Merry Christmas!!

Some pictures from our Christmas holiday...Bentley, curled up close to the Christmas tree on his red blanket.

Lane's first fish...a gift from her Grandpa.Josh opening his electric blanket. He's laughing because I wrapped the electric blanket inside of the gift bag in wrapping paper in case he decided to snoop one day while I was at work.

Allyson sporting her new Minnie Mouse Necklace with an interchangeable Cinderella charm.
Josh and his Grandma Jackie.

Traditional Christmas family photo in front of the Christmas tree even though you can't really see the tree...it's there.
My largest gift this year....55-200mm Nikkor lense for my digital SLR camera from Josh.

My gift from Jennie, Brandon, Lane, Donte, & Zoe, a matching Coach wallet to go with my Coach purse.

Christmas Time

I love decorating for Christmas! Josh and I put up our outside lights late this morning into the early afternoon. We only had enough lights to outline the outer edge of the roof, not the peaks, but we plan on purchasing the extra strands that we will need after Christmas to do the peaks next year. This isn't the best picture, but it's all I've got.

Then tonight before watching the bedlam game (OU vs OSU), we did the indoor decorations here's some of those pictures.

Well this one's actually outdoor, but I wanted to include it because I revamped my weath this year since Josh and Jennie both thought it was a little lack luster last year. What do you think? Does it need more?
This is part of the Christmas gift that I received from my cousin Cassie last year at Mom's Family Christmas.
Instead of hanging our stockings by the chimney with care, we hung them by the window because we don't have a chimney.
And after finishing the indoor decorations I made a pot of Mom's chili recipe, and we had that for dinner while watching the game.
Mmmm Mmmm Good!

Finally, just wanted to share the good news with everyone. I received a notice in the mail yesterday that I passed the first CPA test that I took. : ) Which is exciting!

My Bernina

For everyone who wanted to know, I got the Bernina Activa 220. I really like it alot. I'm a fan of the need stop up/down option instead of having to do it manually. I'm hoping that I will have my class on all of it's features soon. I tired to figure out how to do the monogram letters on my own, but I couldn't figure out from the manual how to make them bigger.

Just because I like posting pictures on my blog here is a picture that didn't make the cut on my previous post.

Bentley likes to "closely supervise" my work. This is a picture of him laying on my fabric while I was trying to cut it. I lost count of how many times I had to scoot him out of the way so that he didn't get a hair cut or a straight pin in his tail.

My New Sewing Machine & First Completed Project

A couple of weeks before my birthday Bernina had a good sale on their sewing machines, so I bought myself an early birthday present. It stayed in the box for 3 or 4 weeks before I had time to get it out and enjoy it. Here's my first completed project using my new sewing machine.
This is a diaper bag that I made for the Assistant Manager that I had at Bank of America. The pattern that I used was for a purse the size of the patterned fabric at the bottom and I added the solid black on top to extend it into a larger bag.
I added 5 pockets to the inside. Two large ones and three smaller ones.This is the matching make-up looking bag that I made for the Mommy-to-be.

The Music Builds Concert

For my birthday, Josh got us tickets to the Music Builds Tour this past Sunday when it came through Oklahoma City. The concert benefits Habitat for Humanity and features Jars of Clay, Switchfoot, & Third Day. Of the three I enjoyed Third Day's performance the most. I know you can't really see anything from these pictures because they're so little, but I'll pretend that you can. : )

Jars of Clay

Switchfoot

The crowd...lots of people were there.

Third Day

Josh's Crap Box Is No More

Big thanks to God, he took care of my hubby this weekend while I was away (Thanks again God I was not at the track to witness his wreck). Josh's car ran into the wall Saturday night while he was drag racing at the track in Tulsa. He is very blessed to have walked away with only a sore neck and foot after having hit the concrete retaining wall going approximately 115 to 120 mph. Here are some pictures of what is left of his car...

Additions Around the House & My Sewing Disaster

Here are a few of the little homey touches that we've added around the house...

Our engagement photo gallery in the living room above the couch.

My fabulous garage sale find last time i went to Texas. I paid five bucks, and I got something for our entry way!

Alas, my cross wall has begun. Of course it's in my craft/futon guest room because Josh wasn't too keen on the idea.

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So I've decided that my sewing machine is junk!

One weekend earlier this month I was trying to make a weekend canvas tote bag out of some material that I had bought a while back, but I finally had to stop because I got to a point that the horrible stitches were no longer decently camouflaged. Here are some pictures of my problem.

My stitches are loopy. I've had problems with the tension on my sewing machine so I took it to get it tuned up hoping that would fix my problem, but obviously it hasn't. Jennie even gave me the recommended tensions from the manual (we have the same model) and after I adjusted it my strait line stitch looked like a walking stitch leaving footprints, which is also a problem that I've had before. It did help the tension problem a little though.

So, I've decided to ask for a new sewing machine for my birthday or for Christmas, and that I'll have to put down my sewing projects for now. It's too frustrating.