The Christmas Story

I love this video!!

It's sweet and pretty and I love seeing the 

birth of Jesus through the eyes of children!

My boys loved it!

Enjoy.

Merry Christmas Eve, y'all!

Merry Christmas from the Otts' Family!

So, this year we decided to do a little video

"Christmas Card"!

We figured it saves us a ton of money...
AND
you get to see a whole lot more of our family!

Winning!!

Enjoy...

Our life via Instagram...

It's Friday!!

My boys both had Christmas parties at school today.

They were so excited and sooooooo

excited to have two weeks off school.

Oh, my!!

Two weeks??

Mama had better come up with some ideas of things to keep these

active boys busy...for reals!!

Anyways, here's our week this week!

It would not be a typical week at the Otts' house

without a pirate pic..although the silly putty

'stache is a new one!

I LOVE homemade ornaments on the tree...

Especially with pictures of them!!

MERRY

CHRISTMAS

FROM THE OTTS' BOYS!!!

Legos...they are my life...we have a love/hate

thing going.

Sawyer kept playing with his shadow in the sun light...

it was the bright spot of my day!!

Hope you had a great week and have wonderful

holiday things planned for the weekend!

Linking up...

Jumping on the Bandwagon

Everywhere I look, there are tutorials for cute little homemade 

snow globes...

Like here...

Martha Stewart

And here...

Julie Ann Art

And my favorite ones...

All for the Boys

So, I became obsessed with doing this project with the boys,

especially with the Legos!! : )

So, I scoured the entire Wheaton area for materials...

Seriously...

I LOVE Pinterest, but sometimes when everyone has the same

stinking Christmas craft idea...that means Mama here has to 

travel all over creation to find tiny little trees.

But, I digress.

Here's our finished project!

They were a HUGE hit!!

Yes, he has a gun...it's how we roll here in a house

full of boys.

*Note*

Jars shaken a thousand times by hyper boys=leaking jars.

I found that my Ball canning jars worked the best. FYI

I highly suggest clicking on this link

and giving it a try this week.

That is...if you can find the materials...ha!

HAPPY CRAFTING!

A little teacher gift...

So, things are tad tight this Christmas at 

the ol' Otts' house! 

So, when I saw this cute and {cheap}

teacher gift on a blog I jumped on it!

Teacher gifts: Done

Score one for mom!

Details: a $5 gift card inside of a cute Starbucks cup

Tie a bow on her and she's done!

Oh, and make a cute little tag...

Feels nice to have something off my list for the week...

now on to the craft stuff I have to get together for Gavin's

preschool Christmas party!

I'll post on those later this week...might be some

inspiration to do with your own kiddos???

Hope you have a great Tuesday evening!!

Our life via Instagram...

It's been a crazy week...well...actually

it's been a crazy two weeks.

I cleaned up my sewing room and Mama is taking a break...

except maybe to make something for a friend,

or if an order comes in,

or...okay...well I'll try to at least!

Here's a snippet of our week...

Thanks to grandma, the boys are loving them some

Buddy the Elf!!

With all my hard work for the Christmas Boutique...

I decided to "treat yo' self" to a grande from Starbucks!

Sometimes it's the simple things!

Buddy had himself some Wii time while we

were sleeping...

This mug reminds me of being a kid...I think my grandma 

had ones just like these.

Noticed that the egg carton had a Bible verse inside...wow!

Now that's the best way to start the day!

Lots of necklaces were made in the last two days...

these got some petals and went with me to the city

for a little table at Growth Spurt...such a lovely place!

Craft night lovelies...we made tiny little yarn wreath

ornaments...great night with the ladies!!

Hope you had a great week! We got a little bit of snow today and my boys were so excited! We can't wait for the real snow to come so the boys can get their sled on!!!

White Christmas, please?????!!!

A beautiful show...

So, I've been sort of MIA lately because I've been working on Handmade Hope. A friend of mine and I organized a little craft show to let people sell their handmade lovelies and to give to some really amazing organizations!! It was amazing and a great success in my book...I can't wait to get planning next year's show!! A lot of hard work, very little sleep, but sooooooo worth it!!

We had a little goodie table set up with free cider for all the customers. All the money from the goodies was given to an organization called Restoration Gateway who cares for orphans in Uganda. Such a great group of people running this awesome organization. Check it out here. We raised $305!! What?! So great!!

We were also honored to partner with Hand & Cloth who work with women in Bangladesh by giving them dignified work. They create the most beautiful hand sewn blankets crafted from vintage saris. Seriously, you MUST put these on your Christmas list!!! They are perfection and the organization is changing so many women's lives with the love of Jesus and dignified work. Check it out here.

Each one is unique and so lovely!

So, it was a great show...here's some pictures of our wonderful vendors and all their lovely handmade goodies!!! If you're in the Wheaton area...come check us out next year!!

Our beautiful front door with sign painted by Alissa.

Ann's shop Pretty Little Notebook

Alissa's shop Feast Fine Art and Calligraphy

Amy's Beauty for Ashes table

Amy's display could totally be at Anthropologie. Gorgeous!!

My little shop

Abby's awesome shop...those cowls are to die for!!!

Nancy's shop Hardwired

Leah's amazing smelling bath salts...such a great gift idea!

Tasha and Audra doing their fashionable thing with jewelry and hair accessories.
Tasha did hair feathers and tinsel on site too. So fun!

Rachyl's crocheted goodness!

Dawn's amazing art work...found here!

I mean, look at this painting!! Unreal!

The ever lovely Hand & Cloth!

Their stockings are so beautiful!!

So, that was our show!! I'm so thankful for all the many people who made the event possible and all the customers who came and shopped handmade for the holidays. And I'm thankful that we were able to not only show off our shops, but really bless some amazing organizations...and give a little HOPE this year.

Next year is sure to be even bigger and better!! So, keep a lookout for more info!!

Texas Thanksgiving and this week....

So, we had a great week visiting Chris' family in Texas. It was a looooooong car trip down there (and an even longer one back), but we are so thankful for the time we got to spend with each of them. Our boys were in serious need of some grandparent and cousin time and we so loved catching up with brothers and sisters. There are some really exciting things going on in our family!!

We did some birthday celebrating!

I'm still a little in shock at the fact that I have a 6 year-old!! It's craziness!

We spent some great time with cousins in Arlington and did a little trip to Legoland for the birthday boys!

We had an amazing Thanksgiving feast at the B&N Otts Inn in Austin! : ) They cooked up an amazing meal and we got a surprise visit from Chris' sister Brooke...who flew in from Cali. It was a great week!!

We are glad to be home though and I'm ready to get things in gear for the Handmade Hope Christmas Boutique this Saturday here in Wheaton!! I've got tons to do and tons to make between now and Friday night!! Lord, help me!

So, it's going to be a bit of a crazy week! But, we have so much to be thankful for and our cups are very full! 

Hope you had an amazing Thanksgiving!!

New Items in the Shop!!

I've been crazy busy trying to get stuff done for my trunk show last week, 

the Handmade Hope Christmas Boutique in a couple of weeks,

and a little retail show after that. WHEW! 

It's been crazy...but I realized that I still really need to get some inventory listed on

my actual site for all the lovely people who might check it out and want to do 

some holiday shopping.

So...I've listed a few new things for you to check out!

Like this little heart elastic headband for little ladies...

Or a pretty layer flower hair clip...

or a pretty flower elastic headband...

or maybe a little something special for you!!!

So go check it out here!!!

Hope you are having a great Thursday!

The weekend is just around the corner!! YAY! : )

Handmade Hope with Hand & Cloth

So, I'm helping to create a Christmas Boutique here in Wheaton!

It's my first time organizing and event like this...it's a little overwhelming

and a whole lotta fun! HA!

So, I thought that occasionally I would link up posts that I've been doing on the Handmade Hope blog and let you guys in on some of the amazing vendors that will be there and some of the amazing organizations that will be represented as well.

Today, it's Hand & Cloth...and organization that provides dignified work for women at risk and coming our of trafficking. It's amazing! They create the most beautiful handmade blankets from saris! 

Need a gift for someone?? You just found it!

Come check it out here!