Added Larger Photos!-A Boot Makes A Great Vase, Puzzle Pieces Ornaments,Sheet Music Birdhouse

So we finally found someone that we could convince to go up into the attic and retrieve the Christmas boxes. Next time I try to pull this off I'm not gonna tell them about the ghosts...let alone the coons,possums or snakes. But I tried to be helpful when he finally decided to pull the attic stairs down. "oh,my God! you can't ust pull the stairs down like that! you have to knock on it, and bang on it to make sure the snakes aren't laying on it....give them all a chance to run off! Them? oh, well I was talking about critters that live up there. they'll run off, you're okay. Now... I want my grandson over here behind me. Here's a flashlight, the light switch is to the left at the top of the stairs. Umm, on second thought, I'm going out to the living room and I want my grandson on THIS side of me.( My daughter has never forgotten all the times we walked up on huge critters with sharp teeth and claws and I RAN HER OVER...and LEFT HER...to get away. Everyone knows this, except the FNG climbing up those stairs BUT my daughter gives him the Cliff's Notes version and once he's actually at the top step she tells him about some of the times snakes were in here. Next thing you know, he's going "ahhh......aHHH...a big black snake...it's HUGE...oh(dirty word) ahhHHhh(dirty word). I hobbled over there to the bottom of the steps to see what's up, and lean up against the wall behind my daughter, who begins to back up to get away, and backs right into my hand there on the wall. She starts making these sort of screaming noises, rubbing imaginary snakes and spiders out of her hair. New Guy couldn't stay composed. He caved, and let her know he was KIDDING...I had to let him know that snakes, possums, coons, monsters,ghosts...are ALL in the realm of possibility here....and that's why WE won't go up ourselves. So now my living and dining room has stacks of storage boxes full of Christmas Past. My daughter got the tree up...which is that first huge step toward Merry Christmas, and made sure all the pre-lit lights lit up. And I helped her get the grapevine wound around it, that's always the hardest thing, and this year I yanked out about 30 feet more grapevine to add to it. The plan was for me to start getting the bead garland up and then let Aiden help hang ornaments. Of course, when you PLAN stuff, everything goes wrong. He found the box with the garland in it and decided to get it out by himself. He grabbed the free end and began pulling on it, and that took too long, so he went faster and let it pile up on the floor. And it tangled and knotted into this huge mess that I had to UNtangle. Now, I'd started a vat of turkey noodle soup, and had to go chop some carrots and celery for it, and then some corn muffins to go with it. I kept hearing
" you're taking too long MEME! Hurry UP!" Isn't he sweet? I got the bead garland up, but only about 2 feet of it, the rest is again tangled up on the floor. I get to try to hang more beads today. Grandson and daughter have taken off for the weekend. I hope to have the tree fully decorated by next Saturday.






My little old boot. My sister bought this ages ago, and recently gave it to me. It has a glass baby bottle in it.


I finished a small wooden birdhouse this week,too. I covered it in sheet music, and then painted a glue/coffee mixture over it to age it, and added birds and trims. Now that I see the photo, the birds do not go with it at all!



Here's a couple cute ideas for keeping kids occupied during vacation. Paint up some old puzzles pieces, and make ornaments. Even if you don't have a puzzle, you can buy a 500 piece of for a dollar.

all you need for this one if red and white paint, and some glue. This is my grandson making one.

these reindeer are made from one edge piece and 2 middle pieces painted brown. We already had black and mini pom poms and wiggle eyes. Notice he said one had to have a red nose, like Rudolph. We'll glue fishing line to the back for hanging.

Merry Christmas
kudzu