Happy Holidays!

I can't believe it's Christmas Eve already! I wanted to pop in and wish you all a very Happy Holiday Season! I've been taking a little break from blogging this week and will probably continue to be quiet on into next week. My in-laws are here visiting for the holidays and we've been enjoying some family time!!

It's our family tradition to spend Christmas Eve at the beach, so we headed out bright and early this morning - in fact, Joel was there before sunrise (he went kayaking by himself to enjoy a little "Joel Time", much needed I think during all the hustle and bustle of this time of year! He was able to witness a stunning sunrise over Haleakala from the water surrounded by a small pod of Humpback whales!). It was a beautiful sunny morning and we had lots of fun enjoying the warm Maui sun and playing in the surf!


We've been relaxing at home this afternoon before we head over to my Mom's tonight for dinner and to open presents. My Dad's birthday was Christmas Day, so we've always celebrated Christmas on Christmas Eve so that Christmas Day could be all about my Dad! Everyone else got a day to themselves during the year, it only seemed fair to let my Dad have his birthday too!! No reason to break from tradition just because my Dad's no longer with us. So far I seem to be doing fine during my first Christmas without my Dad. I think maybe this is because last year was just SO bad with my Dad in the late stages of Alzheimer's and us dealing with all that entails, including behavioral problems and social difficulties on his part. Honestly, last Christmas just wasn't much fun at all. So it's honestly been kind of nice this year not having to deal with that and being able to focus on the positive and enjoy Dean enjoying the holidays. I'm fully aware that things might "hit" me tomorrow on his birthday. My Mom and Dad always spent my Dad's birthday at the beach together, so my Mom plans to go to the beach alone tomorrow and take a handful of his ashes to sprinkle near their "spot". I feel good about this.

Anyway, enough about that. I wanted to quickly share this final Christmas project with you. I made some goodies last week for Dean's preschool teachers. He has 3 main teachers that help with his class, the Turtle class, who each got one of these gift sets:


It's a tall skinny covered notepads (the notepads are from PTI), a little bag of hand crafted gift tags, a Starbucks gift card inside a gift card holder I made, and a cute little gift box with some yummy candies inside. Below are some closer views. Stamp sets are PTI's 2010 Holiday Tags and Take Note. The little box, tag and clothespin are from Michelle Wooderson's Etsy shop. The snowflake is cut from white felt using the Winter Wonderland Snowflake Die from Taylored Expressions.


I used Musical Backgrounds from Waltzingmouse Stamps on the bottom inside flap of the gift card holder. I also added some Baker's twine from the Twinery.


There are 10 additional teachers and helpers at the preschool that all have an impact on my son's early education in some way or another - the teachers for the Roly Poly and Dolphin classes often help with outdoor play time when the classes are combined, there are amazing substitute teachers, there's the Japanese and Hawaiiana teachers who come in once a week (and Dean knows A LOT of Japanese language and Hawaiian language and culture!), the reading teacher, etc etc etc. Each of these other teachers and helpers received one of these filled with candy:

The gift boxes, clothespins and tags were from Michelle Wooderson's Etsy shop. The snowflake was again cut from felt using the Winter Wonderland Snowflake die from Taylored Expressions and I added a little sparkly pom pom from the Kid's Craft section of my local craft and hobby store!

The teachers LOVED their gifts and they were fairly quick and easy to make and didn't break the bank! Gotta love that!!

OK, we're off to deliver gifts to the neighbors, then headed to my Mom's. Everyone have a happy and safe Holiday!!