By Lisa Gutierrez on 12/19/2010 
I went to a cookie exchange and ended up being so full I could hardly look at my cookies when we were getting ready to leave. I consider that a successful party. Kudos to my aunt for totally decking the halls right. These ornaments hanging from the ceiling are the best. I couldn’t help taking a snapshot or two.
I ended up taking a combination of raspberry thumbprints and raspberry thumbprints covered in white chocolate ganache. Yeah, they were as good as they sound. The recipe is the same I’ve been using for the past couple of years. I can repeat it from memory, but I’ll just share the link. I skip the glaze. I’m just not too gung-ho about glaze.
Anyway! Did you know Christmas is next weekend??! Of course! I refuse to answer the question of whether or not I’m ready, or have done all my shopping, or have planned what, when, where, why we’ll do what we do. Let’s just enjoy these days. I have a 5 year-old who is off from school, so I’m going to be taking my vitamins, drinking my coffee, and trying not to let every little thing annoy the heck out me. I’m going to water my fuse and hope it grows.
On that note–winter is a few days away! If you find your noggin to be a little chilly, might I interest you in a little sale?
Get 20% off your entire goodknits order by entering the code WINTER2010 at checkout!
I hope the second half of your weekend is wonderful! Don’t let the little things get you–just smoooosh ’em.
By Lisa Gutierrez on 12/13/2010
I finally made a felt tree. I don’t remember how I ended up at this tutorial on Thompson Family-Life, but when I found myself in front of a foam tree at the thrift store on Saturday, I knew EXACTLY what I wanted to do with it.
-I bought the foam for 75 cents.
-I had 2 sheets of craft felt with no intended purpose. I bought it a few weeks ago; it was on sale and I was drawn to the colors!
-I had these amazing red buttons that I bought a few weeks ago at the same thrift store. They were in a bag with some other old buttons and I knew that one day they’d be called to the altar of pretty-craftiness. That day was Saturday.
And it wasn’t even a day, it was an evening. My oldest was spending the weekend with his grandma and my youngest, bored and alone, fell asleep all on his own in the living room. BEFORE DINNER! What’s a girl to do with so much free time? Make an adorable little tree, of course.
I knew the general steps for the tree, but I was far too lazy to run up the stairs and double check when I was trying to cut the shapes, but foam is so forgiving and I used pins to attach my felt, so I was able to trim, try it on, trim, try it on, and so forth. I think that’s what the directions in the tutorial say to do anyway! It was kind of nerve-wracking, because I only had 1 sheet of felt in each color, but everything turned out ok!
I attached the buttons with floral wire. I just threaded it through the back of the buttons and stabbed the tree with ’em. Again, foam is forgiving, so it was easy to figure out placement. I could NOT remember how the top went, nor did I even THINK of the bell, so I quickly crocheted a little star, stuck a button with floral wire through the center, and jabbed it into the top. Voila! Tree topper!
You should really, really, reeeally, go check out her post. The trees are SO gorgeous. They’re colorful and trimmed with beautiful vintage findings. I adore them.
By Lisa Gutierrez on 12/06/2010 
I must say, I do love knitting by tree light. I do most of my knitting in the living room and since we put the tree in another, I decided we should get a teensy tiny one so that the Christmas cheer could permeate the house fully. I would like to welcome this 2-footer to the family. It’s adorably small and will be perfect as the “handmade” tree. Since this is the first year I actually made ornaments, it has a few ornaments from Target spread amongst the doilies. I hope to transition it over the years to hold ornaments made from our hands.
Because of its size (or lack thereof!) the one string of 50 lights pretty much makes it glow!
By Lisa Gutierrez on 12/04/2010 
Since I’m mildly obsessed with shop-stitching (explained in this post) and I already had the word “christmas” stitched, I decided to put it on the outside of our Christmas card, this year.
I really love using kraft card stock for our cards. Actually, I like using kraft colored everything. It just adds a sort of rustic feeling to stuff. I used it for our cards last year, and even the year before! I think I’m going to commit, RIGHT HERE AND NOW, to using kraft card stock for every Christmas card I ever make.
Inside, I attached a little ornament for folks to hang on their tree. Oh the joys of getting this done early! People aren’t receiving them ON Christmas, like I’ve done in the past, so they can actually put it somewhere in their house. Oh! I hope everyone enjoys them.
The main event of the card, though? My kids, of course:
I gave up on getting “good” photos of my kids for the cards…ummm…the very first year! In fact, when my oldest was 6 months old and enjoying his first Christmas season, my mother in law and I sat him in front of her Chistmas tree with only a Santa hat on. And I do mean only! He was at the age, though, where his hands tended to migrate south A LOT, so he did his own covering up and there were no penises in my photos. HA! Those didn’t end up getting sent to family. they’re pretty hilarious, though. He was SO FAT.
The years since, pretty much every Christmas card I’ve made has had a subject making a face, sitting without pants, not paying attention, or just generally being themselves. I like it that way. This year, I gave them both a candy cane and sat them on my love seat. I sat across the room and just…snapped away. Voila! That up there is THEM. All the way down to Andrew pretty much INHALING his candy cane and Nathan savoring it.
I sent the cards out, this weekend. I passed them out to those who I see regularly, or would see this weekend. The rest are in the mail, sent out to family and friends whose addresses I have. If you don’t receive one, then this lady doesn’t know where you live! Consider this your e-card. :)
By Lisa Gutierrez on 11/30/2010 
SO! Our television has been a pain in the butt the past few months. It’s only 4 years old and is one of dem fancy LCD thingamabobs. Alas. There must be some crossed wires or loose….thingies inside. It WORKS, but sometimes it takes a lot of switch-pushing for it to come on. It’s like it doesn’t want to make a power connection? ANYWAY. It’s been out for about two days, now and you sure can tell. I finished up a custom order zippidy-doo fast and started in on decking these mighty halls.
I don’t know what’s up with all the adjectives and adverbs I’m throwing in, tonight, but I’m just gonna keep on keepin’ on…
My son went back to school on Monday after a whole NINE days off. GAH! Since then, I have:
-made about 30 of these
-completed and hung our advent garland
wrapping paper, washi tape, a scallop punch, number stamps, and the cuuutest mini clothespins!
-cleared my craft explosion from the dining room table and transferred it to the breakfast room table
-put up the tree! well, technically, my dad did that. BUT! I strung the lights on it and hung a few ornaments. in time, it’ll all get done.
-snapped a Christmas card photo & settled on a design. (I’m most excited about this one.)
-did some Photoshop cross-stitching. I’m going to call it shop-stitching, from now on. Little X’s where the stitches go.
and what have you done?
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