The Chic Life

Christmas in February

Ok, so there's no such thing as Christmas in February, but it felt like Christmas today when I got home and discovered 2 surprises - 1. A surprise from hubby and 2. A delivery that I knew was coming, but I didn't know when.

Hubby's Surprise

Hubby set up a little surprise for me, which I saw when I got home from work today (while hubby was out and about).

Inside was the camera bag/kit I've been wanting for my camera since Christmas. I even get a new battery with the bag, so I don't have to worry about missing any shots due to an uncharged battery. Plus, I now have a good way to protect my camera when we're traveling. Yippee! Thanks babe!

A Coast-to-Coast Swap

I also got a special delivery all the way from the other side of the country from most-awesome blogger Kate from Cooking with Kate.

The contents of the box, besides the vanilla bean syrup which inspired the whole thing, were a surprise, so I had a blast oohing and aahing over all the goodies I kept pulling out.

Inside the box:

Oatmeal & Cranberry Cookie Mix - all yummy-sounding ingredients!

The famous vanilla-bean syrup. Yum!

Whole-grain pancake mix - hope hubby doesn't see that "whole grain" part.

Chocolate Tea! Who ever heard of such a thing? I dunno, but I can't wait to try it!

Pomegranate white tea - another goodie that I'm sure to enjoy for a long time. Pom-flavored stuff is so good

And I even got an adorable card!

*UPDATE*

I totally forgot to add these Perfect 10 Western bagels last night because they were in the fridge when I started shooting photos. How could I forget these?!

Thank you soooo much Kate! I am gathering goodies for yours and hope to send it out asap! :)

Swaps & PIFs, Swaps & PIFs, Tea

PIF'ers Selected!

I received 9 comments for the PIF from last week and have selected three lucky winners using a random number generator:

#5 is Betsy in Pittsburgh from Joe and Betsy

#1 is Lys from Cooking in Stilettos

#9 is Judy from Judy's Fabric Addiction

Ok PIF'ers, not sure if you know how PIF's work, but upon receiving your PIF from moi, you will select three people to Pay it Forward to, and you must PIF within a year of receiving your PIF.  Yea, I'm not really gonna track that deadline...it's more of a guideline...haha.  Oh, and if you have the chance to blog about the PIF you receive from me, I'd love to see what you say - send me the URL so I can check it out! :)

Anywho, thanks to everyone for your interest!

Blue Giveaway Day Winner

Wow, 215 comments for my giveaway!  Thanks guys - what an honor to receive so much interest in my giveaway!

Like some other blogs did, since I received so many comments, I decided to have one grand prize winner and a second place winner who will receive a smaller, but heartfelt present.  I entered the total # of comments into the random.org generator and got two numbers: 24 and 82.  

#24 is Michelle from The Give-Away Diva

#82 is @nnette from generic girl

Congrats!

I am trying to respond to everyone's comments, but as you can imagine, 215 (plus 2 late players) is a lot to tackle!  I will do my best to get to you.  Thanks so much for your thoughtful comments and for entering this giveaway!

Giveaway Day Goes Blue

After seeing everyone else on the blogosphere participating in the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day, I wanted in on the action.  I think it was such a marvelous idea that Sew Mama Sew came up with!  Don't you?  Anywho, I'm submitting my giveaway far later than everyone else (just found out about it this afternoon), but I think I'm not too late to participate, but will give away something either way. :)

Up for grabs is:

A handmade necklace by moi, from my jewelry collection at my company, D Celestine Limited (click).  This necklace is called the Everyday Beauty necklace (click here for necklace details).  This gorgeous necklace is made with the eye-catching, faceted, cube-shaped Swarovski crystals in color "sapphire" with smaller clear bicone crystals and sterling silver.  This necklace is great to dress down with jeans or up with a fancy dinner dress.

I am also giving away matching earrings to the necklace, some vintage buttons, some gift tags I punched from some super pretty blue paper with red and green sparkly details.  You also get the cutsie bird ornament I made tonight with some fleece, felt, a vintage button, and some embroidery floss.

To Enter:

*Leave a comment to this post by this Saturday, December 6th at 11PM EST.  

*Winner of giveaway goodies will be randomly selected from all the comments.

*Please only comment once per person.

*Winner must provide a valid email address.

That's it...simple, no?

Good luck! :)  Thanks for stopping by!

Pay It Forward - Holiday Style

Whilst chatting with Mr. Chic yesterday, I found out that there was a box for me at the apartment.  I knew I hadn't ordered anything recently, so it must have been a prezzie. :)

Sure enough, there she was - my mystery gift.  I opened her up to see...

...another layer of wrapping.  It reminded me of when I was a kid and it was cool to wrap your friends presents in as many boxes as you could find so they had to keep opening box after box after box. I think I fit one friend's small present in about eight boxes...haha...good times...

Once opened, the card confirmed my suspicion...the mystery prezzie was my Pay-It-Forward gift from sweet Veronica of The "Bearister" Bookcase and Teas and Scones!

The box contained tons of goodies.  I don't know how V fit so much stuff in there!  First to come out was the card, some adorable holiday recipe cards and three tiny, handmade ornaments.  They looked origami-ish - very detailed and so small.  They look to have been hard to put together.

The box also contained some yummy candies, apple ornaments, some cupcake/muffin/candy liners (love these things!), and some heart-shaped cookie cutters that came in their own adorable tin.  Look at all my new goodies!

Oh, and check out this cutsie bear ornament.  A PIF from V, the bear-master, wouldn't be complete without a little something of her trademark. :)

Veronica, thank you so-so-so much for your sweet PIF!  I will be enjoying this for some time!  I'm sure you'll be seeing your gifts showing up randomly in my future blog posts.

Now, would you like to join in on the PIF?

* Now, for my turn to Pay-It-Forward...if you would like a PIF from me, please leave me a comment on this post saying you would like to participate in the PIF.

*All you have to do for the PIF is promise to Pay-It-Forward to three other people within one year of receiving your PIF package.  Brownie points if you blog about it. :)

*Anywho, I'll randomly select three names from the group of comments using one of those random number generators, so please comment before 9PM EST one week from today, which will be 12/9/08.  I'll announce the names once they are selected.