Holiday Catch Up

Happy New Year everyone!  I’m sorry I have been such a bad blogger these past couple of weeks!  The hubs and I spent Christmas and New Years out in the Midwest.  We visited his family in Indiana, and also visited one of my friends in Chicago.  We didn’t bring a laptop with us, so I didn’t really have many/any opportunities to post.  I know you all have been dying to know what’s going on in my life ;-)  Well, worry no more!  I’m back with updates.  Prepare for a long post!

We left for the airport early Thursday morning the 22^nd.  HUGE thanks to Jamie over at thislittlehomeofmine for being so kind and taking us to the airport!  The flights on our way out were pretty bumpy and I nearly got sick on the second flight.  But we got into Chicago safely.  John’s parents picked us up from the airport and we headed to John’s sister’s house.  So we got there and settled in and got to visit with his parents, sister, her husband and their two kiddos.   We had a great time visiting with them and doing things with the kids.  We went to one of those indoor bounce house places, went and saw Santa, and went out to lunch. 

The Whybrew family with Santa

Christmas Eve we went to 2 different church services where Nathan (SIL’s husband) is a pastor.  The first service was the “family” service so we went for the kids.  The next service we went to because SIL, her hubby Nathan, and FIL were all playing their instruments for the choir.  Then we went back to the house and waited for Nathan to get back from the 11pm service.  Mean while I made my family’s tradition of Grasshoppers (1 part crème de mint, 1 part crème de cacao, and 1 part milk), as well as prepared my other family tradition of bubble coffee cake for Christmas morning.

Christmas morning we got up and went to church (since Christmas was on a Sunday) and then came back, ate, put the kids down for a nap while the adults opened presents, and then let the kids open presents after they woke up.  It actually worked out really nicely.  The little ones got to be the center of attention while opening their presents which was perfect J  There were some great presents to go around.  My most exciting present was the sewing machine I got from my hubby!  I haven’t gotten to see it yet, since he only brought the foot pedal and the user manual with him (obviously you can’t really travel with a sewing machine!)  But the pictures look awesome!!  You can see it here.

The day after Christmas we travelled back to John’s parents house (about an hour and a half drive).  And 7 family members from FIL’s side of the family came in from Virginia to join us.  We spent a fun few days with that crew (even though hubby was sick most of the time L  still is actually). They left on Thursday to go visit more family, and on Friday was the big family Christmas for MIL’s side of the family.  So there was about 30 people over on Friday afternoon.  Full house!  But a good time was had by all and it was nice to see everyone.

Saturday morning John and I trucked back up to Chicago to spend NYE with a couple of my friends.  New Years day my friend and I got to go into downtown Chicago and shop a bit on Michigan Ave.  It was a pretty magical site.  The street was lined with lights, there was a bit of a snow flurry falling, and people were bustling around all wrapped up in coats and hats and scarves and gloves. 

And now we are finally back home, and back to work.  John is still getting over his cold and we are trying to get back into a normal routine.  Phew!  If you read this whole thing and got this far…kudos to you!  If you skipped to the bottom…I don’t blame you J  Happy New Year!  

Here are some pics from our trip:

It snowed on the 27th :)

I started knitting a scarf for Tessa (niece)

Walking around Wrigleyville

Cubs themed Christmas Tree

Tree inside the mall on Michigan Ave - The Magnificent Mile!

Friday High Fives

I thought I would take a moment to list out my top 5 favorite things from this week.  I got the idea from some blogs that I follow The Small Things Blog and From My Grey Desk (they are sisters and I love their blogs!)  And in the spirit of the trend I thought I would join in!

1. Walking my puppies at night after work and looking at all of the fun holiday light displays around the neighbor hood.  Some people are so creative!  It really gets me in the holiday mood.

2. Having Craft night with some awesome girlfriends and learning how to knit!

3. My beautiful new shoes for New Years that showed up on my doorstep this week

4. Holiday potlucks and holiday parties at work!  It's like holiday party time at school where people really only show up for the food and festivities, even though we're supposed to be working ;)

5. And last but CERTAINLY not least...my hubby finally coming home after being on travel for work!  I missed him so much!!

What have been your favorite things this week?

Craft Night - Surprise!

Last night was our (mostly) weekly craft night.  Jamie, Linda, and (brand new member!) Bethany came over for a craft night surprise J  I had them guessing and wondering for a few days as to what we were going to be attempting.  As my Christmas present to the girls, I got them each a set of knitting needles, a needle stopper, and a skein of yarn.  All the girls came over and opened up their presents.  I got a mixture of excited/skeptical looks from all of them, but it turned out to be a fun night!  Jamie brought some awesome lasagna, Linda made some oh so delicious fudge, and Bethany brought the glue that holds it all together….the wine! After dinner, we poured some wine, got out the fudge and got to work.

Learning to cast on

Concentrating!

We used 10 ½ bamboo needles.  They seemed like a good size to start with.  Medium length, not too thick.  I found a blog that had some great links to video tutorials on how to start (referred to as casting on) and continue your basic stitch (referred to as the garter stitch).  She also has links to a really good video on how to finish (referred to as binding off) your project.  Here is her blog and here is the link to her post about knitting.  We all started/attempted to make book marks.  Seems best to start with something small and work your way up to something bigger like a scarf, right?  Well I’m hooked for sure.  Now I want to make scarves and hats galore!  Here is a picture of my lovely little bookmark.  

Apparently I got acrylic yarn, which I learned today was probably not the best idea.  You can see in the top picture that my yarn is starting to fray pretty badly.  That was making it difficult to make the patter look nice and even.  But as a first attempt I think it turned out alright.