Santa Came Early This Year

Santa Claus visited our house early this year. Perhaps you can see why...where would we ever hide this huge thing?!? Danny has been looking on Craig's List forever for a Power Wheels for William. But not just any Power Wheels...it had to be something big, a two-seater (so his sister could ride too!), and of course it had to have a radio. William loves to play with the radio in the car. Finally, he found this Escalade on Craig's List, not too far from our house.

We went to go look at it, and quickly realized why the guy was selling it...he lived in a second floor apartment and it had to be carried down the stairs by himself and his wife, for his young son to use. The thing probably weighs 100lb. While we were there, 3 other potential buyers called, all fighting for it and offering to pay more money. Needless to say, we quickly said yes.

William is so happy about his new truck. When he calls his grandma or his great-grandma (Oma), all he can talk about is his 'big truck'. He gets in and out a million times, plays the radio, and even loads 'groceries' into the truck (canned goods from the pantry).

Doesn't he look small? :-)

Reusable Gift Wrap

For the first time, we will have reusable gift wrap under our Christmas tree! My mother has been doing this for years (I can't even remember a time when we had paper gift wrap!), and I decided I wanted to do it for my own family, so I made my own gift bags. These are all made from Christmas-themed cotton fabric. I started with 6 yards of cute printed cotton fabric, and cute each yard in half. I sewed the bags using a french seam, and they have a drawstring closure (sewed with a button hole and seams on each side of the button hole). To finish, the ties were made using sparkly silver and gold cording. So simple!

Now I will be able to cut the time I would normally spend wrapping Christmas presents by a fraction! Using these bags (and handmade gift tags that I made and will be able to use year after year as well), I could probably get all the Christmas wrapping done in about a half hour. And another great feature of the reusable bags is that odd-shaped presents are no longer a problem. You just stuff the bags, tie, and go!