Hillary Heidelberg's Blog

Merry Day After Christmas!!!

I hope everyone had an absolutely wonderful Christmas. I am down in Florida visiting my family, and yesterday was a great day...Luca and Julian got their fair share of great presents, and it was just nice to relax with family in the warm weather.

I was excited to find out that Memory Makers is featuring my book all this week over on the Memory Makers' Books Blog. Each editor is creating a layout inspired by the book and will be posting them all week. Also, classes (both Debbie's and mine) are filling up quickly over at nycscraps.com so if you're interested in taking either one, please sign up as soon as you get a moment.

Sorry for the brief post, but I have to get to the beach :)

Win a free copy of Scrap Simple!

Hey! my book is out (amazon will be getting their order in a few days, so pre-orders will go out first, and then everyone else) but Memory Makers is giving away a free copy of my book on their book blog if you haven't pre-ordered it...plus, there's an interview with me over at the forums (since I am oh-so-private on my blog I'm sure you're dying to know more intimate details about me......)

So, I went to that FANCY party I was telling you about the other day, you know the one where I agonized over the outfit for 2 weeks...it was held in probably one of the most spectacular apartments in NYC...four seperate balconies overlooking Central Park, and all of Manhattan. THere were at least nine different Christmas trees, a toy train running on a track, spiked eggnog handed around by tuxedo-clad waiters, and unbelievable chocolate desserts. I had a few wonderful glasses of champagne, and Michael and I had a chance to talk (since we didn't know a ton of people there)..but the dress looked really good, if I do say so myself. My hair, not so much, since I haven't had a cut or color in months. But hopefully nobody was looking at my head.

In two days we head for sunny Florida to visit my family, and from there we'll go directly to Disney World. We'll be gone almost 3 weeks!!! Luckily, I'll have some internet access. I know you were worried I wouldn't be posting. But I will. A lot. I'm sure you all want to see the many photos of Mickey and Winnie that we'll capture. But really, the weather has turned SERIOUSLY nasty here in NYC, so I am really really glad that we're going.

I also have some GREAT but secret news (I will be able to share in a couple of weeks). I am really excited about this scrappy news, and I can't wait to share.....have a wonderful holiday, everyone.

The dresses arrived....

I know you've all been waiting to hear what dress I chose. Well, they arrived a few days ago. The Shoshanna dress (#2) was way too small in the bust area, which is weird because she markets her dresses as being for "curvier" women. So that was weird. So that one was out right away.Plus, the silver circles looked sorta cheap in real life. The last dress was quite pretty, but the boob area was kinda "pointy"--the way the fabric was sewn made me look like I had Madonna coned Vogue look. Not too good. It's probably simply that my post-nursing boobs didn't fill out the dress adequately.

So, on to dress #1 (which was the one I thought I would like the most) and dress #3 (which to me said "new york christmas party" more than the others). The first one was lovely, but very slightly too big. It's almost like I am a Size 5 and this was a size 6. Of course, they don't make size 5, so there you are. But it was lovely. The material was stunning. Finally, I tried on the green Tufi Duek and I, let me say, this dress is GORGEOUS. The black material around the waist is a soft velvet lined with gold trim, and it just hugged my upper waist (but left my belly bulge intact, which means I can eat unlimited holiday treatage at the party). It just looked so right. Of course, it HAD to be the most expensive of all the dresses I chose, but when DH saw it, he said immediately "oh, that's the one" (he has expensive taste too).  So there you go. Green dress it is. 

In other exciting news, Luca got his HIGH YELLOW belt on Wednesday of last week!!! He was SO wonderful in his test, and was so focused and determined I actually took a video of him, so everyone gets to see him:

Some layouts to share too!

 

So because I don't have enough to do

...i've recently become obsessed with the idea of knitting. Not "knitting" itself, mind you. I haven't actually gotten any needles or yarn yet. BUT I did place an order for some wool yarn and needles at joann.com yesterday, and am making the rounds of the BILLIONS of knitting blogs out there to learn more. I am totally excited to learn a portable hobby that I can do anywhere (like say Luca's TKD class every day, or our upcoming flight to Florida, or on the beach in Florida, or while sipping mojitos while sunning poolside in Acapulco--oh wait, that's another fantasy)...anyway, as I was saying, I bought myself some needles and yarn, and have watched the beginner videos at Knitting Help  a couple of times, so i think i understand the basic casting on and stitching. I am totally excited to make something. I don't know what. A tea cozy? Little striped slippers for Julian? I saw this adorable bunny that I want to make someone who's having a baby. Who? I don't know anyone who's pregnant, but I will find them.  In fact, I don't think I can wait for my yarn to arrive so I am going to head to my craft store tomorrow. With both kids in tow. A crafty crafter knows no obstacles!!! Bad mom moment of the day: DH went to London tonight and so I ordered the kids a pizza and Shrek 3 so I could sit and surf KNITTING PATTERNS online. Aren't these scarves cute? I want to make all of them right now.

What else--oh yes, so I had this idea that I would finish a mini album for the latest SS call due tomorrow, and it's about halfway done but did I finish it? Noooooooo. It looks pretty nice for a half done, where-am-I-going-to-put-the titles-and what's-the theme-again sort of look. And a page about my grandma is half done too. I don't really know about trying to slip things in at the last minute with mag deadlines--my guess is they choose things a bit earlier on, so I am in no mood to kill myself.

I have a shindig to go to with Michael in 2 weeks. Now, when I say a 'shindig' I mean a truly Manhattan Holiday Bash, filled with exquisitely dressed women in gorgeous holiday outfits with a professionally decorated Christmas tree and waiters serving canapes. How perfect, I say to myself (given my current shopping state of mind)....let's just see what our online neighbourhood store Bluefly has for me....Now, keep in mind that Bluefly has free return shipping, and I will only be keeping ONE of these pretty dresses for the party...which one do you prefer?

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