merry hohoho

To all those celebrating, I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas or solstice, or Hanukkah, or what have you. I wish you all lots of lovely time and happiness with your loved ones, and best wishes for the new year to come.
We spent a lot of lovely time with my family, hanging out playing games, eating, drinking, laughing, and relaxing. Just what the psyche ordered :)

Even my dog spent all of Saturday relaxing. Here is how he spent his day, gradually getting sleepy... sleepier... even sleepier....

and there we go....asleep.

Being partly of English decent, our family continues the tradition of the flaming Christmas pudding as dessert. It is soaked in alcohol, and then lit with a match. Everyone oohs and aahhhs while my mother brings it to the table, while trying not to light her hair on fire, and we bask in it's Christmas prettiness, until the whole thing goes out, and we smother it in whipping cream, and eat it up.

Here are some pictures of the tree I made last year that we hung up again this year instead of a "real" tree. It's made of 5 wreaths of graduating size, strung together with heavy duty fishing wire, so it looks like each layer is floating in space. Last year, I strung it with those berry-looking lights, but I took those off, and restrung it with regular twinkle lights this year - 600 - and I think it looks better. It has glass icicles hanging from it, and various little fake berries and such wound into the grapevine. Even more fabulous, is the new fat mermaid my friend gave me, who now floats gracefully over the whole affair.



Ok... so I hope you all had a lovely weekend! I'm looking forward to more time with the rest of my family in Sudbury this New Year's, and then lots of time making new goodies for the shop! Thank you to everyone who finished their Christmas shopping at manus made, especially all those with custom orders, what a treat! xox Tania