Mayfly

So how did your holidays go? I hope they were relaxing. Ours was extraordinarily stress free. I don't know what it was- there were last minute gifts to buy and make, mad dashes to the grocery, B had a decent-ish cold- but somehow we stayed calm and collected and found ourselves dancing around to Frosty the Snowman, smiling an awful lot, feeling grateful.

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If only for the sake of having something to visit about, here's a run down of the few gifts I made:

I think I've talked about this before. My kids ask Santa for one gift, we give them one toy, and I make them something. Between their cousins and grandparents they get plenty. Too much, really. So our three gift limit keeps things simpler for us.

For his mommy-made gift J asked again this year for warm jammies. I sewed up a quick pair of fleecey p.j. pants and bought a thermal shirt to go with it.

N asked Santa for an American Girl doll, so her mommy-made gift was a set of matching dresses. I used this pattern for her dress and I made the blouse from this pattern for the doll dress, shortened the bodice and added a skirt.

My nieces, who are also AG doll crazy, each got a little doll blouse (same pattern) and a little doll skirt (no pattern) and a pair of little doll shoes.

My good friend, Andrea, pinned these little toothpaste travel rolls, so I made her a couple.

And our sweet neighbor, who dotes on our kids and left a gift on our porch, got a last-minute batch of these nuts. (I used almonds.) They were SO good. In fact, I think I'll make some more today!

Oh, and worth mentioning. We ate this savory bread pudding on Christmas morning. Oh my lord- it is rich and delicious. Instant tradition.

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So that's it for Christmas. As soon as we enjoy two dinner parties this weekend, it's time for a fresh new year, a fresh start. Time to clean up and purge and get on with things, whatever this new year holds in store for us.