What a splendid get together!

Wednesday night, I had my long awaited Old Fashioned Christmas Party! My Kumquats, my little sisters and a few of their friends all came over and picked out some of our dresses.

{Dani Rogers, Marisa Oswald*, Me, Maddiey Beardall and Brenna Bergeson} 

{My Gorgeous Kumquats}

{Emily- Dani's sis, Hannah- my sis}

{Shelby- Brenna's sis, Haley- my sis, Annika Goodman}

We made the classic popcorn and cranberry on a string decoration with a needle and thread. It was so fun!

My personal favorite part of the entire party was making the old fashioned Christmas postcards. We printed out pictures of old postcards in black and white and on the back printed the writing side. We colored them in with colored pencils. We didn't have a picture, but, to make them look extra antique, my mom showed us how to rub tea bags on the postcards. It was very fun for me.

{Maddiey coloring her post card}

{Shelby rubbing her post card with a black tea bag}

The food was delicious! We had Turkish Delight, Broccoli Quiche, Lemon Bars, Orange Marmalade on freezer rolls:), incredible Wassail, Popcorn and other things. Haley gets all the credit for the food preparation. Except the Turkish Delight- it's in Narnia, how could I pass up an opportunity to make that? 

We dipped strings in hot wax then into cold water over and over again to make homemade candles. My were quite an odd shape because I struggled. But otherwise, everyone's were beautiful and old fashioned! 

We watched Little Women with Winona Ryder (who is my favorite) and Christian Bale (who is Gotham's favorite-- and everyone else). I absolutely LOVE that movie and it happened to be quite Christmasy.  

{I like this picture b\c it happens to have Teddy's face on it- We decided that we will waste our wishes on hoping that a boy like Teddy will move into the Hammer's house. I'll tell you if it ever happens:)}

*not as if anyone reads this, but I didn't know Marisa's new address so I couldn't link hers :)

If anyone reads this that wasn't actually at the party, I hope that you will try to have an old fashioned Christmas Party next year too. It was a lot of fun, at least for me. 

Love, your old fashioned (on-and-off Blogger), Brynnie

faces are for sitting on- nothing more

As dearest as friends can be, they are. I have been a bit of a jerk myself, but I have these friends who have stuck with me all the way through it.               I know how Thanksgiving's already past, but I am thankful for you guys. 

Dani, Maddiey, Brenna, Marisa... I love you three. One cannot function with out girlfriends to lay in the roads on their stomachs with, doing our recently discovered Dani's Mating Call Dance and making Brenna pee her pants. Without you three, who would sit on my head and try to get that dang pillow to engrave the flower into my face? Tyler... Tommy?! No, no. No one would. Because that might be a strange thing to do.

(besides John Hansen- I can tell that that boy would like to sit on my head sometime)

{p.s. Hey, Dani. Thanks for letting me sit on you for so long on the 4th year hike when all I had was lost, broken or forgotten. It must have been painful for your hawt legs.}

Love, your friend, Brynnie

{Psst: I can't take credit for taking these pictures. Maddiey Beardall did most of them}

"I'm all toasty inside... and I'm leaking!"

From here and now on, I am going to post pictures that I take. With my father's beautiful new, big camera, and the right settings (I've been playing around with it all day), and the Christmas lights that Haley put up for the holidays, I decided to give you a tour of my bedroom. I enjoy loading it with messy crap, but Mom, it's an organized mess, you see?

{stars are hanging from my bedroom ceiling}

{notice the collection of 16 scarves on the door- I've only worn 5}

{that wall there? that is My Blessing's List :) When I am feeling really grateful for a person, I write their name over again. Notice the big black box in the corner? I was feeling quite blessed to have that person this morning, so I simply colored it in :)}

{Me and Haley}

{not in my room- but we have ornaments that look just like bubbles!}

{on this setting... our tree looks like a tree from heaven!}

Did you watch the 1st Presidency Christmas Devotional too, perchance? If not, find some way to read Elder Uchtdorf's talk from 2011 and 2010. Both are incredible and the second talked about the Grinch. We watched that after the devotional and I wrote down about half the movie into my journal. I found quotes and a whole new vocabulary for myself to use! Umbrella- Pumbercella  Recorder- Blabbacorder  Refrigerator- Sub-Zero Chililibrator

The Grinch: Those Whos are hard to frazzle, Max. But, we did our worst, and that's all that matters.

The Grinch: Oh. Bleeding hearts of the world, UNITE. 

The Grinch: The nerve of those Whos. Inviting me down there - on such short notice! Even if I wanted to go my schedule wouldn't allow it. 4:00, wallow in self pity; 4:30, stare into the abyss; 5:00, solve world hunger, tell no one; 5:30, jazzercize; 6:30, dinner with me - I can't cancel that again; 7:00, wrestle with my self-loathing... I'm booked. Of course, if I bump the loathing to 9, I could still be done in time to lay in bed, stare at the ceiling and slip slowly into madness. But what would I wear? 

Maxy, help me, I'm feeling! Chayse (favorite boy to babysit) calls me Blynn. So- Love, Blynn