dome, which is handy and turns upside down to be a pedestal bowl!

There was a nice white tablecloth with little silvery-gold threads in it, but DH vetoed that, reminding me how much of a messy eater he is and the fact that we actually eat in our dining room.  :-/  Bummer, ‘cuz it looked so pretty!

Last but not least is one of my favorite things.  When DH and I got married, a woman from our church asked if she could give us a special gift to remember New England.  One day at church she showed up with all of these small white boxes.  She explained to me that one of her good friends had passed away several years ago and these always brought her joy around Christmas time….

Yup, a whole car full of Department 56 houses!

They are a set for “New England” – and I love them!  I grew up with my mom setting up similar little displays around the house.  I always loved the glow of the homes at night and just imagining little scenarios where the little people would be caroling or bringing home their sled after a day on the hills.  Such joy as I remember those growing up!  My mom still has a bunch, but she probably won’t part with them for a while, so I was thrilled when this friend gave me her collection!  How generous!

Last year we set them up on the piano, but this year they are making an appearance on a low coffee table in our foyer.  I wish I had a better place and way to display them, but this will have to do!  Here’s our little New England winter village.

I love it!  I can’t wait until there’s actually snow on the ground and we’ll be living in a little midwest village witner wonderland, with a piece of New England right in our foyer!

First, I apologize for the lack of posting in November.  There really wasn’t much going on that was worth posting.  We spent virtually every weekend either raking the gazillion leaves in our yard, or inside fixing something in our house.  Things accomplished:

1. We brought 3 or 4 truckloads of bagged leaves to the city compost.  (Note to self – next year, start our own compost, because they charge you!)
2. Took out the window AC unit in our bedroom after one especially cold night.
3. Installed the ceiling fan in our office (picture forthcoming – I really like it!)
4. Installed a fun little under-the-counter storage thing-y in our sink.  I’m kind of an organization and de-clutter freak.  My messy kitchen is driving me nuts after being gone for 4 days and forgetting it was there…
5. Killed my thyme and oregano plant  Sadness.

And now that Thanksgiving has passed and all of the gaudy fake leaves can go back into storage and the weird scarecrow in our neighbors yard is gone, it’s time for Christmas!  I love Christmas time and Advent.  I love thinking about the birth of Jesus, the greatest gift of all.  My faith is refreshed every year during this season – I love it!

I also love all of the joy, celebration, giving, time with family, snow, twinkle lights and holiday wreaths, trees, and decorations.  It’s my favorite time of year.  :-)

Unfortunately, I’m going to be away for most of it this year.  In fact, I’ll be away for more than half of December due to work, a wedding, spending time with family, and more work.  But I think I’m still going to decorate a little.  Because who can deny that they don’t like a little bit of Christmas cheer?

Because I won’t be around much, and we’re not actually celebrating Christmas here this year, I don’t think we’re going to have a tree.  :-(  Sadness.  But it’s okay, because we will have cute little Christmas houses, a wreath, some twinkle lights, and I think I’m going to try some decorating ideas I found on a “friends” blog:

I love the dangling ornaments from the pictures, and the wrapped pictures that look like presents – it looks super easy and something I could reuse from year to year.  Unfortunately, we don’t have shelves quite like that in our house.  But we do have our piano, a plate rail and a few book shelves that could work.  I just need to go out and finally print some pictures that I’ve been planning to for a while!

This table idea is cute and simple – she just used a floor length mirror and plopped some candles on there with the glass containers holding the extra ornaments.  I have a few similar glass containers and I’m pretty sure we have an extra mirror lying around somewhere…maybe I’ll just do the candles and ornaments without the mirror.  I envision lots of food smudges on it in the future!

I’ll post some pictures when I get around to it, and eventually I’ll post a picture of what I did for the month of November to decorate around the house.

I know you’ve been waiting eagerly for this.  Here’s a few photos from the last month or so.  We’ll start with possibly the most hilarious thing I’ve ever seen having to do with InterVarsity staff.

Hilarious skits at RSC 2008

At our regional staff meetings, we played some games to celebrate 2 staff who are in their last year (these were their favorite games).  One was “Skit in a Bag” where you have to put together a 5 min skit using totally random objects as props, NOT with their typical uses.  This group had the theme “Synchronized Swimming at the Olympics”.  I’ve never seen my AD do water ballet on carpet with a weird wrench thing plugging his nose, but it was SO funny!

Jon the water goddess

Ta da! The big finish.  I give it a ten for originality.  Let’s just say they “won” the game.  My team lost miserably.

My "missionary" shoes

We studied part of Acts during the week and talked about being missionaries.  We brought our shoes, people filled them with notes of encouragement and Bible verses, and then we sorta “displayed” them around our regional vision, which is about going to Jerusalem, Judea and the ends of the earth, from Acts 1:8.   These are my “missionary” shoes – I already feel like I’m “at the ends of the earth” so to speak, but I know eventually I’ll be more comfortable at Grinnell and it will become my home.

Tom Lin, our Regional Director

Lindsay and Len celebrating Len's many years on staff

Cenral Region Staff! Aren't we a good looking bunch? I LOVE Amy's expression

Those 4 1/2 days were tons of fun.  I got to do archery for the first time, hang out with new people, play some Settlers (I should post about that sometime…) and have some really great time with the Lord.  Moving to a “new” part of the country has been hard.  There are some familiar faces, but even so, adjusting to new traditions, patterns, ways of thinking is a bit tricky.  A lot is similar to New England, but there’s enough that’s different that I’m relearning what it’s like to live in the Midwest.  I’m in a strange situation because Grinnell (the town) is a pretty typical small town with farmers and families, but it’s also pretty influenced by the college, which is much more akin to the elite schools and towns in New England that I’m more familiar with.  So, in a sense, I’m sorta in two worlds at once – my old Jerusalem (the midwest) is now my new ends of the earth, and yet there are pieces of my old ends of the earth (New England) that will eventually become my new Jerusalem (Grinnell).  Catch all that? 

After RSC, and a flurry of crazy winter weather, we drove out to Nebraska.  Here’s a few pics from our time out in Alliance.  Gotta have a picture of the cows. 

Cattle Country

More cows.

As previously stated, I joined Jerod and his dad for some hunting excursions.  I went out with them twice – the first day was FRIGID cold.  The second time was much more bearable.  I think most of these are from the second time – otherwise, I have a feeling my finger probably would have gotten frostbite.

Nebraska Grasslands

The beautiful Nebraska grasslands, right at dusk.  It started getting dark around 4 pm – so I snapped this picture on the way to our next spot.  Unfortunately, wordpress doesn’t render the colors quite as richly as I’d like.  It always looks a bit “washed out”.  I’ll try to work on that.

On the hunt for some pheasant.

Here’s Jerod on the hunt for some pheasant – he got one too!  I think we just ate it for dinner a few nights ago…SO much better than I thought it would be.

Both Jerod and I have Danish ancestors, and one of the traditions (sort of) on my mom’s side of the family is having aebilskivers (pronounced able-ski-ver) on Christmas morning, most often when at my Nana and Papa’s in Chicago.  So we made some for the family that morning!  Jerod actually puts apples in them the way you’re supposed to, I prefer plain.

Our Christmas Stockings

I brought my old Christmas stocking with me – I had this one when I was younger and people called me Jenna.  I think my mom made it.  Jerod’s is made by his mom too – I love that it has sequins on it!  heehee, so cute

Christmas Morning!

It's a Christmas mystery!

So, Jerod and I had trouble getting all of our Christmas shopping done before we left for Nebraska because of all the craziness going on.  And we had the toughest time figuring out what to get Liz (his step sister) and Jaime (her husband).  We finally decided to grab something left over on their wedding registry (they had A LOT they didn’t receive) and have it shipped to them in Minneapolis, but we wanted to give them something to open.  So, we printed out a picture of their gift (this schnazzy wine opener set), mounted it on some tag board with rubber cement, and then I cut it into puzzle pieces.  They had to put together their puzzle to figure out their gift.   We also gave them a dollar store cork opener as a joke.  They LOVE it, and it was tons of fun to see them work at it.

Red Velvet Cake

And last, but not least, is the red velvet Christmas cake that Micki made.  We were overwhelmed with cookes and sweets during the week.  This in particular was quite decadent! A wonderful Christmas had by all

It’s been a busy month!  December flew by quickly with so much going on.  Jerod went to Florida for a conference one week, I went to the Ozarks in Missouri for a conference the following week.  Then, after dodging a crazy blizzard, we drove out to Nebraska for a week over Christmas.  It was a wonderful week full of many new things for me – the biggest by far was my first hunting outing!

Now, don’t freak out, I wasn’t allowed to shoot anything because I don’t have a license, but I did walk some fields with Jerod, his dad, and some of his dad’s friends.  Parts of it were torturously boring and it was incredibly cold, but it was also really exciting when I saw Jerod shoot a pheasant.  I did have the chance to shoot at a cow pie with a shot fun.  The kickback nearly gave me a bruise on my arm!  I’m such a wimp.

There were a few other new things – driving off road in a truck, eating pheasant, driving across Nebraska for the first time in 12 years (not the most exciting thing ever, but a really good way to get lots of knitting done!) – overall, it was a great week.  We played lots of Wii, which is seriously QUITE the workout, enjoyed the hot tub, and hung out with the family lots.  It was a very nice relaxing week – just what we needed.

Now that I’m back, I’m busy finishing my album layouts since my trial version of photoshop expires in like 4 days. Eeeeeeek! I’m also preparing for the spring semester – I’ve got to finish planning two retreats, work ahead on our Bible study planning, and a few other things.  Yikes, I’ve got lots to do.

This week will be exciting for two main reasons – today, Jerod and I both have eye doctor appointments.  Now, I know this sounds mundane and boring, but it’s very exciting because, you see, Jerod has had the same style of glasses for like 10 years or something crazy like that.  And during grad school he broke them or lost them or something, and just ordered the same ones, but one size too big – so they are HUGE.  Hehe.   So, not only will it be good for him to get an updated prescription (he complains of not being able to see everything) but an updated style will be nice as well.  For me, I probably will get new lenses in my funky black rimmed glasses and a new pair of other glasses since my second pair is completely stretched out and scratched.

The other exciting thing is we’re going to hopefully get one of our Christmas presents this week!  Jerod’s dad and stepmom pooled together their Christmas and wedding gifts to us and asked us what we wanted.  After much debate, we decided we wanted a grill – so here’s what we’re getting:  It’s called the Big Green Egg.  It looks ridiculous, but apparently it’s a pretty awesome ceramic grill that maintains moisture real well and conserves heat too.  It is technically a charcoal grill, which at first I wasn’t too thrilled about.  But Jerod pointed out that we can also smoke things with this, cook overnight, and make many varieties of yummy things.  After reading some websites and reviews, we were sold!  So we’re hoping to run out to a hardware store in Brooklyn to buy ours, and then Jerod is going to make a table for it.  Woohoo, winter grilling, here we come!

There’s a lot more to share, including new years resolutions, pictures of current fun projects (I’m making my first pair of mittens!) and other fun things, but that’s all for now.  I need to get working on those album pages…