boots & chocolate

Apparently starting a blog during the holidays wasn't my brightest idea; so little time and so many fascinating projects to distract me from writing... This week I've learned how to break a glass bottle with yarn and nail polish (what?!), collected printer ink cartridges to recycle, shopped at a locally owned toy store for kiddo Christmas gifts, baked gingerbread cookies, and designed a shoe pattern.

Handmade boots:
I drew Finna's name in our annual gift swap and I'm creating her a tiny pair of velvet knee-high boots (because she refuses to keep normal shoes or socks on her 11 month old feet, and baby its cold outside). In my new found spirit of upcycling I've decided to create her boots from thrift store purchases. Not only will they be inexpensive, they'll also reduce waist / win-win! I'm pretty excited and really want to make myself a pair after Finna's are done, although you should have seen the panic on my husband's face when I mentioned I could make him a pair too = priceless.

Chocolate:
So far our new commitment to only purchasing fair trade coffee has been going very well and it feels good to make better choices, however we've recently been talking a lot about chocolate and realizing we need to make some commitments in that area as well. "UNICEF estimates that nearly a half-million children work on [cocoa] farms across [the] Ivory Coast, which produces nearly 40% of the world’s supply of cocoa. The agency says hundreds of thousands of children, many of them trafficked across borders, are engaged in the worst forms of child labor." I've already purchased a bunch of chocolate for stuffing stockings this season and I have no idea if it was harvested by enslaved children. How heartbreaking... So from here on out I'm going to be making much better shopping choices when it comes to cocoa products. Wanna join me?

Find Your Peace This Holiday:
"It’s that time of the year when our hearts seem to connect to and long for the idea of peace more than ever. Ironically, it is also a time when we are so busy that we sometimes forget to breathe."
Don't forget to breath... Slow down, relax, and ENJOY making and giving love this holiday season.

Baby steps. 
xo