road trippin’

Today was biZZy!  We were having our [belated] family Hanukah party today at the early-bird-special time of 4:00pm!  I didn’t do shopping before coming to Cleveland because it’s always so hard to travel with gifts, so there wasn’t much time to get things together.

Something I started doing last year is creative packaging.  The family loves it and I think it just adds such a fun personal touch.  Plus I saved a few bucks and some space in a landfill by re-using various shopping bags.

For the crazy spiked bows, I cut off the handles from plastic shopping bags and cut them into shreds, then tied in them in middle.  Easy + funky!  I wrapped my uncle’s gift in a Victoria’s Secret bag to be funny, and he got a good kick out of that.  Since AJ’s name is short, I spelled it in tape, instead of writing on the bag with marker.  And cards?  Really?  My family knows I love them and they just get thrown out anyways. :)  Typically for the bags, I just cut them down 1 side, then cut the bottom out and wrap away.  I also like to reattach the handles so they still look like shopping bags, hehe. 

The rest of the gifts.  These were all mine…muahahaha.  Just kidding..they were split between 10 people. :) 

Blue + silver ornaments around before the red + green on the tree go up.  Yes, we do both holidays.  Don’t ask. ;)

AJ, Jenna, Dad

My Aunt Sherie’s mom, Aunt Sherie, My grandma

Josh [brother] with my two grandmas.  So cute.

My dad took this and it’s just oh so lovely…..at least the new mug is cute!!

Square bowl and a few other fun things from Crate + Barrel of course! 

I wasn’t really focused on taking photos tonight.  There was SO much going on and I wanted to relax!

Monday you can look forward to a new flavor of an old favorite. [not nut butter!]

And a DIY project that will cost you $ZERO and take you about 2 hours.  It is awesome!

Tomorrow, my mom, Aunt, Jenna, and I are off to Pittsburgh to hit up IKEA and meet up with Abby + Jessica!!  I’m so excited to see them again.  They both visited the last time I was at home, and we had a blast.  Yay! 

Time to catch some zZzzzZZ’s…

<3 Ashley