Winter crafts.

I'm back from my Thanksgiving getaway. It was enjoyable but stressful and tense. One member of my extended family is less than good and a terrible host who goes out of their way to make my family and I feel unwanted and uncomfortable. Beyond that I ate great food and spent time with my Yaya who is a wonderful and caring woman and a hoot to talk to. But after a few days being on a different schedule and doing lots of family things I feel the need to relax and chill for another week! Heh, I wish. I have a 9am Drawing class that I need to be bright and chipper for. I also never said what I was thankful for so I suppose I should say. Mostly, I'm thankful for my friends, my great family, and my boyfriend who loves me more than he probably should. Also the friends I've made on here who keep me wanting to craft every day. I'm also thankful for sleep which I am looking forward to my own soft bed after sleeping on a blow up mattress for several nights.

On a separate and slightly scatterbrained moment, I also quit smoking. It's been close to a month and I've been doing well with it although sometimes I get antsy for the slight escape of a cigarette. Most of my friends smoke but thankfully my boyfriend does not and never has smoked so at least I can feel good being smoke free around him. I smoked for 8 years so I figure it's a good change. I can smell things much better now and I don't smell like smoke all the time and use less perfume. And I save money!! Which is truly wonderful.

Been working on a few things craft wise, including a scarf I've been knitting for myself for what seems like ages now and several Yule ornaments. Whenever I knit anything for myself it takes forever because I feel no sense of urgency like I would if I was crafting for someone else. I also started a new miniature, a 1:12 scale enchanted garden. It will be the craft I work on between other crafts if I ever get any time. I just redid my seasonal altar this evening so I'll have to take pictures of that. I used some holly I gathered from the large 25 foot holly tree in my Yaya's side yard which is included in the picture above. I also am involved in a Yule card swap so I'm working on those too plus the rest of the Yule craft swap stuff. I need to get the sewing machine up and working again so I can stitch up a few more dresses that are more winter appropriate (my tush is freezing in the thin dresses I've been wearing!!) plus sew a few things for the Yule swap. It's getting stressful to say the least but I'm glad to be kept busy.

How are you handling your holiday craft crunch??