A Homemade Christmas {Gift Ideas!}

I feel like I have about 25 projects in the works right now, and time is going by quickly but we are 21 days out from Christmas and I'm sure most of you are scrambling. No? Just me?

Well I have been debating, sewing, and organizing things and am happy to report I atleast know what everyone is getting for Christmas, except for my brother. If he's reading this, I need some ideas STAT or you're getting a homemade sweater. It will probably have antler ears on it. It will be awful. You've been warned.

So really quick, here are some ideas I've ran across and things you can make yourself super easily! Great for neices, cousins, teachers, random friends, etc.

For the little girl in your life, I have been loving Made For Mermaids free pattern releases this past week! Megan is doing 12 days of giveaways and I have been LOVING it!

I'm thinking mermaid blankets for every little girl I know? Super quick and easy to stitch up and you can even use fleece blankets from stores if you're not a fabric buying pro.

Hope the kids teachers don't read this blog, because they're all getting these coffee cozy's with gift cards.

Babies are also a big challenge for gifts for me, unless it's a baby shower with a registry. I got a few teething rings though and am planning to make a few of these bunny ear teethers for some babies in my life. Super simple and cute!

These are all super cute and easy and can be made with blankets from the store and scraps of fabric! 

If you don't want to make, just buy, I am loving LuLaRoe lately! If you have a woman in your life that is tricky to buy for, some leggings or a Randy tee is a perfect option! They are super cute, comfy and versatile. The patterns might scare you for a minute, but once you have 1 item, you'll be sold. 

If you need someone to buy LuLaRoe from, might I recommend my awesome friend, April. She turned me to the dark side of LLR obsessed. The tall and curvy leggings are my absolute favorite!

Ok, hope this helps. If you need help buying for a guy, you might need to find another blogger because I bought the world's most boring presents ever for Tom this year. I know he reads this, and he should set his expectations very low this year ;) Sorry, but I love you :)

Have any other great ideas you would like to share? Pleases comment and let me know!

{This post is not sponsored in any way but my Made for Mermaids is an affiliate link. Thanks for your understanding and helping me keep this lil blog a runnin'!}

A Merry Minted Holiday + Giveaway!

Tis the season! For festive gifts, holiday cards, lots of cookies and a giveaway!

So in all of our married days, I have gotten a picture together by November, cards ordered by Thanksgiving and out first thing after the long weekend. I rocked Christmas cards.

This year...Yeah, I just ordered them a few days ago. They won't be here until the end of the week so if you're anxiously awaiting our holiday card, you should probably calm down because I'm not going to get them all addressed and in the mail until, ya know, Christmas Eve? Fingers crossed!

But it's not too late to still get Christmas cards! So if you're looking for ideas for a special card this year, I have just the place!

Minted is a great place to find some unique holiday cards! I absolutely love cards in fun shapes! It's probably one of my new favorite trends in holiday cards! Such a fun change from the usual picture card.


They have cards in all shapes, colors and price points to make a special card just for your special family!

Another fun new trend, foil cards! Umm, they shine? I haven't seen one of these in person but if that's what you chose for your family, please send me a card so I can admire it's pretty shininess! K, thanks ;)

You can get 10 or 15% off of your holiday cards right now using codes JOY10 or JOY15. You can check out Minted for all the details.

If you're more on top of things this year with your holiday cards but still looking for a special gift, Minted also has a great collection of artwork.

More foil things...so shiny!

What a pretty edition this would make to anyone's holiday decorations! They have a whole collection of great holiday artwork to choose from!

And my personal favorite for all of you military friends, Minted has a great collection of Map Art! You can personalize it with pictures. I want to get one made for each state we've lived in! Wouldn't that be a great gift to a friend who is moving soon?

I also love the idea of these letter pictures for a baby gift!

This would be such a sweet addition to a nursery or kids room! Or a picture wall of all your littles ;) So many cute things, so little money to spend before my husband cuts me off ;)

Right now, you can get beautiful art and gifts from Minted for 20% off with code GIFT20.

Don't forget to get your orders in soon! Minted recommends ordering holiday cards by TOMORROW to get them by 12/19 and gifts should be ordered by this weekend to ensure Christmas delivery! You can see their schedule here to make sure you get your order in on time!

Ok have I filled your heads with enough ideas? Now would you like the chance for a little extra money to make your shopping spree a bit bigger and better? The wonderful folks at Minted have offered $50 promo code to one lucky reader! You can enter below! Giveaway is open until Monday night! Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Full Disclosure: This post does not contain affiliate links, I do not receive any incentive from your order, however I was compensate for my time from Minted and the giveaway is sponsored by Minted.  Please rest assured that as always, I only recommend products that I love and think would appeal to you, my wonderful friends and followers!

Christmas Traditions

As the holiday season comes to an end, I thought I'd write one last post about our family's Christmas this year before focusing on a bright and happy New Year.


We actually made it back to Pennsylvania this Christmas for the first time in a few years. The last time I was at my parent's house for Christmas was the Christmas I was pregnant with the twins, but I didn't know it yet. We didn't get a positive pregnancy test until right after the New Year.

This was our first Christmas in Pennsylvania with kids so that made it pretty special and a lot of fun. We even got some snow on Christmas Eve which was great! I went for a little jog in the snow on Christmas Eve, just like I did back in the day. It was much colder than I remembered ;)

Amelia really liked the snow.

 This guy did not.

Chrismas Eve we went to church then came home for dinner and desserts and a visit from Santa (aka my little brother.) The kids did NOT like the visit from Santa. They're still not so sure what a guy in a red suit has to do with them getting presents.

 Clearly, Ben really disliked the festivities.

 We then got everyone in their PJ's and they put some cookies and milk out for Santa for later.

 

They didn't get it at all but you can't say we didn't try. It might be more of a 3 year old thing ;)

Christmas morning Jack, Ben and I were the first ones up. We watched a Christmas movie on Netflix while we waited for everyone else to start moving and enjoyed the peaceful morning.

Finally, it was time to start the festivities.

My mom has taken a picture of us on the stairs every Christmas morning when we're home. I tried to take a picture of the twins on the stairs last year but it didn't go so well...and I was too pregnant to care.

Queen Elsa and Rapunzel were Amelia's favorite Christmas gifts. Jack got Go Go Smart Cars train set that was a big hit. Ben just loved the paper.

The rest of the day was quite a blur. We had breakfast, all of our family came over to celebrate that afternoon. The kids were running wild, there was a questionable game of Cards Against Humanity (which I can't believe I'm even mentioning on a mommy blog), and a lot of fun had by all. I think everyone was also very ready for bed that night though after all of the chaos of the day. It was great seeing the kids really enjoying it, even Ben was getting into it a lore more than I thought he would. Everyone was happy to be celebrating with the kids so I'm glad we made the long journey to Pennsylvania to be there with everyone.

I hope your holidays have been as lovely as mine! I'm excited to celebrate New Years and see what the New Year has in store for us ;)

For some fun, you can check out Christmas 2012 and Christmas 2011.

Deck the Halls

I hope everyone is ready for Christmas!

We've been cooking and decorating and enjoying lots of relaxing time with family.

Because apparently now, my family members expect Christmas gifts from not only me and Tom, but also our children, we've been doing some craft projects around the house as "gifts". Because really, what is a 2 year old going to pick out as a Christmas gift? And I think the grandparents and great grandma much prefer some little keepsakes.

So the other day I whipped up some salt dough, we did a few hand and foot prints, plus a few random ornaments using cookie cutters, baked and painted them to get some cute little decorations and keepsakes for the family.

 Mistletoes. Cute!

Can you tell which ones I did vs which ones I let the twins paint?

Too obvious? We made the Santa handprint decorations last year for our tree, so it was nice to add them to my parents tree this year. I'm signing out until after Christmas. We have a lot of people home for the holidays and lots of fun things going on, but I'll be back to share all of our holiday fun after Christmas.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Ho Ho Holidays

We're not in sunny SoCal anymore Toto ;)

We've had  busy few days! Lots of fun getting ready for the holidays and traveling.

What do you get when you have a mother who hoards all of your childhood clothes and toys? Dress up your kids in ridiculous Christmas outfits? Yes, please.

Embarassing kids pictures. Now THIS is what the holidays are all about ;) Reindeer sweatshirts circa 1988 that belonged to me and my younger brother. Can we do a virtual ugly Christmas sweater party?  Because I think my kids would be top contenders ;) Have any embarrassing/funny holiday pics you'd love to share? Tweet them my way @emilytara #uglychristmassweater. I'd love to know I'm not the only one who does this to their children.

On another note, let's take guesses on how many times Jack would have ridden that tray around at the mall?

If you guessed infinity, you win. Number of times we let him ride it: Twice. He was very upset at the end of both rides. The boy certainly loves trains.

Holiday Pancakes: Recipe

Can we just discuss my son's love of pancakes for a second?

The first things he says in the morning isn't "Good morning mommy! I love you so much!" Oh no. It's always "Pancakes?"

I wish I was kidding. I'll take a video tomorrow morning.

I think it's safe to say that I can whip up pancakes like the best of them. Whole wheat pancakes that is. I've had a really hard time with gluten free pancakes! I've tried quite a few mixes of flours to get the right fluffy/crispy mix that doesn't taste too much like coconut or almonds...it's harder than you think. I think if you're a professional gluten free person, you probably don't mind the different texture and flavors of the flours, but if you're new to the gluten free world like I am, it's a little tricky. So without spending a fortune on pre-made mix and using the flours I had around the house I decided to try whipping up some holiday pancakes!

 Eggnog Pancakes (Gluten and Dairy Free)

Wet/Eggnog Ingredients

• 1/2 cup raw cashews-soaked overnight
• 1 cup almond milk
• 1 cup water
• 3 egg yolks + 1 whole egg
• 2 tbsp honey
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 4 tbsp coconut oil -melted
• 1 tbsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp nutmeg
• 1 tsp all spice

Dry Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup millet flour
• 1/4 cup oat flour
• 1/4  cup brown rice flour
• 1/4 cup almond flour 
• 1/4 cup potato starch or tapioca starch (or a combo)
• 2 tbsp ground flax
• 1 tbsp chia seeds
• 3/4 tsp sea salt
• 3/4 tsp xanthan gum
• 2 tsp baking powder

Instructions

• Preheat griddle to medium-high heat. Grease with coconut oil if needed.
• Take the cashews out of the water they've been soaking in. In a food processor or Vitamix combine all the eggnog ingredients. Blend for a minute or 2 until all ingredients are blended well. 
• In large bowl, combine the dry ingredients. 
• Mix wet and dry ingredients together

•  Carefully pour batter onto griddle. Cook until edges start to look crispy and small bubbles form in the middle then flip. Cook for 1-2 minutes on the other side then remove from griddle.
• Serve and eat immediately with warm maple syrup. Note: gluten free pancakes DO NOT taste good re-heated so they're best to eat right away and not make too much extra. 
• Makes approx 8 medium sized pancakes.

Pancakes with just enough holiday flair to make your holiday breakfast festive and delicious. Yum!

The pancake obsessed toddler approves of this recipe. So much so, it took a lot of work to steal these pancakes for a picture without him eating them. True story. Toddlers+recipe developing+photo session=chaos.

Pin The Halls: Holiday Food

We have a Christmas party coming up this weekend where I need to make food. It's one of those fancy progressive dinner party events...and by fancy I mean not really because it's held in garages and kids are there so how fancy can it really get when toddlers are involved?

I need to whip up a festive dessert so you can guess what I've been pinning on my Pin the Halls board!












 

Your turn! What are you pinning? Any dessert ideas for my party this weekend? ;) 

It's Christmas Time

I admit, I'm pretty excited for Christmas this year.

1. There's a chance we might see SNOW! I haven't had a white Christmas in years!

The last time I saw snow this happened....

Obviously....

2. We're actually going home for Christmas! The last time we were home was probably the last time I saw snow for Christmas. See picture above for how exciting that was...

3. The twins LOVE Christmas. I don't think they REALLY get it, but they do enjoy the lights and music and the idea of Christmas. Don't even get me started on their love of the Christmas tree.

4. I am not pregnant and don't have a newborn (ok the twins were 6 months old their first Christmas but they were still acting like newborns).
Christmas 2010-pregnant
Christmas 2011-the twins were itty bitty and we had just moved aross the country
Christmas 2012-VERY pregnant
Christmas 2013-NOT pregnant with an almost 1 year old and two 2 1/2 year olds. My, how quickly that seemed to happen!

5. It's this big guy's FIRST Christmas!

Isn't he cute? :)

What are you excited for this holiday season? My favorites are everything white chocolate peppermint flavored, going for walks to see Christmas lights, hot chocolate, and lots of family time! :)

Pin The Halls

I'm happy to say, that before Thanksgiving even gets here, we are DONE shopping for the kids Christmas presents ;) shhh don't tell them where we hid them all!

With the holidays here, and my shopping out of the way, I'm excited to kick off some new projects, some fun things for the grandparents, some yummy goodies for friends and families and I want to share it all with you!

So I'm connecting the world, or atleast attempting to, with a new Pinterest board, Pin The Halls!




If you're cooking, crafting, or just found something you love, I'd love for you to share the link with me and I'll add it to my pin board! Check back frequently to see what kind of fun things I've added! If you're looking for some inspiration, follow my pinterest board, and my other boards, to see what I'm loving these days ;)

Once a week, I'll try to throw a round up of some of my favorites on here ;) So stay posted. Since no days of the week start with P, I can't do it Throwback Thursday style, but I'll try to get my favorite pins up every Thursday until Chrsitmas ;)

p.s. how cool was my Christmas project from 2011? The correct response is not cool at all, but bless your heart for trying ;)