My early mornings, late evenings and every free moment these days have been spent researching and purchasing items for my Etsy store. My Mother and I have been going back and forth about listing her gorgeously knitted blankets for a while now.  She has been knitting blankets for our family, my expecting friends and just for her pure enjoyment. So why not sell them? Our store will also include handmade hair accessories, hair bow holders and pettiskirts by me! 

So my lovely readers, what do you typically purchase from Etsy?

Have a great weekend!

 I  know this post comes really, really late but I don’t have as much leisure time when it comes to blogging these days. For Christmas this year I had to work on Christmas Eve until about 9:30 PM and then I came home to help pack up my car and we drove to my parents house. We did not arrive until 2 AM, which was no big deal but I still had packages to wrap since we did the majority of our shopping earlier that day. I told Jim that come June we will figuring out Christmas and our shopping lists, it may take us a few years to learn how to balance having Payton’s and our nieces birthday seven days before Christmas. The holiday was great, we had a quiet morning just playing with Payton and watching football as we waited for my sister’s family to head to Running Springs. We dined on my favorite meal of the year: a standing rib roast, Yorkshire pudding (my absolute fav thing) and veggies. It did seem a little odd this year not baking one single holiday treat, this all comes from what I previously stated about the balancing act. This year was also a little harder being the first without my Grandma. As I had pulled out my holiday wrapping boxes I looked straight into the box and saw a bag that my Grandma had used many years prior and then two gorgeous wraps that were perfume from Nordies. I immediately started bawling. I miss her so. When we stayed at my parents, we slept in my old room which turned into my Grandma when I moved out. Before then I couldn’t even walk in there without losing it. This time, I was at peace, I felt her warmth in there and knew she was looking down on me. This Christmas wasn’t about all  the presents, which by looking under my parents tree you might beg to differ, but as my Mom stated, she had to buy double to make up for what my Grandma would have given. We are truly blessed to have spent the holiday together, and I truly hope y’all had a great holiday. 

Little Miss when we woke her up to leave for Grandma and Papa’s. 

My parents tree. 

The only gift Payton seemed interested in. 

She played on my Grandma’s rocker the entire day. Here she was getting out of Daddy’s way as he vacuumed. 

The day after she played in the little snow that my parents had while Daddy and Geoff went snowboarding. She gave me the best gift by sleeping until 11:30 AM that day. 

Our Tree

Payton on NYE eating her breakfast. 

Daddy and I ate at the coffee table and we watched Beauty and the Beast as a family and then hit the sack by 8:30. Exciting. 

Not me, sadly. I miss flying somewhere fun. I cannot wait until we can travel this Spring or Summer, whenever I earn enough vacation hours to take a family vacay. For now, Jim has left our little family for a few days to head on his first business trip of 2011. Back in 2006 Jim had been promoted to International sales but UPS sold MBE and Jim was transferred into Industrial Engineering in 2008. As 2010 came to a close they moved him once again but back into sales. UPS is focusing on selling franchises at the University level so my dear hubby’s first trip is to Clemson University. He is somewhere over us heading to San Fran at the moment and then later tonight he’ll land in the A-T-L. Very jealous. I would actually move to Georgia in a heartbeat, which, given a higher promotion we would have to move to Georgia where the UPS headquarters is. Anyway, this is our first few days ever without Daddy home and of course Miss Payton is coming down with a cold. We’re headed to the doctor after my hair appointment this afternoon, let’s pray it’s just a cold and not an ear infection!