Here are a few more FUN family pictures:
We had tons of food. Aunt Mary told everyone to not bring anything, so of course, everyone brought something!
We also had games:
... AND Santa made an appearance:
And we aren't done yet! The next day is Christmas! Yes, even Jena got presents...
Then we head to Grandma's and Papa's house for more presents!
And here it is! The Christmas KISS!!!
Thanks for stopping by! I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas!
The cards are out and delivered!
The ornaments are done!
I went simple this year and attached a group shot of the kiddos to a small wooden plaque from Michael's.
While the paint was drying on the ornaments, and I had all my paints out... I started a new She Art background. I learned from looking at the backgrounds made by my friend, Mary. Her backgrounds are so much cleaner than mine... I kept the embellishment to the outside of the page and used less black. I think it came out nice.
This is going to be the perfect background for the BFF girls that Cheryl drew out for me. I thought the girls that Cheryl made looked too old, so I changed their clothes (thanks Old Navy!). They are going to be cute, cute, cute!
This is a different look for me. I thought it would make a good GUY card. Thanks for dropping by!
Thanks for looking! Merry Christmas!
The stockings are up, waiting for Santa to arrive!
Chris found himself a nice hidey-hole tucked in behind the Christmas tree.
Jena found a nice comfy spot for herself too.
I took Friday off work and finished all the Christmas shopping. Then I spent all day today wrapping! Poor Jena... her comfy spot is now full of presents!
I need to show off my boxes and tags! Cute, huh? (That's why it took me all day to wrap presents ;oD )
Jim and Chris did some decking on the outside of the house too! Don't the lights look great?
It's been a long day of Christmas-y activity! Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!
The white night gown and top hat were taken from Scrooge himself. Snow is blowing in the Christmas Eve night. I broke from the typical She Art tradition and didn't start the quote with "SHE." I used my favorite quote from the book. "I will honor Christmas in my heart and try to keep it all the year."
I like how the girl came out, but the background... YIKES! What a mess! I wanted to make it black, because it's night. But, I didn't like it black. It was too dark. I tried to add white and colors to lighten it up, but ended up with a mess. I'm glad the girl covered up most of it... In hindsight, what I should have done was covered the background in cream instead of dark brown; and not been so afraid to cover up the play paraphernalia, keeping only what mattered most, the play ticket. Then I could add colors and have it not be so messy looking!
Here's the ticket from the play in a place of honor.
Here is another close-up of the background... I stenciled the snowflakes with modeling paste. It adds some fun dimention! I don't know why I used blue instead of green. I guess I thought it might lighten it up more.
New Flash! Our house is decorated for Christmas! I'll post some photos later. Now it's time for the annual Bunco Christmas party! Good Night All!
I don't know if I'll actually make any, but I started drawing hat pictures just in case (all on yellow post-its of course).
Speaking of girls in hats...
For my birthday, I said that I wanted to go up in the Great Park Balloon. We tried a couple weeks ago, but the winds were blowing and the balloon was closed. But today, the winds have calmed down and it's bright and sunny! The perfect day for a balloon ride. Nowadays, everything costs money... If this was a "normal" park, we'd have to pay for admission to the park, pay for parking, and pay for the balloon ride. BUT, this is the Great Park! Everything here is free. No admission, no parking, and no tickets to ride. All we have to do is sign in, and they call us when it's our turn. Here's Chris checking out the FAQs. The balloon is tethered, we'll be going up 400 feet, and the donut shaped gondola can carry up to 30 people. There were only 6 other people in the gondola with us, so there was plenty of room to move around.
Here it comes! You can see the cable that tethers it to the ground and the shape of the gondola in this picture.
And here we go!!!
There's Jim and Chris on the other side of the gondola.
There's a good view of the Great Park area. Eventually, the Great Park will take up the entire marine base, but right now it only covers a tiny corner. There's a merry-go-round, a couple museums, an agricultural area, and a hanger that they converted into classrooms and meeting areas. They also fill it with ice for ice skating in the winter.
Here's a view of the business end of the base. It's still filled with offices and hangers. If you look past the hanger's off into the distance, that's where we live.
The old runways are still here too... If you watch American Top Gear, you might see the Great Park balloon in the background, because this is where the Top Gear race course is...
Here is a view of the soccer fields and agricultural areas.
I couldn't resist taking a panorama of Saddleback Mountain from the balloon. I put it up in the blog header temporarily. Thanks for stopping by!
