I've Waited All December for This Moment

 I love Christmas.

It's such an incredibly special time for me.  While I was growing up, I was blessed with a grandma who loved Christmas as much as I do today.  Everything from my love to Christmas, Disney, and crafting comes from her.  She was a pretty stellar lady.
Her Christmases were so magical and filled with wonder and true family bonding. I have the best memories because of those family gatherings.  When I was I think, 9-years old, I received my very first American Girl Doll, Samantha.  We went to Christmas Eve mass at St. Mary's or St. Mark's and then headed to my grandma's house.  It was my family, my cousins, aunt, uncle, and grandma.  We usually had to have Christmas Eve dinner first and grandma had some sweet networking connections with Santa because he stopped at her house first and we were allowed to check out our presents once we were done with dinner.  As a child, I was always amazed by this.  I distinctly remembering walking from the dining room, through the kitchen, and then into the living room where my grandma's Christmas wonderland was displayed.  Each of the kids had a section that Santa had created and in my section was Samantha.  It's on a family video somewhere but I was screaming, I was so happy.

Fast forward to 2011 and my husband is deployed to Afghanistan and I am home for Christmas.  My mom, brother, and I take a trip down to Chicago and check out the American Girl Place while we're there.  If you've never been, it's a pretty awesome place.  If you haven't checked out Conan's video on it, you need to.



He's hilarious and I love it.

Back to the story...

While we're looking through the store, my mom comes across the doll, Julie and the doll is gorgeous.  My mom is from the Philippines and grew up very poor.  She had several brothers and sisters on a farm and they had no money.  They would fabricate toys out of whatever they had and as a little girl with a really expensive doll, I heard stories of my mom creating dolls out of spare bottles and a cloth wrapped around it.  At that moment, I knew my mom would love this doll but at the time I didn't have the money for it.

Well this December, Ryan and I decided to get my mom the Julie doll and I wanted her to be completely surprised.  We mailed it to my mother-in-law's house and she prompted to wrap it (which is awesome, love her).  My dad picked it up and this morning we Skyped in with them while watching the Disney Christmas Day Parade (my favorite).  I had tears in my eyes as my mom was opening it and she loved it!!

Thank you so much for my beautiful doll. It's the first one I've ever had.  I have tears in my eyes.

I love Christmas for reasons like this.  The past couple years I've had a hard time with Christmas because we've been away from family but these are the moments that make Christmas.  The Lord gave us the ultimate gift of his only son.  He gave us Jesus to take on our worldly issues and problems and to be a guiding light for us.  This time of the year is a celebration of love, faith, and hope.  For me this moment was something I had wanted to execute for years and not for the materialistic reasons of physically giving my mom a present but because I knew that this would mean so much to her.  It makes me tear up just writing this post.  It means so much to me to be able to give my mom this kind of gift and to share how much I love her.  I hope you all have a wonderful, beautiful Christmas or holiday season with your families. God Bless!  

 

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Christmas with the Erskines: A Sneak Peek into Our Home for the Holidays

 

 

Here's a look into the Erskine household for the Christmas season...enjoy!

 

 One of my favorite things about Christmas is gift giving and this year I participated in Emmy's Christmas Gift Exchange over Instagram.

 

 My partner made me this amazing gift as a way to record memories throughout the years.

 

 With a ceramic fruit basket from Anthro and index cards, I have it propped up in our kitchen to record so many memories.

 Brittany got me the tree topper of my dreams!! Isn't it gorgeous?

 

The ornaments Ryan got from St. Nicholas.

 

 My 24th birthday present from the folks!

 Our first Christmas village! It's from the Dollar Tree and had some "handwritten" storefront signs (womp womp) but it's really cute.  I also have an African American Santa which I'm sure Megyn Kelly would love.  Have no idea what I'm talking about?  Don't stress over it.  The Fox newscaster is convinced that Santa and Jesus could only be white men.  Therefore this Santa is my little play at irony in my house.

Blu will rock antlers and Holly hates them with a passion.  Ryan had to stand with them for every picture otherwise Holly looked terrified and Blu would run away.

 

If you love this wreath, check out The Paper Mama's blog for the tutorial! 

Looking to make one of these bomb.com sweaters?  I'll be posting my tutorial on the 23rd! :)

 Blisterz's Christmas Tree Lot- super simple and incredibly cute!
All you need are bottle brush trees, which are actually really hard to find leading into Christmas so I always stock up.  Put them next to a sign (mine is made from cardstock) and you have a Christmas Tree Lot.

I've had my eye on these foxes at Target for so long! I was thrilled when one of my besties and battle buddies, Brittany surprised me with them on my birthday!

I was determined to get a nativity this year and bought this from Walmart.

It took me four baby Jesuses to find one without crazy eyes but alas, I was successful.

 I wanted to snag the camel but I only had $10 on me and had to get Hershey kisses for cookies so I went with the donkey.

 

I painted these reindeer last year and they turned out to be a perfect solution as a centerpiece.

 

The snowmen placemats I got on sale at Kohl's last year (we don't have a Kohl's here unfortunately) and the nutcracker placemats I found at Goodwill, along with a table runner.

 

Santa hat chair covers were found at the Dollar Tree for only $1 each.

 

I made this shadowbox last year when we I was stationed at Vandenberg.  It's a wooden shadowbox from Michael's.  I then used two pieces of scrapbook paper, a metallic blue and then a diecut snowflake piece.  I then took mini ornaments, that I believe I got at Walmart, and hot glued them together.

 

My mini mitten garland was made with mitten ornaments from Target last year.  A pair of mittens was $3 and then I used mini clothepins from Michael's and ribbon.  Super simple and easy to make.

 

We have a ton of cards from so many wonderful friends!

 

I used command strip style squares and thick wire edged ribbon.  You can always find ribbon sales at Michael's, especially leading into December.  I love this reindeer ribbon so much!  I picked up clothespins from the Dollar Tree.  Last year I used mini ones and it was difficult to keep the cards in place.  You can always decorate the pins with mod podge and glitter :)

With that, I hope you enjoyed our home and we wish you a very Merry Christmas!  

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Grinchy moments

I don't want to blame this post on my husband, but if it happens, understand that is not my intent.  My intent is to share how complicated it is for our new little family to establish holiday traditions.  I love Christmas, like SOOOOOOOOOO much.  Yeah, that level of obnoxiousness almost covers how much I love it.  

Although Ryan and I grew up in the same hometown, we lived very different lives.  Sometimes it amazes me how little things add up to bigger complications.  For example, St. Nicholas' Day.  Some celebrate it, including my family back home, and some don't like how Ryan grew up.  If you don't celebrate it, it honors the Saint Nicholas who protected children and orphans and is the origins of the Santa Claus we know today.  It is tradition to leave shoes (or stockings) out so that he may fill them in the night.  Usually the kids in my family received ornaments and maybe other small items but it can be candy, games, etc.  It's kind of like a warm-up to Christmas.

For this St. Nicholas Day, I got Ryan two ornaments.  One was from Michael's, a beautiful white and red vintage airplane.  The other was from Etsy (yay small business) and was the state of Wisconsin shaped from a beer can (we keep it classy).  I was on alert for the night before St. Nicholas Day but gave Ryan the ornaments later on.  What was disappointing was despite my constant reminders, he forgot!

Now that wasn't something that I really got upset over.  The conversation was more like, "I'm glad St. Nicholas came for me but he didn't come for you..."
hahaha



The problem is that little situations like that add up.  My family grew up loving to look at holiday lights and holiday displays.  We volunteer to ring bells for the Salvation Army, visit assisted living homes, bake cookies, watch Christmas movies, have poinsettias around the house, and everything is really special.  Ryan is sometimes completely oblivious to all of this.  There will be Christmas specials on, aka movies you don't normally watch throughout the year, and he'll want to watch a movie he's seen four times.  *face palm* It's also not like his family didn't have their own traditions. He loved to bake cookies as a little boy and his dad won awards from our city for having the most decorated and creative yard for the holidays. 

Is your spouse or significant other like this?  What did you do about it or how did you overcome this?

3rd Annual Inappropriate Elf Contest Entry #InappropriateElf

Blisterz the Erskine Elf is here in prime fitness condition for this year's #InappropriateElf contest. 

Although an ambiguous gender, Blisterz has chosen to rock a great fitness bikini and show that hard work, a dash of Christmas spirit, and the urge to give are all you need this Christmas season.  Blisterz's message to everyone?

World Peace, I mean let's get everyone on the nice list! People have been kind of mean to each other this year, especially online.  Remember the golden rule, 'Treat others how you would like to be treated.' Now go enjoy some hot chocolate and Christmas cookies.

I was inspired by Maria Kang's photo that rocked the social media world this year.  I'm a big fan of Maria and her awesome family.  I love her fitness tips and her positive attitude.  I personally thought it was great to see that after three kids she had a great bod, but not everyone read it that way.  Regardless of how you felt about the image being shared, it was a very popular image this year and I thought it would be hilarious if Blisterz did his/her own interpretation of the photo.  I had a lot of fun recreating mini elves and hopefully the message of goodwill to all and being kind-spirited will translate to everyone.  This holiday season and beyond, remember to be kind to others, especially online.

Image from www.mariakang.com






Want to see more Inappropriate Elf? Check out Baby Rabies' competition. It's pretty hilarious =]

If you liked this post, share it with others! If you feel particularly moved by it, leave a comment because I love feedback and discussion. Social media links are provided below and thanks for reading!