From our home to yours,

I am very late on sending out my Christmas cards. So I am sticking these in and making them Holiday cards..

Mrs.J

The first ever...

Wow! I am working on taking down my Christmas decorations today. I have most everything done except for a few things I need Todd's help in putting away. Alas, he went golfing with our neighbor so I am taking a break and sitting down to blog about our wonderful Christmas. It is always sad to put all of the decorations away for the next 11 months. After having almost every nook and cranny stuffed with garland, snowflakes and lights my house seems really bare. Maybe this will give me a jump start to adding some more decorations.

So we had our first Christmas together as a family. It was incredible. My family and Todd's family all came together to celebrate our first Christmas by spending it in Queen Creek with us. We had so much fun and seriously stuffed every day with Christmas events. Over the last few years the McLarty's have created a few Holiday traditions and this year was no exception. I wish I had taken more pictures but hosting a major holiday is craziness. When you are the one doing everything, you don't have time to take pictures. But let me tell you about a few of our Christmas traditions.

1) The McLarty-Jaramillo Annual Gingerbread House Build Off
This tradition has really taken shape over the last two years. It is part Iron Chef part Food Network Challenge and 100 percent super fun. We put everyone's name into a bowl and pulled out teams randomly. Since there was one extra person we put Team 1 and Team 2 into a bowl and pulled out who got the extra person. Katie put together the "secret ingredients" we had to use. These we pick out and don't come in the gingerbread house kit. They always are pretty crazy and require extra creativity. This year Katie picked out brussel sprouts, oatmeal, rice and tortilla chips. Then we had one hour to assemble them and move them to the judging table. Our neighbors Nick ans Sara came over to judge the homes when they were done. Team 2 was victorious! I think our cute snowman was what did it for the judges.

2) McLarty-Jaramillo Christmas Corn Hole Tournament
This is actually a new tradition to this year, but it was so much fun I know it is going to be a staple at probably every holiday we do. Todd first played corn hole in Iowa in college and after playing recently with our neighbors Pam and Time he decided he needed to make his own corn hole set. He found a set of instructions online and with a little elbow greased made his very own personalized set. Did you think he would put anything other than Angel's logos on there? We had a few tournaments that weekend. Todd and I even won one together!

3) Tamales
My family has been making tamales at Christmas time for over 10 years now. We love to sit around the table and just laugh while we make a huge batch of tamales. When we were younger we would put all the extras into the freezer. Now we split them up amongst ourselves. My tamales are almost gone. I love to eat them with eggs at breakfast time. When our families spent our first Christmas together in 2008 we taught Todd's family how to make tamales. This year we had a little throw down with our neighbors Pam and Tim. They didn't know when they agreed to it that we had been making them for that long. I think we might have won that one, although Pam and Tim's were really yummy too! Next year we want to make them all together.


All in all it was just an amazing, incredible and lovely Christmas. The weather was lovely and company was even better. On Christmas morning Todd and I recorded all the fun gifts that our family opened instead of taking pictures. I want to try and put them together in one video because, I have to say, Santa was very, very, very good to me this year. Now I am relaxing a little before heading to my sisters' house to ring in the New Year. What a year 2010 was!

-Mrs.J

Last month was about...

My "digital life" went a little by the way side in the last week or so of November. Not like that is always a terrible thing; sometimes it is a little nice to not feel so attached to your computer. Anyways, I had tried to keep a status update on Facebook of one thing I was thankful for up until Thanksgiving. I started out doing really well, then I got busy preparing for the holiday and things kind of fell apart. I do have so much to be thankful for though.

I am thankful for a loving husband who supports me and helps me continually grow as a person.

I am thankful for my siblings. My sisters are just incredible and I love how our relationships have standed the test of time and are now more adult. It is a lot of work, but to have them as best friends, it is completely worth it.

My brother-in-law, I never had a brother before and I am so thankful that Brian is my brother now! He is hilarious and really caring at the same time.

I am so thankful for my parents. They worked so hard on raising their three girls and they did a pretty dang good job if you ask me! Because of all the hard work they put in when I was young, we are now able to have a certain kind of friendship you can't find anywhere else. I love them so much!

Todd's family, which is now my family. They are all such wonderful people. From the very first time I met them, they were nothing but loving and accepting. When Todd and I dated long distance for 3 years, I always felt so welcome in their home. Debbie is such an incredible Mother-In-Law. She loves my sisters just as much as she loves me and that means the world to me. I am so thankful our families are now just one big mish-mash.

I am thankful for my home and everything it contains.Every day I have shelter over my head and food in my fridge; I have much more than many people just with that. I am thankful for it every day.

Incredible friends who always make great company. I also get to call two of them my neighbors, which I am double thankful for!

My little kitties. I know this may be a silly thing to be thankful for, but I really am. I am thankful for the unconditional love that these two furballs give me. Even if I have had the worst day, without a doubt Nunu and Scioscia can cheer me up. What a feeling to have someone happy to see you every morning, every evening, even when you just walk back into a room. Both Nunu and Scioscia are rescue kitties and I thankful I get to take care of them and repay them for the amazingness that is their kitty companionship.





So much to be thankful for, it is nice to sometimes sit back and reflect on all of the blessings you have in your life. I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Let the holidays begin,

Mrs.J

I spent today being a

I turned this:

Into this

I have been meaning to make one of these for a while now. I had been keeping my eyes open for a frame and then last night I remembered that I had an old frame sitting in a closet! I just needed to update it.

This project was super simple all I needed was a little paint and scrap book paper, both of which I had sitting in my craft dresser. Really, this project didn't cost me anything to do!

First I painted the frame with some white acrylic paint.

While I was waiting for that to dry, I started to work with my scrap book paper. This part was tough because I didn't have enough of one paper design to do the whole thing in that color. It actually worked out better though because I was able to do a boarder and incorporate a bunch of colors that we decorated the house with. I also cut out about 35 squares in a fun pattern paper that are the days on the calender.

I used some stickers I had to put the days of the week on the top of each row. I know the squares are not perfect, but I think it gives some character.

All you have to then is put the frame back together and fill out your calendar according to what month it is.

I love the way this turned out. I am just so excited about it! I know exactly where I want to hang this on the way when the hubs gets home tonight.

Being a crafty girl is fun and even better when you can craft with stuff you have laying around the house.

-Mrs.J