Before I get started today – if you haven’t entered the giveaway we are participating in yet, you can click over to Smile and Wave first and enter here, then come back…just as long as you come back:)  Giveaway ends tomorrow and there is some really great stuff, so hurry!

Can you believe it?  2010 is over…and I’m totally okay with that – although 2011 doesn’t roll off the tongue quite as easily, too many syllables.

What are your plans to bring in the new year?  I don’t currently have any, and it is a glorious feeling.  It feels nice to not have anything I’m required to go to, I can just be.  So as far as I know – I will be hanging out at home with my family and relaxing – heck, I may not even stay up for midnight.  Gasp…yeah I’m kinda boring sometimes.

Another thing that may shock you(or not) is that I don’t do new year’s resolutions.  This started a couple of years ago when I decided that doing new year’s resolutions was too much pressure and made it a bigger failure if there was no follow-through.  Easy way out?  Maybe….but I like to think of it as giving myself a better shot at the whole goal thing.  When I think of a goal, I decide to put it into motion – I don’t wait for the new year even if it’s really close.  I find that I succeed more that way without putting deadlines and specifics that I can’t possibly live up to – who wants that kind of beast looming over their head?  I sure don’t.  Thus, I don’t have any resolutions.  I have made some decisions for this year though.  I am not setting dates or deadlines, or even specifics for these – they are just things I want to start implementing as I go forward with my life in 2011.

So, without further ado….here are my Non-New Year’s Resolution Resolutions:

You might remember my post a few months ago about my 4 Simple Goals (inspired by this post).  It’s hard to believe that 2011 is just 2 days away, and I wanted to give you all several updates on my goals, but I only ended up doing one update – tee-hee, oops.  Darn my good intentions but (sometimes) fickle follow through!  Well, here I am anyway, and ready to give you the details:

Goal #1 – Keep my nail polish fresh and….well, polished.

I actually did pretty well with this one – it wasn’t too difficult or time consuming, and the results were pretty.  I think I will continue this goal.  Yay:)

Goal #2 – Get in front of the camera (a lot) more often.

This goal was also fairly simple – take the time to get in front of the camera – regardless of hair or makeup (most of the time).  I didn’t get as many photos as I would have liked, but I still have way more in the past few months than I had before, so I would consider this a WIN.

Goal #3 – Make a new recipe once a week.

Hmmmmm, I don’t know about this one.  I definitely made new recipes, but 1 per week?  Nah.  Too bad – I’m sure that Tristan was rooting for this one:)  I DID make buckeyes, monkey bread, cauliflower steak, and oreo truffles.  Pretty delicious.

Goal #4 – Spend more time outdoors.

I didn’t spend as much time outdoors these past few months as I intended.  If it weren’t for letting my kids stay after school and play on the playground a few times a week, I would have failed this goal in about 3 seconds flat.  I shall try….again.

How about you?  Did you succeed on any goals in 2010?  What about 2011?  Do you have lists made out, or are you skipping the whole resolution thing?  I am definitely making lists, and will be sharing my new goals with Tristan, so that he can keep me accountable (maybe I will even share some here again?).

I hope you have amazing last days of 2010, and do something fantastic that you will never forget!  You could:  write a super long blog post, get your nose pierced, or go see 4 movies in a row.  Do…something.

Love,

Stephanie May*  Oh, if you haven’t already, please head over to Smile and Wave to enter in our MayDae giveaway (ends on Saturday)!  Yippeeee!

Hello dearies!  I’m so excited to be back sharing with you on the blog after a fabulous holiday weekend!  Stephanie May and I had so much fun with our family and friends, and we hope you did too!

Here’s a picture of me on Christmas – apparently I take myself quite seriously.

I know you are all wondering if I was ever able to make the gingerbread houses for our coffee mugs that I talked about here.  Well – to answer your question…

Aren’t they the most adorable things you’ve ever seen?!  Couldn’t you just eat them up?!…well, actually you could – but I love how they turned out and they were also completely delicious!

Now, onto my handmade Christmas.  I love to make handmade items for gifts – my goal every Christmas is to make every person in my family at least 1 handmade item.  While I didn’t quite reach that goal this year because I was so busy, I did manage to make a few things and thought I would share them with you today.  I also received quite a few fantastic handmade items from my family that I can’t wait to share with you.  Get ready for lots of photos and piles of cuteness!

Gifts I made:

Our sister and brother-in-law bought their first house a few days before Christmas – we are all so excited for them!  This is an acrylic painting I did of their new home.

Don’t laugh…I know the mouths are weird – but it was my first ever attempt at embroidery…and yes, as Tristan pointed out – he kind of looks like King of the Hill:)  I love this picture of Stephanie May and Tristan and really wanted to try my hand at embroidery this year – overall I think it’s cute.

Because Stephanie May likes artwork with red hair(or anything with red hair I think), our entire family each painted her an acrylic piece of art with…you guessed it…red hair.  Mine was a play off of her Thanksgiving attire seen here.

I saw this amazing perpetual calendar on Etsy and as you know, embroidery = awesomeness…so I made this for my mom with wooden disk tacks that I hand stamped – it has cork board in the back for changing month to month.

I saw this on Smile and Wave and thought it was adorable.  Just my luck, Stephanie May’s daughter, Guini, has developed a recent like for unicorns.  I’m pretty sure she loves it, and I do too.

I didn’t get a chance to take photos of everything I made but among the other items were a skeleton necklace for my nephew(his request), leather tassle necklace{tutorial here}, and a few felt bows, flowers and feathers hair accessories.

Gifts I received:

Precious owl felt iPhone case – please excuse the dusty phone…it was in my pocket.

Checkbook cover – so stinkin cute!

Hand painted tote bag – for my namesake.  LOVE.

Embroidered teacup – awwwwwww.

Fancy bow dishtowels.

Ignore the bike necklace, although it is super cute…but the other necklace was made by my sister, Tredessa and is…Number 5 from Short Circuit.  Oh. My. Gosh. LOVE.

If you’ve never seen Short Circuit…go now.  It came out the year I was born and is flippin fantastic.  Ally Sheedy and Steve Guttenberg – can’t go wrong.  “Number 5 is alive.”

Large bow tote bag…yes please.

Hand embroidered dishtowels – the colors, designs and sheer cuteness are so much fun.

Felt cup cozies….so cozy.

I hope you have enjoyed seeing all things handmade from my Christmas this year – I am sure to enjoy them for a long time!  Happy jumpday loves!

Tristan and I are spending some much needed time together.  Yesterday was our 9th anniversary, so we drove to Downtown Denver to spend a couple nights at a hotel.  Not a big deal to some people, but when you have 3 small kids – 2 days of alone time and quietness are pure bliss.  Bliss.  We are also doing some shopping, lots of eating, frequent hand holding, and some snuggling (among other things…).

Photos of Tristan and I that I love (including some wedding photos!).

I am a fortunate, blessed girl.  I really am.  Hope you are having a magical week as well.

Hello everyone!  How was your Christmas weekend?  We hope it was good and nice:)  Today is a very exciting day for me (Stephanie May), because it is my wedding anniversary!  I have been married to my husband Tristan (I love you!) for 9 whole years.  Wow.  We were just 2 young kids (19 and 21) when we tied the knot, and although I wouldn’t recommend getting married at that age to most other people, it worked out very well for us, and I am still very much in love with him ♥  In honor of my anniversary, we (the sisters, May & Dae) wanted to do our Etsy Picks this week about winter weddings.  I love winter weddings, and I would LOVE to do a vow renewal ceremony sometime in 2012 for our 10 year anniversary, so it was super exciting to look up ideas for something like that – fun fun fun!  If you or someone you know is planning a wedding, you should definitely look to Etsy for some awesome handmade and vintage wedding goodies:

Stephanie May’s Etsy Picks:

If I were having a wedding this winter, I would need:

Matching heels and groom’s socks with a gorgeous handcrafted bouquet.

Lovely vintage theater seats for all of the guests (I obviously have a fantasy budget for this).

A colorful handmade quilt on each chair for the guests to wrap up in when they get chilly.

A beautiful, non-white dress with ruffles and raw edges.

A breathtaking knit wrap to keep me snug.

Balloon-darts, other carnival games, and carnival rides at the reception.

An amazing double breasted suit for Tristan.

Pin wheels.

And of course, a mini-ferris wheel to serve our red velvet cheesecake cupcakes to our guests.   :)

Would you want to come to this wedding?

(jewelry bouquet by The Ritzy Rose, theater seats from Dirty Birdies Vintage, quilt by Carolina Patchworks, wedding dress by Kate Towers, knit cape by Fashionable Knitting, balloon dart photo from Mist Flower Photo, suit by Michele Nassaney, pinwheel mobile by Pickled Parlor, ferris wheel cupcake holder by Knob Creek Metal Arts)

Stormie Dae’s Etsy Picks:

Since I’m not married yet, I can’t give away all of my real ideas:) but here are a few I love:

Vintage dress with lots of lace and layers.

Rustic ornaments celebrating the union.

Large flower brooches.

Thousands of little confettis strung about.

Ruffled leggings to keep the bride warm.

Place cards at each setting – don’t these look like cute little snowballs?

Random household objects and lots of light for decoration.

A fun party dress for the rehearsal dinner or reception.

Non-traditional cake plates.

(Vintage inspired lace wedding dress by Your Fairytale Wedding, Wooden Mr and Mrs tree ornaments from Little Wee Shop, Hand felted dahlia brooch by Jurgita Mi, Silver spun metallic confetti garland by Kristina Marie, Country fried ruffle leggings by Bayou Salvage, Yarn pom pom place card holders from Imeon Design, Vintage metal funnel from Little Byrd Vintage, Poufy party mini dress by Love June,  Wooden cake plate by Sunday Hatch)

We hope you have a fantastic and safe holiday tomorrow…stuff yourselves, spend time with the people you love and have a MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Love,

Stormie Dae

Hi people!  My family had our 2nd annual have-anything-we-want-that-is-yummy-dinner on Tuesday night.  It was so much fun, and very much needed in all of the chaos of Christmas week.  You can read about our 2009 dinner here.

I have to say that I am really loving this new tradition!  We chose to have the dinner with just Tristan and I and our 3 kids.  We had it a few days before Christmas and I think that it really builds anticipation for Christmas for all of us.  The kids were so excited all day for the dinner, they could hardly contain themselves!  There was much preperation going on in the kitchen during the day, and they kept asking when it was going to be time to eat, while bouncing up and down:)  Sometimes it was cute, and sometimes….not so much.  I also spent time making sure that the kitchen was festively decorated so that it wasn’t just a regular night to us.  I hung up some honeycomb bells, and I am not taking them down – LOVE.

Tea lights, Anthropologie bowls, patterned table cloth, the rest of the decor was pretty simple.  I took these photos during the day, but the actual photos of dinner were, of course at night, so please forgive the dark lighting:)

For dinner we had:  spinach artichoke dip, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, baked potato soup, steak, cauliflowerr steak, and fresh made crepes with fruit and cream cheese for dessert.  Oh, and we had sherbet punch to drink – yum!  The fun thing about this tradition, is that we get to choose foods that we don’t have on a regular basis.  What is cauliflower steak you ask?

Cauliflower steak was my alternative to the top sirloin steak that Tristan made for himself and the kids.  I don’t eat much red meat, and had read about cauliflower steak in a vegan cookbook, and thought that it sounded so good, so I tried it and really liked it!  I would definitely have it again and again and again.  Recipe here.

All of the food was SO yummy, and I ate way way way too much, but that’s part of the fun I suppose:)

I cut Tristan’s head off in both of these photos.  Darn.

So glad that we got to do this again – We sat around the table and felt happy to have amazing food and to be together.  I can’t wait until next year!

_________________________________________

On Monday, the 5 of us went and took some photos for our Christmas card (that we would be “giving” to people via FaceBook and email).  We wanted to try something non-traditional, and since Tristan and I  just watched the 1st season of The Walking Dead, we had zombies on our minds (ha! – no pun intended)…

I absolutely LOVE how the card turned out – definitely off the wall, but undoubtedly “us”!

Did you send out Christmas cards this year?  What did you do for yours?

2 days left till Christmas!  Stormie Dae will be here tomorrow with a Christmas Eve post, and we will be on our regular schedule next week.  Thanks so much for reading and commenting on our posts!  Even when we are at our busiest, we NEVER get tired of hearing from you!  OH, and we have new items in our Etsy Shop – please take a look if you get a minute!

Merry Christmas to you!

Love,

Stephanie May

Have you seen it?  Do you notice the trend?  I hope so…because it’s large.

I wanted to take a break from Christmas talk for today and show you my new shoes.  Yes, it’s all about me.  I found these at the Arc thrift store for $3….and I adore them!

I know, you’re totally jealous…it’s okay – I would be too.  I am really loving this trend right now – the colors, patterns, and plain old fun of it.  Swooning over these:

This gorgeous dress by Mociun

The cutest little dreamcatcher around from Red Velvet Art

Colorful painted sticks by Ginette Lapalme

Elsie’s cute feathers

This fantastic Heritage1981 cardigan {photo from lookbook.nu}

Just thought you might like to see them again:)

I am so excited for Christmas and so close to finishing all of my projects I can taste it!  Happy Wednesday lovelies!

Love,

Stormie Dae

Hey guys!  Quick post today – here are a few of my gift wrap ideas for this year – bows, and paper circles!

Pretty simple, but I do love the effect:)

And speaking of simple, here is a recipe for one of my favorite chocolate treats:

Knock-off Thin Mints (sorry Girl Scouts)

You’ll need:  Ritz crackers, 16 oz of Almond Bark, and 1/2 teaspoon of peppermint extract (yup, that’s all!)

After melting the almond bark, add the peppermint extract and stir.  Taste it to make sure it is minty enough for you.  Once the chocolate is ready, start dipping the crackers!

Put the dipped Ritz crackers on wax paper to dry, and then move to the fridge to harden.  That’s it!  You’re DONE.  Easy right?  This cookie is definitely a family favorite, and it is so fast and easy – how can you go wrong?  :)

Hope you are having a lovely Christmas week – only 4 days to go!

Love,

Stephanie May*

Today’s Etsy Picks are all about one of our favorite holiday movies:  Little Women

It’s hard to believe that we were only 12 (May) and 8 (Dae) years old when this movie came out in December 1994.  We totally remember going to the local mall to see it with our family on Christmas Day, and we were instantly smitten with the gorgeous sets and costumes, beautiful and poignant Jo March (played by Winona Ryder), and the very cute “Laurie” (played by Christian Bale).  To this day, Little Women remains a Christmas-viewing must for both of us, and if you haven’t seen it, please please do.  It will make you weep (in a good way).

Stephanie May’s Etsy Picks:

(Doll from Nacho Kitty, chalkboard from Beth Whitcomb, cup of tea photo by Emma Lynne, ice skates from Mechanical Stag, dress by Maggie May Fashions, opera glasses from Rage of the Age, sled from Bellalulu, hair combs by Bel Canto)

Stormie Dae’s Etsy Picks:

(Antique ice skates from Bargain Track, Beaver fur top hat from Marvita 13, Copper candle holders by Twelfth Night Design, Civil War camp dress by Maritime Arts, Antique pen nibs from Regina’s Studio, Stack of books from Two Vintage Avenue, Sleepy time bonnet from Second Wind Vintage, Antique curling iron from AM Radio)