Birthday Gifts

This years birthday was different than the rest. 

Since Miss Molly decided to give birth to her adorable little babes on my actual birthday, we decided to post-pone the festivities for a week. No big deal. It was easy to reschedule as all we were planning was dinner at a local restaurant and then back to our place for cake and puppy viewings. 

This year, when asked what I wanted as gifts I seriously had no ideas to give people. 

There wasn't anything specific that I wanted. 

J had let me order some lovely bracelets online for a gift. 

My sister pre-ordered me a book she knew I would love. 

My other sister gave me some great bath products from Lush. 

And my other sister said she was going to treat me to a pedicure when the weather is nicer so we could spend some time together. 

And I asked my parents to give me some cash (like I do every year!) 

I decided to use my birthday money for some art work for the living room. 

We have lived in this apartment for almost 3 years and I have never found anything I liked for above our couch. 

It was really starting to get to me. 

Every time I walked into the living room it was like a giant canvas waiting for something to be placed on it. 

I went to a local store, Homesense to wonder one day and say this awesome art combination that I could not take my eyes off. It was 5 photos in one. They are all similar but not the same, which I loved and as luck would have it, in my purse I had my couch fabric swatches and they matched. 

It was only $10 more than my birthday money, but for how much I loved it I had to have it. 

The end result; 

I love it. 

It looks amazing and was affordable (even before using my birthday money). 

My eyes are always drawn to it when I walk in the room. 

Happy Birthday to Me!!

:)

Saying Thank-You This Holiday Season

 As some of you may know, my hubby suffers from Cystic Fibrosis. Due to this he has home health care year round, unless he is in the hospital. Every week a nurse comes to change the dressing on his arm and check his overall health. There are two main nurses that come to our home, and this holiday season I wanted to find a way to say thank you to them. 

I decided that I wanted to make their gifts. I don't know what it is about homemade gifts, but to me they say that the person took the extra time to make their gift that much more special. Don't think that by me saying that that I don't think store bought gifts aren't fantastic, but in this situation I really wanted the nurses to know that these gifts were truly from the heart. These ladies are amazing just for putting up with Josh's craziness all together and they deserve to be recognized for what they do.

I searched high and low for something to hold the goodies I was going to prepare for them. Walmart, dollar stores, other discount stores. And nothing. I couldn't find anything that really stood out to me. I was close to buying the traditional cookie tins at the dollar store but they only had really large ones and really small ones. I didn't want to limit myself with the small ones, and the large ones were far too big and far over budget for my liking. Finally, I found exactly what I was looking for. I was at my local grocery store and they had these plastic holiday cookie jars with screw on lids that I knew would be perfect. And to top it off they were only $1.50 each!

I began to plan what I was going to put into these containers and after a lot of deliberation I decided on the following holiday goodies:

• Chocolate Covered Pretzels 
• Hot Chocolate Stir Spoons 
• A Package of Hot Chocolate

These treats were chosen because both the pretzels and the hot chocolate spoons will be great used in the hot chocolate!

 All of these treats were simple and affordable to make.

The Final Product :

Adorable!