Christmas Time

Its Christmas Eve at the Beaverton Carey's this year. Buckle up kiddos its gonna be a bumpy ride.

The hubs and I are hosting My grandparents (2), parents (2), sister (1), cousin + fiance (2.5) that is a grand total of 9 people at my home that I will have to feed. HA. I pre-ordered a 8 pound bone in ham that I will pick up 12/20. I will make mashed potatoes, I think I will go with garlic mashed because lets face it, I am a garlic enthusiast. I will make green beans. I think just sautéed in, you guessed it GARLIC and olive oil. Simple, quick and healthy! My grandma is going to bring a fruit salad which is her specialty and my mother will bring green salad and the gravy making ingredients.   Of course I will try to make a traditional desert as well, pie? I don't know about that one.....

I am not concerned about the food I am mostly worried about seating. We only have the kitchen island which has 4 stools possibly could hold 6 and then our round dining table that holds 4 possible 6. I just don't want anyone to feel excluded.

Christmas eve at my house and then christmas day at MIL's. I am excited. I made her a homemade heart felt gift that I am pretty proud of. I am also excited for this because I will be enjoying the last day of a large breasted woman. AHHHH I am so ready for this.

Christmas time this year, (is awesome).

Happy Holidays everyone!

We went shopping

Hubby and I went to the home design store to look at tiles for backsplash and actually came up with some final decisions about colors etc. Hubby said it helped him a ton to go to the store and see the choices first hand.

We like the varied texture and colors

The top two are contenders

We like the white subway tiles TOO MUCH. I like the sliver of color between these. 

Love the colors

Who knows maybe squares?

No official choices have been selected as of yet. It depends on the counter tops we end up with so we can match those to the color.

We really like the white subway tile with the white bead board that will be on the back of the island. Plus bring that splash of color with some of those rectangle  tiles could be amazing.

The following are from the Official Corian Website

Corian in "Earth"

"sorrel"

"Burled Beach"

Too many to choose from!!! I just love how it looks like a stone like Granite but it doesn't come with the price tag of slab! Plus we can do our underlay sink if we go this route!

We are getting excited because our tax return this year will give us the boost we needed to complete the island I have so desperately been wishing for. This means that time permitting I may have this island within the next few months! Wahoo! I am giddy with excitement!

Tis the Season

We LOVE the holidays. Hubby sits and watches the "25 days of Christmas" while drinking hot cocoa and I get a chance to change up the decor in the home. We don't have much in the decorations department as we are still considered newly weds (I hope...) and this is our first Christmas in the new home.We have hand me down exterior christmas lights that my grandparents so generously donated to our cause. They said they were not even thinking of doing lights this year or maybe buying new ones. We are convinced he just likes to help us out so made up the stories. Either way we got some icicle lights for the front of the home. My parents friend had a house fire a few years back, no house = no need for lights = give to someone who would put them to good use, a.k.a. us =) So on the street side of the home we have real bulb blue lights. I only broke two putting them up, score! As for the interior I got this inspiration from the Potter Barn Catalog. For two reasons I DIYed. One being that I can not afford practically anything in their catalog and two, they weren't even for sale!

To start I searched for the garland. There was some expensive options that I wasn't digging, they had garnishments such as berries and holly. I was going for plain and simple. This was in a separate holiday aisle wrapped up like a wreath. 3$, nice find if I do say so my self. As for the words I got some glitter scrapbooking paper, and did them two ways- stenciled and then cut out with scissors and when I didn't like the way that turned out I tried exacto knifing straight out of the stencil. Let me tell you, glitter paper does not cut easily. I think I used alot of muscle for this task. I still do not know which one I preferred. I have "CHEER" and on back up I did also make "MERRY". Nicely enough this only required a few more letters to be made. Win win.

The boxes on the mantle, Dollar Tree, One dollar. Wedding date sign, stays on year round and is green so it fits into the holiday spirit! You may be thinking "Where are their stockings?" Here's the story. Hubby is convinced that if we leave our stockings at our parents homes Santa will still fill them for us. He is so precious. I am less optimistic about this but still going to give it a whirl. What does it hurt? This way we don't have to buy stocking holders until after the season, and hopefully a better deal!

We adore our neice and nephew. They make us happy. So, to get into the spirit of the season we took them on the polar express the day after thanksgiving.The Hood River Railroad does their own rendition on the polar express and the idea caught our eye. We actually got really excited for it. The kids wore PJ's and she even had pig tails. Here we are after the train ride. Don't ask what his face is, he doesn't like to cooperate for pictures on a regular basis. 

What would a post be without ending with a themed ending regarding the animals? Last year we thought it would both be cute and tortures for Dweet to wear a Santa hat. He HATED it. The first is the best shot we got of him and I was holding his paws so he wouldn't rip it off immediately. The second is Mr. Dweet this year lounging in the hat. He has learned patience ever since he became a big brother. And then Dude of course is cooperative and adorable posing in front of the tree.