Where Has the Month Gone?

I can't believe I've been gone this long. Goes to show how disorganized I've been (or possibly lazy?).

It's not like I've been totally absorbed in Christmas decorating...I'm still not done...there will not be 15 trees this year....and I'm fine with that. Seems the older I get, the less trouble I want to go to, not to mention the more practical I get...practical as in everything I take out will have to be put away again, so I find myself asking myself 'is it worth it?' many times over.

What's totally out of character is that when I got back from Florida I went and picked up my sewing machine, and it's now been 3 weeks and I've yet to use it. (GASP!!) I was hoping to spend some quality time in the studio today, but alas, Mrs. There Will Be No Outside Christmas Lights This Year caved at approximately 3 p.m. and spent the rest of the evening setting up outdoor extension cords, cursing strands of LEDs that were supposed to live forever that no longer work after 3 years, and untangling and hanging lights.

While I've self imposed the 'no trees upstairs' rule this year, I did decide to put the little sewing tree in my studio. It's one of my favorites because I made everything on it.  It's supposed to sit inside a sewing basket, but I just haven't found one large enough yet. One day.

I went to Ladies Night at a local garden center a couple of weeks ago and bought two Cyclamen to keep the Christmas Cactus company.  (Gotta have flowers in the studio)  I'm as surprised as anyone that the cactus is flowering this year. I'm also surprised that I haven't killed the Cyclamen yet (Shh!, don't ask the red one how long it went without water this week. If it complains just tell it to buck up, and be happy it's alive.

I pulled out my little shabby chic pinecone gnomes and trees I made. I like them, and I'm glad they didn't sell on etsy.

This is the newest addition to my pincushion collection. He's not really a pincushion, but when I saw him at the garden center on a snowman tree I had to have him. It's woolfelt and he makes the prefect pincushion. This one is definitely my new favorite.

After the Ladies Night things got crazy. I had a week to clean/decorate and bake cookies for my annual Cookie Exchange.

Friday we had friends for dinner, so no work then. And Saturday was out, as the Happy Hour crew had plans for lunch (3 course) at Volt (yes, that would be Brian Voltaggio's restaurant),

This is my appetizer, it's a yellowfin tuna tartare with two kinds of roe on top and a little drizzle of wasabi on the plate. (I sent this photo to the hubs, and his first comment was 'ewww, who spit on your food'.)  I never really did get the full explanation of the foam, but it's some kind of soy foam that they used to use nitrous oxide to make but it made it too sweet so now they use something else ( more likely, the nitrous was running out a little too frequently).

And this is a triple chocolate dessert, and that is egg-shaped chocolate ice cream (well, not exactly ice cream, something more pretentious-sounding).

After our $55 per person lunch, we popped into some of the shops and then went on a tour of some of the homes that were decorated for the holiday.

With the Cookie Exchange party looming, I had to bake Sunday if I expected to have any cookies for Wednesday. And of course I  HAD to take on an all-day Bakerella project.

 (My neighbor took this photo with her iPhone the night of the party). We had a lot of fun (and a lot more wine), I've gained 3 pounds eating cookies for the past 4 days. 

Two more neighborhood shindigs this week and then things hopefully die down. I still need to put out a few more decorations, light one more tree outside, finish shopping, and wrap.

I don't think I'm going to get to that paper pieced Christmas tree quilt this year. Right now, I'm thinking more along the lines of the flannel rag quilt. It's freezing in here!