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

the dance!

So, here are some links to the belly dance recital I was in last Monday! They were taken by my husband, just with our digital camera. It only has so much memory, so the whole dance is in chunks. Also, from where he was sitting, he couldn't take in the whole dance, but most of the solos are on there. The video is pretty big, but I'm sure anyone with a high speed connection should be able to view the files, although you may have to wait a minute or two for it to download. Enjoy and let me know what you think!!

Video 1

Video 2

Video 3

Video 4

a few ramblings

I haven't been too chatty recently... I've been trying to sell some stock in order to get excited about making some new stuff. I sent out an email to a few friends recently and got some sales, so that's always good! I was originally going to do a big craft show at my house this Christmas, but have decided not to do one, in order to just relax and enjoy spending time doing nothing and not feeling the pressures to sell and create when I just feel like hibernating.

Arek and I have also recently been spending lots of time and energy on our dog, who's just been diagnosed with cancer. This has taken a toll, and we are working through the options that are available to him. Who knew we'd be spending time with a veterinary oncologist! Currently he's on prednisone, and he seems to be perking up, and the symptoms seem to be going away. He's only been on it for a few days, so we'll see how things go. All in all a kind of inward-looking couple of weeks.

A few bright spots though in all of this... I bartended my sister's friend's 40th birthday party on Friday and that was a complete blast! The man of honour was very surprised and was really moved by the all the attention, good wishes, friends and family there. As well as the full bar with drink menu chosen just for the occasion! I did some flower arrangements too, with some twigs, red berries and red gerbera daisies and started getting into the festive season. I'll probably some similar things around the house here for Christmas. I can't believe how fast it's approaching!

We're off to see the Tragically Hip tonight (ahh, gordie...). Recently saw the Beastie Boys (awesome), and will go to Fishbone on Friday.... Saw them a few times in the late 80s/early 90s, but then kinda forgot about them till a friend told me about the upcoming concert. Lots of good concerts happening!