Monthly News: A January Recap

 

Surprise! It's a January Recap post!

I hope your month has been warm and cozy as we burrowed in to the long cold days of winter.

Our January swung from eventful to quiet and everything in between.

It began with Sam's big move to Illinois, where he started his post-college career.

We did a lot of shopping. We did a lot of packing. 

We hit the stores for all the necessary things. We even scoured the second hand stores, where Sam scored this vintage guitar. Apparently, that was a new apartment necessity.

Remember Sam's long blue hair? Well, that was gone at the end of December. He's a young man of extremes. I gotta admit. I love the new look!

Sam's move made me so blue! Even though he's been living in apartments for the last couple of years, he's also been just down the road. And now, all of my sons live out of town, and I'm feeling untethered. The days ahead will feel different, and I will have to make an effort to get out to see them more often. It will take some deliberate planning, for sure.

After Sam's move, it seemed like a good time to clean house and fluff.

On one of our Walmart trips, I found this Pioneer Woman platter on clearance, and remembered that it matched the placemats I picked up over the holiday.

That led me to a refresh of the hutch. 

A sweet look as we head into February.

We gave Sam our old IKEA couch and chair to help him furnish his new place. And after doing a little shopping and comparing. we found a new couch and chair for our great room. 

Spoiler alert: this blue couch is not it.

This couch is from our basement, and it is our temporary solution until our new furniture arrives. When will that be? Who knows! At least one or two months, I think.

But in the meantime, this couch works just fine.

I found these cute plaid pillows from Walmart, and they did a good job of tying the colors together. And Jemma loves them, too.

We've had a lot of snow and c-c-c-cold for so many days!

It was a good time to make a stack of snowman cards! These stamps are from Penny Black, and they were a freebie from an order I placed at Scrapbook.com. I colored them with COPICS, and then fussy cut them and placed them onto different embossed panels.

Ed took some time off of work to recover from those crazy retail holiday hours. We spent a lot of time on cleaning and organizing projects in the house. And then there were the good books and movie marathons. 

We ate good food, like these snowflake shortbread cookies.

One snowy day, we popped over to the mall and found this quilt set at a super deep discount price. It's a great color to camouflage Jemma fur!

We had a new baby great niece born this month! We got to visit her and her big sisters this week, and she was absolutely precious. It has been so many years since I've held a baby in my arms!

I needed a fast baby card, so I pulled this card from my stash, added a special delivery banner and heart, and made the sentiment tie it all together.

I remembered to bring a little something for the big sisters. They loved these snowy stickers and books.

I started two new Bible studies this month, one at church and one at home. I have a LOT of prayers for a LOT of people this month. Praying for our adult children, and praying for quite a few family members who have been in the hospital. 

Starting to think about the new month ahead. I made this fun card after being inspired by the newest Concord and 9th release. I made my own mailbox with some arch dies, and added the "POST" with some alpha dies.

And inside, the sentiment and images pop out.

A combination of stamps and dies from Catherine Pooler and Penny Black. This card fits into a 5 by 7 envelope.

Are you doing any heart-themed crafting? I have some new shortbread-themed crafty goodies from the Greetery, and I'm going to make some cards with them this weekend. I found a new heart-shaped shortbread pan at my thrift store, and I'm going to make these for the ladies in my life. 

And that's January, in a recap edition. Candles and cookies, blankets and books, roaring fireplace and bird watching.

Stay cozy, cafe friends!