One of my Christmas presents

I recently discovered Etsy and I am in shopping heaven (more on that in another post). I followed a link from Rocks in My Dryer to "The Vintage Pearl", an Etsy store. Rocks in My Dryer was hosting a giveaway of a piece of jewelry from the Vintage Pearl and I was just enamored with her cute "mom" style jewelry. I begged my husband to let me order one for a Christmas present to myself and he quickly said "Yes!".

This is how it arrived inside a bubble mailer.

The card inside the bag has a little graphic of a piece of jewelry stamped with t v p representing the vintage pearl.

Here you can see the piece of jewelry I ordered. It is a necklace with two charms and a pearl. One charm is a domed circle that has "keaton" stamped on it and the other is a domed flower that has "autumn" stamped on it. Hanging between the two charms is a single pearl. It is of course hand stamped by Erin of the vintage pearl and I just love it!

Here you can see the names more clearly.

Here is the necklace next to her card, the necklace is very dainty/delicate looking, that's one of the reasons I like it so much.

Here you can see the backside of the card with all of Erin's contact information if you want to purchase something yourself. She is currently closed for Christmas but I can't wait for her to re-open in January because I have a couple gifts I want to purchase now.

A close-up of Autumn's charm.

Both of them together.

close up of Keaton's charm

I have this vision in the future of giving the necklace to Autumn, and giving Keaton his charm. Autumn can wear her namesake and Keaton can keep his as a gift to give his future wife or use it as a charm on his keys. Maybe it's a lame idea and maybe they'll think it's lame but for now I think it's a sweet idea.

I think it's a steal for $40, $38 for the custom piece and $2 S&H

The TOTTLE Family

Family Photo Shoot at Ft. Barrancas

I had found this awesome photographer named Laura through my friend Carnley. I saw a couple of Carnley's photos on Laura's blog ( http://gritzphotography.blogspot.com/ ) and then I checked out the rest of her work and was really impressed with her style.

http://www.gritzphotography.net/
http://www.myspace.com/keylargo99

I knew I wanted something different than just posed portraits but I really had no ideas. So we just booked a photo shoot and Laura had all kinds of ideas and even suggested some locations. We chose to go to Ft. Barrancas ( http://www.nps.gov/guis/planyourvisit/fort-barrancas.htm ) because they have a light house, some stone building backgrounds, some grassy areas and the beach. That way we got some versatility all in one spot. We all had a lot of fun taking the pictures. We did some classic posing but mostly we just kind of played around while Laura took loads of shots. Now she has to sort through them and find the really good ones. She posted these 5 photos on her blog for us to look at while we're waiting for the whole package. She will then put up a slideshow of the finished photos in a week and mail us a cd with all of the digital images so we can print out whatever we want at our leisure. She doesn't offer prints yet because she's new but I totally like this idea better anyway. I'd much rather have the cd with ALL of the photos rather than picking a couple prints to buy.

Anyway, enjoy these for now and I will post some more when we get our finished product.

Autumn thought the sand tasted really yummy!

Keaton was a ham, and I'm sure Laura captured a ton of good ones of him in action.

Butter Keeper / Butter Bell

I had a glass butter dish that just annoyed me. The cover was rounded (and glass) so when you picked it up, it slipped out of your hands most times, smooshing itself into the butter below. So I started looking for a new one on the internet (where I start most of my shopping) and found this neat butter thingy. The one I purchased is called a butter keeper, but there are also ones called a butter bell. I really like this hip square one but it's much pricier than the one I purchased. The reason I like it is because you can always have soft butter on hand, it doesn't get messy and the butter stays fresh because of the unique airtight seal created by the water in the bottom. Here is a snippet of the explanation:

Butter stored in the fridge tastes like leftovers and tears up your toast, while butter stored on the counter spreads easily but goes rancid in days. What to do? Norpro has the answer. Simply pack the Norpro Butter Keeper’s inverted lid with softened butter, put an inch or so of cool water in the base, and invert the lid on top. Water makes an airtight seal between lid and base, keeping butter soft, sweet, and spreadable for up to 30 days without refrigeration. (You’ll need to replace the water every few days.)
I found an additional, unexpected and surprising benefit of the butter keeper. The day after I buttered toast, I lifted the top out of the butter keeper and looked at the water on the bottom, it had a floaty in it. I thought, ewww, gross, how did that get in there. Then I realized it was a small crumb I had gotten in the butter the day before while buttering toast. The crumbs in the butter come off in the water! Brilliant.

Keaton at 7 months old - May 2007

Both my kids are chubbos!

CHubs in a CHair - 7 months old