Turning food and trash into pretties.

I have been crafting up in here. I just, I really like Christmas time, and now Pinterest is a thing. I know, right? Ugh, I love it so much. I mean, I really dig cheap, lazy crafts that turn out really well, and Pinterest is a WELLSPRING of that sort of shit. So I made a wreath out of candy canes.

The tutorial is here, but you really just glue gun candy canes to each other and put a ribbon on it. Ok? And then I made icicles out of a coke bottle, and this might be the prettiest thing I've ever made out of straight garbage. Because candy canes are a Thing You Eat Or Decorate With, but a coke bottle is a Thing You Throw Out, Or Recycle If You Have Room In Your Bin. But beHOLD.

So pretty. And it took me, like, twenty minutes, and was incredibly easy and I burned myself way fewer times than I did making the candy cane wreath.

Eleanor has been an incredibly satisfying audience for all this decorating. When we come up from her nap she has to swivel her little periscope-head around the room and make sure all the decorations are still there, the tree's still there, the giant wall-stocking is still there, the nutcrackers are still there.

She used to come over and try to climb on the couch so she could cuddle me, but now she pushes my face out of the way so she can say hi to the nutcrackers. And then wrooch herself around so she can say hi to the stocking. And then the elf on the shelf.

And YES, I know, he's suuuupah creepy, but she really likes him and I love the IDEA of the elf on the shelf, and every morning you wake up and go find him because he's in a different place because he's just gotten back from reporting to Santa, but a blog I read recently was all, And because of Pinterest, just plopping him on your Lazy Boy and calling it a day is no longer sufficient, and I was like HA HA, NOPE! This elf is just going to cycle between the bookshelf, the purse-shelf, the fridge, and maybe the curtain rod. I am not going to design a little winter scene or build a cabin out of pretzels every day to put him in. Oh, and aside: I hacked mine to make his limbs bendy and give him velcro hands, but these things cost like a majillion dollars if you buy them full price. They should already have bendy limbs and velcro hands, is what I'm saying. Anyway, the eight minutes I spent playing doctor used up all my creative energy elf-wise, but Eleanor's too young to know that I'm short-changing her.

I have a few other crafts up my sleeve/half-finished in a basket somewhere, but this post doesn't have enough pictures of Eleanor it in, so here.

Don't you want to bite her face? She kind of likes it when you do.