Merry Makers

HOLLY DAYS:  And just like that, Christmas 2019 is upon us.

This year has seemed to fly by, and the weeks leading up to the holiday season were no exception. 

We headed over the (Columbia and Wilammette) rivers and through the (Dechutes National Forest) woods, to Bend, Oregon, for Christmas with some of the family.

We like to try to put some personalization and craftiness into gifting. This year that included everything from our home-harvested honey to home brewed beer.

Christian bottled up a Christmas brew on Christmas Eve eve. He wasn't exactly wowed by this particular batch, so we settled on a tongue-in-cheek name for it, "OK Ale."

Annabelle used the Cricut to make up some golden labels for the bottles. 

CJ and Annabelle typically make fun gift bags for four of their cousins. This year's theme was Japan, since CJ and Annabelle have been studying Japanese this fall. 

They figured out how to spell their cousins' names in Japanese, and "Merry Christmas."  Annabelle cut out the words and a red circle with the Cricut, and then applied them to the bags. (The red circle was so that the gift bags would resemble the Japanese flag.)

They carefully chose all Japanese ingredients for the bags - everything from ramen to candy, seaweed to soda pop, and some cute pens, plus a funny facial mask.

The finished product looked really professional. I think they could probably make gift bags like that and sell them this time of year.