The Christmas gift I'm most excited about!

Most years, I hesitate to name any one gift as my favorite... not this year! Although I love the royal blue Rachel Ray cookware set I got from my mom, nothing could compare to what my husband bought me:

Introducing my new best friend - the Canon Rebel T3 - my first DSLR! I just got it yesterday, and I have a lot of learning to do with it. I'm starting by reading the instruction manual entirely - something I wish I'd done with my Fuji since I probably never knew half of what that camera could do.

I think it's ironic how the two shots that are possibly the last from my Fuji FinePix S700 are some of the best it's taken lately - it had my new homemade lightbox to help, but still, those are the raw photos, no editing whatsoever.

Did you get anything exciting for Christmas?

What's in my Sketchbook Wednesday

In my sketchbook today:

Art Instruction Schools assignment - design a monogram using my initials.

Friday favorites Dec. 16

I promise one of these days I'll get back to blogging something besides my Friday favorites. It's been a bit of a crazy week at work with the ad designer out sick for three days and having to do her work plus my own and then having to put together the Christmas edition.

But for now, some things I found to love on Etsy this week:

Gorgeous candle holders from blueroompottery. Love the color, and I'm obsessed with candle holders that throw shapes or colors on the surroundings.

Exquisite Andalusian drawing from EquineTreasures.

A super neat horse shoe star from BurdetteIronworks. I've seen lots of things made from horse shoes, but never anything like this.

From Pinterest:

Peppermint swirl cookies - I have so many Christmas treats made already, but I might have to make time for one more - only three ingredients too!

How to protect your camera in cold weather - I never would've even thought about condensation inside a camera, but it sure is easy to protect it.

Sesame chicken recipe - I LOVE sesame chicken, but there's really only one place I can get it, and it's 45 min. away and drowning in grease. Now I can make it myself and maybe make it a bit healthier.

I've been collecting a lot of Christmas goodie recipes this year. If you have any good ones, I'd love to have them!

Friday Favorites Dec. 9

From Etsy:

Horse-shaped soap from Melsfunsuds - how neat is this? I'm amazed at how detailed and real looking they are - I thought it was a plastic model!

This white chocolate hot cocoa from tetoncocoacompany sounds especially good today since the temperature outside is ZERO!

This unique ponytail holder from Vacationhouse would be great to make an everyday ponytail a little special.

From Pinterest:

Beginner DSLR buyer's guide - Oh, so helpful since I'm starting to save/look for a DSLR!

Pesto rolls - Yum!

Getting great color in your photos - Can't wait to be able to experiment with these.

Friday favorites Dec. 2

Wow, can you believe it's December already? I sure can't. I've started playing Christmas music and doing some Christmas baking, but I think until I get the tree up, it won't really hit. It also doesn't help that merely a week ago, I was walking around outside barefoot - that just doesn't happen in Minnesota.

A couple new Etsy favorites:

Rustic wreath from WildRidgeDesign. I love that it would work for so many seasons - Christmas, fall, Valentine's day, heck, add some white and blue ribbons, and it'd be 4th of July!

Some beautiful Friesian horse artwork from JoanneKilner. I love the composition, the simplicity, and the depth of that eye.

What I'm loving on Pinterest this week:
I want this menu planning board!
This is a genius idea - a cutting board right above the garbage.
These garlic knots look so yummy!
A huge list of good ideas.
A simple tool to help with hanging frames.

Craft it Forward

Sorry for the absence lately. November was a crazy month. I was out of town two whole weekends, and another was Thanksgiving of course, leaving only a single weekend free. We also just went through computer problems and then updates at work, so my computer has been down and/or being worked on, and I usually get a large part of my blogging done during my lunch breaks.

I'm working on some Project Pinterest projects including a lot of Christmas baking, and I'll be posting some about that in the coming weeks.

In the meantime - a post I started almost a month ago but never quite finished...

Perhaps you've heard of Craft it Forward - receiving a handmade item from someone and, in return, sending something handmade yourself to five others.

I received an adorable fabric flower clip from Tweal (blog or Etsy shop) several weeks ago. I'm ashamed to say it's taken me that long to get this post up, but since I finally have something resembling a light box, I finally got some halfway decent photos which is hard to do when I'm leaving for work in the dark and coming home in the dark.

Would you like to participate? I still have openings for people who'd like to receive something handmade from me. All you have to do is shoot me an email telling me you're interested or leave a comment with your email address and I'll email you (you will have to provide your mailing address, so we'll have to deal through email). 

Then you spread the word and find five people to send your own handmade items to. Even if you don't have a blog, you can still take part. I've seen people posting about craft it forward on Facebook and other social media.

Let's craft it forward!