"O Holy Night, the stars are brightly shinning. It is the night, of our dear Savior's birth..."

Merry Christmas everyone!  I hope you have a wonderful day, and take time to refect on the reason for the season. If you would like to know what I will be doing today, check out this post.  And if you do not see this post until after Christmas, I hope it was wonderful. :)

"I'm dreaming of a white... Christmas"

"O Holy Night, the stars are brightly shinning.  It is the night, of our dear Savior's birth..."
"I wish you a merry Christmas.  I wish you a merry Christmas.  I wish you a merry Christmas, and a happy New Year!"

P.S.  Hopfully I will be able to post later this week with details from my Christmas, but it might not be until after the New Year.  So, if you don't hear from me until after theNew Year... Happy New Year!  My next post might be published in 2013... that is crazy!



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Beeswax candles

Aren't these candles adorable?  I have fallen in love with them... yes, I have fallen in love with beeswax candles.  I love the organic and tectured look that they have.  I think they would look lovely in different height candle holders, clustered on a side table.  Don't you?  You can make them by using this tutorial!  This is totaly on the top of my list of 2013 crafts...

Thank you, Kelsie for guest posting!

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christmas traditions // guest post by kelsie

traditions and christmas go together at our house like coffee and my mornings (see what I did there?;). they just go, and without them something seems wrong. tradition during the christmas season is a big deal for us.

Christmas in our family really begins weeks before Christmas. We like to say it is  pretty much just a month long holiday. Every year when we were kids the Christmas traditions would start on Christmas Eve. We would go to grandma and grandpa's house around midday. All of us cousins would usually just play around or help grandma out with last minute Christmas cookies (we take our cookies very seriously, folks.). Once evening would arrive we would go to our church's candlelight Christmas Eve service. I looked forward to this ever year for it brought singing Christmas hymns by candlelight, a story from our pastor, and usually a delicious candy cane or two.

Once the service would get over we would all get back to granny and grandpa's house where the mini houses are lit (my favorite),  the abundance of Christmas decorations happily greet you, and the delicious smell of potato soup would await us. It sounds weird to have potato soup on Christmas Eve, huh? Well that's our meal every year, and it's one of the most delicious traditions. Usually we would have to wait a good amount of time for the soup to finish cooking. So while we wait we would track Santa. Yes, we would track Santa. There is a website called the Norad Santa tracker . It sounds silly, but it was one of my favorite things to do with my cousins every year.:)

Once we would finish the delicious potato soup (we had to eat every bite in order to open presents) we would go and read out of  the book of Luke in the Bible, the real Christmas story. We usually would go around and each read a verse. We did this before we opened presents so we could get our focus on what's really important and be reminded of the real reason for the season, not presents. Of course though, once present opening time came around, it was quite fun. After we would open all the presents from each other after reading it was time to go home. On the way home every year I would get so anxious that we wouldn't make it home before midnight and that Santa would skip our house.:) But thankfully, of course he made it ever year. :)

Then we would usually anxiously greet Christmas morning with jumping on my parents bed letting them know what the day was! And the day usually follows with lots of food and time with family.

that's our Christmas.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

kelsie is the name. 

northerner gone southerner, lover of the ocean (mountains are cool too), and happy journal-er. 

writer + coffee drinker at bella ragazza. 

(also really excited for christmas!)

blog/twitter/pinterest

(thanks Jo for asking me to guest post, her blog is the best you guys, and she is pretty much awesome)
what are some of your favorite Christmas traditions?

Have a Merry Christmas!

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Holiday Mints Recipe

HOLIDAY MINTS       This recipe is very very old and I do not where it is from

6 oz. pkg. cream cheese (room temperature)

food coloring (the amount depending on the color you want)

1/4-1/2 tsp flavoring (I used a mint extract flavoring, but you could also do something like lemon extract if you wanted)

4 1/2 cup powdered sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

Beat cream cheese until soft in a stand mixer.  Add coloring and flavoring.  Gradually add the powdered sugar.  It should be slightly sticky.  

Fill a pastry bag (that has a very large holed tip) with the mixture. On sheets of wax paper, gently squeeze the bag with your hand and make as big of a mint as you want.  The mixture might be a little tough to squeeze out at first, but eventually it will warm up and become easier to squeeze out.  After you have shaped all of the mints set the sheets of wax paper (with the mints on them of course) in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.  When I made them I let them set in the fridge all night.   

Pour the granulated sugar in a small bowl.  When the mints are firm and come right off the wax paper, take them out of the fridge.  Remove a few mints at a time from the wax paper and drop them in the sugar.  Gently coat them with the sugar and put them in a plastic storage container.  Repeat until the mints get to soft and won't easily come of the paper.  When this happens put them (and the mints that are already coated) back in the fridge for about 20 minutes.  Repeat this process until all of the mints are coated.  (You should only have to put the mints back in the fridge a couple times.)

Store the mints in the fridge until a few minutes before serving.

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Top 5 Christmas Movies

Christmas movies... Oh, how I love them. They make the Christmas season even merrier... Don't you think? We have an abundant supply of movies, but somehow we seem to be lacking Christmas movies.  Which is sad, because when everyone comes home for the holidays, we all want to gather around in our living room and watch a few LOT of Christmas movies.  I must ask, is anyone as excited for Christmas as I am?   I just get so giddy thinking about it and all that it brings.

p.s. Do you have any movies that you would like to add?  List them away!

1/2/3/4/5/

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Visitors and Football

Last week my sister Mary, her husband Cody, and her two kids, Sebastian and Bruno were unexpectedly able to come up from North Carolina for a visit.  They where here for *counting with fingers* six days.  It was a nice little visit.  Sebastian was able to help us milk each night, which he loved, and he also loved when Grandpa would give him a ride on the tractor!  Bruno... he just laughed at everything, but he particular loved it when you would make unattractive and ridiculous faces at him.  While they were here we were all able to go to my brother's state football game last Saturday.  It was a long trip to the game, so to occupy ourselves, Sebastian and I watched Cars on the way there.  We arrived to the stadium, ate cold meat sandwiches that we had packed, and then slowly bundled up.  It was nice that it was 40 degrees out, so we didn't need to bundle up too much.  We took a little "hike" to find our seats and waited until the game started.   Now, I'm not very good at explaining sporting events, so I'm just going to keep it short and sweet... we won!  It was an exciting game with the scores being close the whole time.  Each side of the stands were full of energy and excitement.  People yelled, clapped, and waved pom poms in the air to show support to their team.  After the game, we went down to the field and waited for Isaac to come out of the locker room.  We stood around for a while, talking about the game and taking a family picture.  After we left, we went out to eat for a late supper.  On the drive home, Sebastian and I watched Cars again... and both fell asleep.  It was twelve o'clock by the time we got home.  We were all tired and ready for a good night's sleep... 

 The rest of the weekend was nice and relaxing.  On Monday morning we had to say goodbye to Mary, Cody, and the kids, and had to start back up with school and the usual.  On the bright side, we Christmas decorated yesterday!  Now we have twinkle lights and garlands in about every room!  And another exciting thing is that Christmas is in 19 days! Oh, I'm excited all right!

P.S. If you're curious, Isaac is  #40

Jordan (sister-in-law) and Bruno

Cody, Sebastian, and Isaac

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I'm that girl

I'm that girl...

who's room is filled with blue.  My walls, my comforter, everything... is blue. Hey I like the color!
who is sarcastic 99.9% of the time.
who is not very photogenic.
who has white skin... very white skin I'm afraid.
who loves to bake anything with at least a pound of butter in it. :)
who is terribly shy around strangers.  I get awkward...
who loves cows and doesn't know why.  Seriously, they are slobbery, they tend to cough on me, and tonight one of them went to the bathroom on my foot!  (that might have been partly my fault actually...)
who likes to sing ALL THE TIME!  I can go through the whole day without shutting my mouth.   Now I just wish that I had a good voise! My favorite right now is "I'm Dreaming Of A White Christmas." 
who can not play a sport to save her life.
who is short.  Here I always wanted to be 5'7, hah, not happening.
who laughs a lot
who can only do a messy bun.
who likes autumn the best.
who likes to eat snacks all day.
who is liking the weather right now.  it's 60 out...
who is missing her little nephews. 
who was a little excited when her brother's team won state football last Saturday.
who is really not liking her biology this year.  I think it has beat math for becoming my least favorite  subject. 
who has green eyes, with one of them having a big brown spot in it.
who doesn't like "The Grinch".  He has just always creeped me out for some reason.
who can't wait to send somebody this scarf.  Tonight is the LAST night to enter, so hurry up!
who just saw "Brave" last night.  It was pretty good, but not as good as I expected.
who likes old movies better than new ones.
who hopes you like this post! Pin It