Have a day like this, try a week or a month...be totally conscious of the treasures around you the next time you get together with family, friends, children, your spouse. Time is precious ~ be conscious of your life & all it's worth! xo Sarah
"We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures."
We have hit day 100 of school! It amazes me every year that it goes by faster and faster than the previous year. I think time flies even more since my son was born!
This month means~ Valentines', my son's birthday, vacation (right around the corner), celebrating my sister in law's special birthday, getting some tax money back, and one extra day this month!!
Hope your February is full of wonderful things!
xo Sarah
Monday, February 6, 2012
Hello Monday (again)~
Hello Super Bowl loss to those of us in New England (blech),
Hello to a dry weather week, and more mild days
Hello to my weekly to-do list: my favorite item this week ~ buying a new bouquet for my table
Hello to 2 more weeks until vacation, and time to start some canvas projects
Hello to a busy week with lots of meetings and a site visit...
Love is in the air...time to decorate the front door once again. We (my son & I - I did the purchasing, he did the painting) bought some foam hearts, opened some paint & glitter, and turned our Christmas wreath into a Valentine wreath. Maybe, just maybe, I'll get a few more weeks out of it! ;)
I am certainly not the chef in our home (I leave that to my skilled husband), but I love food! I also enjoy taking pictures of food, and wowing people with food presentation. These photos were taken at a catered dinner party that I worked with my brothers. Not only was the food unbelievably delicious, but the food displays were amazing too!
I'm thinking of spring with my tulip bouquet on my dining room table! Aren't they beautiful? Remember my word for the year ~ celebrate~ well here's one more way I'm celebrating. I've been good to myself by buying flowers every couple of weeks. This week tulips were in at the florist - my favorite!! Be good to yourself this week!
I love shoe organizers, you know, the ones that hang inside of a closet door? But, I don't use them for shoes. I have one set of shoe organizers (in a blue Waverly pattern) inside of my den closet. The pockets hold all of those little items that we never used to be able to find such as cords, accessories, or extra parts.
For example, this pocket holds ipod accessories: cords, manuals, cases, etc.
This pocket holds memory cards for our cameras and camcorder.
Some of the other pockets hold things such as: discs, our label maker, binoculars, monitors, batteries, and Leapster games.
The uses are endless, and everything stays organized. The best part ~ when we're looking for a certain cord, we know where it is (or at least where it should be)!
Canvas, paint, and a creative 5 year old is all you need!
My son and I created this painting together a few months ago, and tomorrow we're off to enjoy a few hours together at the local art museum. I will have coffee & a book in hand (for some quiet time for mommy), and he will be in ready-to-create clothes (aka~play clothes). I love that my son enjoys art as much as I do! Here's to creativity!!
We set the table, lit the candles, filled a vase with beautiful flowers, and enjoyed a dinner that we all love before heading back to school tomorrow.
We enjoyed eggplant parmesan, with melted mozzarella of course, and cheese filled raviolis. Ignor all of the carbs on this plate. I sipped a glass of Merlot, and enjoyed every bite, as my family & I discussed all of the wonderful things we enjoyed together over our Christmas vacation.
Now, the alarm is set, lunches are made, clothes are out, and here we go to welcome 2012 at school!!
Here's my word for 2012! We have many celebrations to look forward to this upcoming year, so my word choice is celebrate~ why not?! We will be celebrating a new home in our future, our first trip as a family to Disney, & my 40th birthday (wow). I also want to be sure to celebrate all of the little day to day things that can be taken for granted: Celebrate coffee with a friend, snuggling on the couch, dinner with my family, building a Lego kit with my little man...just to name a few. What's your word for the year?
Each Christmas, I write a letter to my son capturing the highlights (and low-lights) of our year. I have them saved in a special box for him to read when he gets older (which will be here in the blink of an eye, I'm sure).
Anyway, each year I include a quote, song and word of the year, also. This year's song is Hello World, by Lady Antebellum, quote: "What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?" (love this), and our family's word of the year was PERSEVERANCE. I simply love that word! It means so much: never giving up, moving forward with strength, overcoming obstacles...and so much more. As we approach this new year, we are taking on a great adventure as a family: we are moving! Our home~sweet~home officially goes on the market on Monday, January 2nd.
Happy New Year everyone! I wish you all health, happiness, and perseverance for 2012!! Now, I search for my word of 2012... xo Sarah
We're busy little elves, working on handmade gifts for our son's Godparents & Grandparents - oh what fun!!
We're making a couple different kinds of gifts ~ painted flower pots, ornaments out of pipe cleaners & painted paper towel rolls, but this one is my favorite... a plain ornament with a child's hand print on it. Simply, paint your child's hand with white paint, and have them grab the ornament. After the white paint dries, paint on a scarf, eyes, nose, and hat on each snowman. We have one for our tree, too!
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and a Happy and Healthy New Year to all!
Simple~ that's my motto for this Christmas. Our decorations are simple & meaningful...things that have special meaning to us, or have been passed down to us from our parents or grandparents, friends or loved ones. Our wreaths are simply decorated with reminders of God's simple gifts to us - seashells. They remind us of our favorite place on earth ~ Cape Cod ~ and look lovely on our doors. Our gifts are wrapped in white butcher paper, tied with a ribbon, and under our tree waiting for Christmas Eve & Christmas Day visits with family and friends.
My grandfather used to always say the simple things in life are the most important. Amen!
~Sarah
It's looking like Christmas, but it doesn't feel like Christmas. We're also not complaining about the weather!
I'm sharing a couple of our decorations with you...
First of all, our nativity set sits in our dining room on the side board. Above it, are our 4 vintage ornaments from my husbands grandma. They are from the mid 1930's! I love them all, and am so glad that we can hang up a bit of memorabilia for such a special season.
Next, is a photo of my grandpa. He used to dress up as Santa at our annual family Christmas party every year. He is still Santa in my heart!
This week, I'll share with you the handmade stockings that my grandma made for each of us. A tradition that someday, I will have to pass down to future generations.
The house is decorated for Christmas, our tree is up, our stockings are hung by the fireplace, our green balsam wreaths are decorated with starfish & sand dollars, and we are ready for Santa! Our elf, Popcorn, made his appearance this year just before Thanksgiving. He even visited with us at the Cape when we stayed there over night last week. Christmas is so full of magic and believing! I love witnessing all of it through the eyes of my five year old!!
Elf
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Today, I'm feeling blessed for the wonderful time spent with family over the last few days! Fourteen cousins kept each other busy, busy, busy playing football, video games, tag, board games, and watching the Macy's parade together. They're ages range from 28 down to 5 (my son being the youngest), and oh what fun they had together! We all sat down to an abundant Thanksgiving meal together, and traveled home today.
When we got home, we unpacked the car, picked up our dog from the kennel, and started bringing our Christmas boxes up from the basement - let the decorating begin! Tomorrow we will head out to a tree farm together to cut down our Christmas tree - what a wonderful time of the year!
My husband has been a busy man in the kitchen lately! Our soups & sauces for family and friends has been very successful over the last few months. This past summer, we hosted a home party for people to taste-test our products. We just finished delivering our second round of soups & sauces, and have had a few friends request our soups on a weekly basis! It's a win~win...My husband is happy cooking, and our friends & family are happy to have home-cooked meals readily available for their families.
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