11 Reasons I love you

12 Days of Christmas for Husband

So I wanted to do something special for Diego this year for Christmas so I decided to do the 12 days of Christmas. I found some great ideas on Pinterest and came up with some of my own, too! I thought it'd be nice to share, since the blogs I found were very helpful!

He'd been asking for sunglasses for a while now (for when he drives) and I happened to find a pair at Big Lots. The first day is the easiest because whatever you get, you just have to get one! So make it good.

Anything that comes in pairs works great for the second day. (And the fourth, and the sixth...and so on.) Also found the slippers at Big Lots.

You can never have to many beanies, right? I found some $2 beanies at WalMart that worked great.

These are my husband's favorite bag of chips. I got the smaller bags at $1 each.

The collage frame can work for almost any of the days. I found a lot that had 8 openings, but I already had something planned for 8, so the 5 opening frame worked out perfectly.

3 pairs. $7. And he needed some new socks.

Found a 7-in-1 function tool at WalMart. Actually, it said 8-in-1 but it was counting the keychain as a function. So on the box I crossed out 8 and put 7 instead and then wrote, "Keychain is NOT a tool." Hey, it works, right?

So maybe not the most useful, but crayons are always fun, right? You have to start getting creative with the bigger numbers. I actually bought dry-erase crayons for our little white board we have at home. I'm expecting some very artsy love notes now.

Like I said, you have to get creative.

This is a coupon good for a ten minute massage. By me.

I stole this one from a blog I found. It's not easy to find things that come in 11, but your husband can always use a little more love.

Ferrero Rocher makes a 12 count gift box of chocolates. Mine is in the shape of a heart, but they had some in the shape of trees as well.

The 12 days of Christmas is PERFECT for my husband because he is so impatient for Christmas to come, and this gives him a little something to look forward to each day for nearly 2 weeks.

Half-Hearted Traditions are Traditions Nonetheless

Today is December 13, which means it is once again St. Lucia's Day.

St. Lucia's Day is a Swedish holiday that we celebrate in my family. Are we Swedish? Not really. I'm sure if you go far enough back in our genealogy you can find some Swedes. However, we have been celebrating St. Lucia's Day since I was in first grade. The story goes something like this.

I had an American Girl doll named Kirsten.

She was Swedish and since my mom had told me that one of my great great grandfathers was also Swedish, I identified with her. That, and she had blonde hair, like me. I read a book where she celebrates St. Lucia's Day and asked my mom if we could do the same. So we did. This is my first Saint Lucia's Day.

Dressing up was more important when I was younger. Once I got a little older my little sister and I started looking up more information about St. Lucia's Day and the traditional food. We started getting up really early in the morning to make bread with my mom. After the bread was made we would go from room to room with bread and hot cocoa on our trays and candles to wake up the family for breakfast.

After several years, my mom would sleep in (or maybe just let us think she was) and just my sister and I would wake up early to make the bread and dress up in our white dresses and red sashes.

Over the years we've gotten a bit more laid back about our celebration of St. Lucia's Day, but every December 13th, I can't help but remember what day it is.

Last year, we brought our nieces over to the house to teach them about St. Lucia's Day and make bread with them at crazy hours of the morning.

You can see we had to get creative with our white "dresses"

This year, there was no dressing up, but I did manage to make the traditional St. Lucia's day bread by lunchtime. It is important to me to keep this tradition going. It may not be passed down from our great great grandparents from the "old country," but it is part of my holiday memories growing up. It is something my brothers and sisters and parents and I share and something I want to share with my own little Lucia as she gets older.

Whatever your traditions, however small or seemingly insignificant they may be, keep them going! Traditions strengthen families in a very subtle way. And don't be daunted if you don't have family traditions. Start new ones!

[EDIT]

Here is a little more information about St. Lucia's Day (from Wikipedia):

"Saint Lucia's Day is the church feast day dedicated to Lucia of Syracuse (d.304), also known as Saint Lucy, and is observed on 13 December. St. Lucia’s Day is celebrated most commonly in Italy and in Scandinavia, with each emphasizing a different aspect of the story. It is one of the very few saint days observed in Scandinavia. In traditional celebrations, Saint Lucy comes as a young woman with lights and sweets. In some forms, a procession is headed by one girl wearing a crown of candles (or lights), while others in the procession hold only a single candle each."

For more information, go here.

A Mother's Christmas Lullaby

lyrics by Hannah Cabrera
music to hopefully follow :)

Last December white snow fell
The same way it does each year
Tinsel hung and carols sung
For all the world to hear

But something's changed this twenty-fifth
Marking it from each other
This year is different from the rest
Because I am a mother

CHORUS:
When I hold you it's easier to imagine Mary sweet
Holding her baby close to her heart
The Savior with his tiny feet
and his tiny hands and his tiny eyes
and his tiny little nose
Now it's easier to imagine
as I hold my baby close

I think the stable disappeared
as she looked into his eyes
And with a gentle mother's hand
She soothed his baby cries

Mary, is this how you felt
when you held your little boy?
That the world fit neatly in your arms
your soul consumed with endless joy?

CHORUS:
When I hold you it's easier to imagine Mary sweet
Holding her baby close to her heart
The Savior with his tiny feet
and his tiny hands and his tiny eyes
and his tiny little nose
Now it's easier to imagine
as I hold my baby close

Daniel's Story

This is another children's story I wrote and illustrated from my nephew for his second birthday. It includes a lot of familiar people and animals and is written more or less the way Daniel talks.