My Handmade Holiday will be spent in Mexico with my in-laws! (Well, with some of them, the rest stay up here and get to shovel the sidewalk for us!!) We’re gonna make tamales and tacos and buñuelos (buñuelos are sort of like a flour tortilla, fried and then drenched in brown sugar syrup!) I’ll be spending all of my ample free time embroidering second-hand clothes! (That’s my newest project for Authentic Arts!)
That’s the reason I love going to Mexico, because everything down there is so in touch with “handmade.” Oh, and the color! So many wonderful colors!! It’s really inspiring and recharges my creative stores! When you want a tortilla press, you stop by so-and-so’s house and commission him to make one for you. When you need goat cheese, you stop by and see those two sisters and tell them you’ll need two large cheeses for next Tuesday. When your truck breaks half-way up the mountain, you cut apart a plastic bottle and patch together the gas line. It’s a thrilling and relaxing place to be!
I miss the holiday feeling of being with my own family, because being in Mexico isn’t very Christmas-y. No cookie making, it’s warm (think tank tops and ice cream!), no board games, not many decorations (there ARE a lot of Christmas lights and 8 foot tall poinsettias!), but it’s the best time of the year for us to go and it’s a special, if untraditional, Christmas all the same. They do have carols on the radio! …in Spanish. The best part will be all the arts and crafts time I’ll get! Here’s to an Authentic Handmade Holiday! I hope you all enjoy yours!!