So many goals, so little time.....

I have been trying to figure out how to make the most of CIJ (Christmas in July) and haven't really come up with a solution. The month is almost 25% over and I feel like I haven't really started!

Really the first step is making a list of goals. Perfect! I'm a great list maker! Not a great list do-er but a great list maker. But I have to start somewhere so here goes......

I HAVE to catch up with my notebook. I have a really nice notebook that I started last year. I kept up with it until the week before Christmas then......who knows. It's not in bad shape but just not very current. I caught up with the Christmas card list but not the gift lists. I hope I remember what I gave to each of the kids. How embarrassing to have to ask them what I gave them last year! They know I'm the queen of detail (compared to them). They will get a good chuckle out of it.


I HAVE to come up with some definite craft ideas that I want to make. Lord knows I don't NEED more decorations but I really like doing them. So I have to make me stop oogling over the books and patterns and start something already. There, I sufficiently yelled at myself.


This is one of the many things I came up with last year, inspired by a picture I saw on the internet. Apparently this picture inspired others by the emails I received about it.


Next, I HAVE to come up with a plan for the Twelve Days of Christmas. Last year's was such a hit that I want to do it again. But to keep their interest, I need to come up with another way. And this one HAS to be started early to give enough time to have 60 items to give out. It's not that hard.....just takes a little planning.


That's all I am going to put for now. Three little goals. I just have to keep repeating to myself.....baby steps, baby steps.


If I just spend 30 minutes in the evening working on these things AND I finish them, I can add to the list next week. Like I said.....so many goals, so little time!

Santa visits the Antique Road Show.....

Last weekend, my DD #2 had tickets to the Antique Road Show being held in Raleigh. When she asked what she could take, I didn't hesitate........the family Santa.

This fella has been in our family for as long as I can remember. Dad told me it had been around the house he grew up in as long as he could remember and he was born in 1926.

As you can see, he is made of wicker with marbles for eyeballs. He even has a wicker tongue.

See his ears? Such detail....

Unfortunately, the dude that DD #2 spoke with had absolutely no clue about him. When she pulled it out of the bag at the "sorting" table, everyone gasped. No one had ever seen one before. Not even the staff....and neither did the appraiser dude. He guessed it was from the 50's or 60's which would put Dad's story way off. But Dad probably didn't pay attention to what his mother decorated the house with at Christmas.

Does anyone else have a clue? I'm thinking of sending the picture in to Country Living or something like that.....but any help from blogging world would be much appreciated.

On the First Day of Christmas.....

This past Christmas I tried out a new tradition with my family. I had blogged about it on my other blog but didn't mention it on this one. Silly me!

I wanted to do something that would extend the holidays a little longer. All of my children are adults now (at least chronologically-speaking) so sometimes doing cutesy things don't work so well with them.

So I decided the Twelve Days of Christmas would be perfect. Every day from December 26 until January 6th, I gave each of the 4 quasi-adults and Dear Hubby a gift. If you do the math, that is 60 gifts! Good thing I started collecting gifts back last July. Some were only a $1 at the Dollar spot section of Target.....some were as much as $5.00 ($5.00 DVDs at Wal-Mart are great).

Each gift was put in a white lunch sack with a note stapled to the front about a different meaning for each day. Something I got off the internet. Each bag was stamped with their initial and a star(s) for whatever numbers of days it was (bad english, I know....can't help it).

I had a lot of fun collecting the goodies. Suprisingly, everyone really enjoyed it. Even the boys! Dear Son #1 went back to his home with all 12 bags in tow and told me he did not cheat by opening all of them at once.

And the best surprise was.....after Dear Hubby learned what I was doing, he went out and quickly bought 12 little gifts for me so I would have something to open, too. Isn't he just the sweetest guy? He didn't exactly go by the rules. Most of his gifts couldn't fit in the white lunch bags.

This year I hope to do the same thing but I'm going to really put my thinking cap on to come up with a different way to present them. Gotta mix it up!

Rudy Day in June.....What happened to May?

May Rudy Day was on Memorial Day. I remember I was busy that day but I can't for the life of me remember what it was. Must have been a "senior" moment!

I had to work today but that didn't stop me from having a mini Rudy Day. I googled for free Christmas movies on-line and hit the motherload (sorry, don't have the website saved here at the house). I watched the "Grinch", "Frosty", an old Sherlock Holmes movie set during Christmas, Bing and Bowie's famous duet of Drummer Boy, Karen Carpenter's "Merry Christmas, darling" among other clips and shows.


I had hot chocolate at work that was oh, so yummy. I work with all boys and it is so cold in there.


I also FINALLY put all my digital Christmas pictures from this past year in the same place. I have a habit of having copies of everything everywhere. So I organized them by year and copied 2008 to my flash drive. I need to take them to get prints made to put in my notebook.

This is what I had scheduled for this month from last year's TO DO list. Since it is going to be so hot here this weekend, I think I will get the prints made tomorrow and work on the notebook and craft ideas on Saturday.

June is Decorating Month
*go through each room's pictures from last year and see what's needed for each room
*update decorating section of the Christmas notebook
*make shopping list for crafts and room decorations


Hope you all had a great Rudy's Day and hopefully it is spilling over to this weekend!

Happy April Rudy Day.....

Just a couple of hours late....I meant to post this last night but you know how things go.

I spent the first half of the day in the yard. My outside job is cutting the grass. I really like it since it doesn't take much brain power to do it.

After lunch, Dear Daughter #2 and I put in Little Women. The movie pick of the month was A Christmas Story which I'm not too keen on.



While the movie was playing, I started cutting out more pieces to a quilt that I am making for a Christmas gift. I can't tell you what pattern or who it is for because that person sometimes reads my blog and I don't want to take a chance on them finding out. Especially if I don't finish it! If they find out and I don't give it to them, then I'll really hear it. But here is a sneak peak.....



Last evening while switching between the NFL draft and M*A*S*H (guess who had the remote and by the way owns the entire M*A*S*H collection but had to watch it on tv anyway!), I worked on my Christmas Wish block for this month. I want to wait until all 9 are finished until I decide how to put them together.



Last year I came up with a pretty good list of what I wanted to do on Rudy Day's and it worked out pretty well so I will do it again this year. Here is next month's To Do List.

May is List Month

* work on gift lists
* stocking stuffer lists
* 12 days of Christmas list
* work on budget
* update budget and gift sections of the Christmas notebook

And since next month, Rudy Day is on a Monday, it should be pretty easy to do.

Blessings, Cathi

Antique Postcard.....

I found this postcard amongst my late Dad's stuff. It was sent to my grandmother in Staten Island but I don't know who it is from. No siggie. But the postmark is December 24, 1908. Pretty cool!

Blessings, Cathi

March Rudy Day.....

I now have time to get on the Rudy Day bandwagon and will start posting again on this blog....at least on or near the 25th.

I sat in my new bedroom last night watching Home Alone 2 - Lost in New York. It wasn't the movie on the "official" Christmas list over at MHH. That was White Christmas but my DVD player doesn't work on the archaic tv we have in our bedroom so I am limited to whatever is on cable. Glad a semi-Christmas movie was on. I finally got around to checking off which Christmas cards I received this past year. I have about 7 on the list that I received from but didn't send to. I probably need to add them to the send list for this coming year. But there were many more that I sent to and didn't receive.

I also FINALLY put the binding on this quilt from this past year. This is a picture of it without the binding. The binding is the same green fabric that I used for one of the borders. I put on my other blog that I would put the binding on the weekend after I posted about it.....way back in January. Guess I told a little fib. Glad the blog and quilting police don't know where I live!



I'll have to post later what my plans for April Rudy Day are.....'cause I don't know myself!

Blessings, Cathi