HAPPY HOLIDAYS + THIS YEAR'S CARD

Have I mentioned that I love having Christmas on a weekend? I usually work at least a half a day on Christmas Eve which means I spend the other half of the day running around like a mad person, which is not at all Christmassy. So even though not a present is wrapped or a single package of cookies packed for delivery, I'm not sweating it, because I have a whole day on Saturday to do all that stuff at a not-crazy pace.

Instead of Friday Finds, I thought I'd go about my annual tradition of sharing our holiday card with you all. I wasn't really looking forward to doing this year's card as it's the first since 2004 that features only one dog, and I put it off until the last minute. So last weekend when it was hovering around zero degrees I quickly snapped as many pictures as I could before I came close to losing my index finger to frostbite. And then I decided to torture myself by trying to put a hat on our cat and make him pose for a photo. Have I mentioned the cat here? Fergus is relatively new around these parts and he's currently a 10-month-old spitfire who is a lot of naughty and cute enough keep us from killing him. And he does not like hats.

Fortunately Odin was far more cooperative than Fergus, which led us to this card.

Here are some of the photos from cards past.

2015 (Rita and Odin)

2014 (Odin and Rita)

2012 (Hudson and Rita)

2011 (Hudson and Rita)

2009

2008 (Rita and Hudson)

2007 (Rita and Hudson)

2006 (Hudson and Rita)

2005 (Hudson and Rita)

Whatever holiday you are celebrating, whoever you are celebrating it with, whether your house is completely decked out in its holiday finery or if you just said, "Screw it, I'm not decorating this year," I hope you have a great time with people who are important in your lives. Holidays can be hard for some, but I hope you find joy. And that your cat doesn't claw your eyes out while you sleep for making them wear an elf hat.

I'll be back next week! Happy holidays!

FRIDAY FINDS

It's weird to have Christmas on a weekend. I love it from a work standpoint (taking off in the middle of the week and having to come back is a drag), but from an organizational standpoint it feels odd. Like there is a lot of Christmas stuff I still want and need to do and given the date, I feel like I should have more time, but this weekend is really the last shot.

Anyway, no surprise, Friday Finds is pretty Christmas heavy. Merry Merry!

Loi's sparse Christmas tree. Loi Thai photo

I think Loi's Charlie Brown tree is pretty much perfect and the garland on his banister is to die for.

I have no idea what in the world an Asian perogi is, but it sounds pretty yummy.

I'll be baking lots and lots of Christmas cookies this weekend (although I'm scaling back from previous years to only what I plan to give away; we neither need nor eat a lot of extra cookies), and I think most spritz cookies are boring. This one may have a needed kick.

I agree with this. I love orchids, particularly varieties other than phalenopsis.

Emily Henderson (ex-HGTV designer and fab blogger) bought a new house and just finished the kitchen. She's calling it "Modern English Country" and I can't decide if I love it or not. What I do like about it is that it seems like a much more approachable kitchen than most kitchens you see in the blogosphere. That's not to say that I don't like other kitchens, but there is a warmth and a "normalness" to this kitchen that seems real. But I have to say, I'm always shocked when I see bridge faucets in kitchens. Who wants to have to turn on two taps to get water and then balance the temperature?

Also on the agenda for this weekend is taking the Christmas card picture (I know, I know, I'm so late!) You can see what we've done in years past, but I really can't imagine a cuter picture than this one of my friend Kelly's new Newfoundland baby Piper. Kelly had our Rita's sister and she died just a few months after Rita. It makes me so happy to see this little cutie bring Kelly and her family some joy. And she's just too cute not to share.

Have a great weekend everyone! What's on your to-do list? Lots of running around or are you one of those organized people who will get to sit back and just enjoy the season while the rest of us crazies pull our hair out?

CHRISTMAS WISHES

Ever since we threw a Santa hat on our first dog Hudson when he was just puppy and mailed it out, Christmas cards featuring the dogs have become "a thing." Mr. Much More Patient says we've been slacking off in recent years and needed to do something more extravagant this year, but I've found that the more complicated we make the setup, the less likely the photo is to work.

So we went for plain old cute this year and, in a nod to the past, we brought the Santa hats back.

And here's what we ended up with.

And here are few from the big Christmas card photoshoot that didn't make the cut.

Here are some of our Christmas cards throughout the years:

• 2005-2009
• 2011
• 2012
• 2014 (Check out how much Baby Odin has grown since then!)

My favorite will always be the snowman one because we did not expect Hudson to eat the carrot nor Rita to look so horrified about it.

A lot of people don't send cards anymore and I can certainly understand why, but they are one of my favorite parts of Christmas. I love seeing photos of my friends' kids as they grow and just hearing from friends who we see all the time and those we don't. We get one good old-fashioned Christmas letter and I sort of love it because it's completely nuts. Plus, it's so nice getting something other than a bill or a catalog in the mail! 

Do you send cards?

A CHRISTMAS CARD

Ever since our first dog was a puppy, we've done a personalized holiday card featuring the dogs. Sadly I can't find that card anymore, but last  year I showed you many of our previous cards (and this one).

This was the first time in 11 years that we made a card without Hudson on it, which is sad, but we were able to include him but taking a shot by the tree we planted for him.

Young Odin was quite patient (for all 146 photos that I took), but by the end, he was just done, hence the photos on the back of this year's card.

Happy holidays everyone! I hope to be back later with some more photos from my house, but all of a sudden Christmas Eve got a little crazy.