In other news our holiday kitchen madness has ended! We spent much of 12/22/07 making fudge, orange ham glaze, cinnamon raisin bread, rice crispy treats, chocolate dipped pretzels, English toffee, oatmeal raisin cookie mix, rustic soup mix and much more! We were canning, packaging and wrapping like crazy till about 2 am!

We made up lots of good treats to give away to family and we had some fun too! I think the baking and crafting that we do every year for family is a nice tradition that allows us to spend quality time together while making some gifts from the heart for those we love.

We actually had some crazy times during it all too! My doggie and I danced to holiday music and I made a pretty major typo on a recipe label for N’s soup mix and didn’t notice it till he read it out loud, then we both were overcome with the giggles and spend about 5 minutes laughing hysterically about it.

Here are some photos of the gooey goodness we were slaving away (lol) to make, don’t get too hungry or drool all over your keyboard!

Well, I hope you all are having an enjoyable x-mas eve! I would love to hear about your preparations for the holiday. Did you bond with someone or have a good laugh today?

Well, take care and get to sleep before Santa comes!

The post Finches leave the nest! Happy x-mas eve! appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

Visiting certain family members means enduring blatant insults, being judged, openly criticized and manipulated. Certain people will go on and on about all the problems and issues they have without regard for anyone else. In general the entire encounter is draining and often extremely emotionally abusive. I do not enjoy being in such an unhealthy situation and the dread often robs me of the enjoyment of the holidays.

Dealing with these people and issues is not an easy task. All I want is acceptance and tolerance from those certain family members during these gatherings. If everyone could just be on good behavior and try to be courteous of each other things would be more enjoyable. However, as a result of previous attacks I find that I prefer not to tolerate them… This means I am also part of the problem.

Finding a middle ground in all this is has been very difficult for me. I have been struggling with finding a way to spend time together while protecting myself from the abuse and emotional drain. My first reaction was to simply cut off contact with those people so that I could protect myself. This does succeed in protecting me but it is unfair to the rest of the family.

So how do you shield yourself from the emotionally abusive, manipulative and hurtful family members without completely cutting off contact?

It’s all about the personal boundaries! Often times in emotionally abusive relationships the victim has become accustom to “taking it quietly”. They feel hurt or angry over the abuse but do not see a way to end it. Many want to tell the abuser off or attack them back but they are aware of the repercussions and choose to suffer silently instead.

I strongly believe that allowing the abuse only empowers the abuser more. Setting clear boundaries is the best way to civilly put a stop to the abuse but it takes much courage.

In my own situation I have found that I am stronger and more able to set my boundaries in a neutral environment. I do not want to visit these abusive family members in their own home this holiday season. This makes me feel trapped and unable to set my boundaries. It is much like a sports team competing on rival turf, the rival has a “home” advantage.

Finding the courage to express your concerns about the behavior is often the hardest part of dealing with these abusive family members but it is imperative, this is why we will not be visiting those family members at their home this holiday season.

Asserting your boundaries is simply letting the offending party know when they have acted inappropriately. When an attack takes place you should civilly call the person out on their action thus establishing the boundary. Let them know that you don’t appreciate the behavior, tell them how it makes you feel and that you will not allow them to treat you that way. This is the only thing you can do to protect yourself, you cannot change their behavior.

If the offending party chooses to lash out at you for expressing your feelings that is not your problem and you should not worry about this. You cannot not control them or change them. All you can do is clearly and maturely express what it is that you don’t appreciate and if they choose to ignore you or get angry at you that is their own choice. They can choose to respect your choices or they can continue to try manipulating you.

Over time your attacker will begin to see what behaviors are acceptable and which ones are not, this is called conditioning. It is much like teaching a child or animal what is right and wrong. The consequences of the said behavior should be consistent so they will eventually be learned. Then it is the attacker’s choice to learn from it and modify their behaviors or deal with the consequences. Ultimately you are not trying to change the person you are just trying to set boundaries and protect yourself, although in the beginning you are giving the offender the chance to learn and modify their behavior. Over time, if the offender does not change it will no longer matter because you have taught yourself how to deal with these attacks without letting them run you.

In the end it is not about the other people attacking you it is how you respond and deal with the situations. Allowing yourself to be attacked will only make you feel bad about yourself, not because of what the attacker said or did but because of what you DIDN’T say or do in defense of yourself.

This holiday season take your personal power back, don’t let those mean spirited/ negative people rob you of the joy of the holidays. Brave those holiday gatherings with a new sense of self love and when you are emotionally or verbally assaulted maturely assert yourself and then move on to enjoy what really matters!

If you are also dreading dealing with emotionally abusive, manipulative and hurtful family members this holiday season try these steps:

1. If you can, try to meet in a neutral area (a restaurant, another family members home, a community event etc).
2. Assert yourself when the inappropriate behavior takes place (but do not attack back), express how it made you feel and explain that you cannot tolerate that type of behavior.
3. If the attacker lashes out at you for expressing your feelings and chooses to continue victimizing you calmly explain that you are choosing to remove yourself from the situation. Then leave.
4. Don’t hold a grudge against the attacker. Let them know that you continue to love them but that you cannot tolerate some of their behaviors towards you.
5. If they choose to hold a grudge don’t take it personally. It is your right to stand up for yourself and define what types of situations you want to be in. This does not make you a bad person.
6. Visit them and speak to them just as you would before you asserted yourself. You are not holding a grudge and you don’t want to play into their game.
7. Continue to assert yourself and remove yourself from the situation if more attacks take place. Repeating this process whenever an attack takes place.

The post Enjoy the holidays- family members and all! appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

We are planning to dig out our decorations this week and this weekend we will go cut down our own Christmas tree. We are slowly preparing to do the holiday decorations and we have been eying the energy efficient Christmas lights that are for sale in the stores. We plan to buy some, it’s cool how many sizes and style are available. The choices can be confusing and misleading though.

There are several types of holiday lights available I am told that “The LED Christmas lights offered in most big box stores use a 2-piece construction. This configuration limits the life of an otherwise long lasting LED bulb because it is not moisture proof.” It is best to choose LED Christmas lights that utilize a 1-piece construction because these are weatherproof, moisture proof and have a longer life thus saving your more money.

An interesting tidbit of information that I just learned is that LED Christmas lights are stronger than the other alternatives! This is a great news for me because our cats make it a mission to knock all the pretty things off our tree and onto the hardwood floor thus shattering and breaking them. I am hoping that these more efficient LED Christmas lights will be able to with stain the destructive forces of my kitties this holiday season.

The post Have you put up your holiday decorations yet? appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

I had planned to publish the instructions for the cozy sweater purse in my previous post titled Homemade Christmas gift ideas, to-go boxes and purses… Oh my but the post became rather long and for the sake of the sanity of my readers I put the instructions here in a separate post so it could be found more easily.

All you need to do to make this nifty little sweater gift bag/ purse is find an old knitted sweater or perhaps a nice wool seater that has been felted (or if you are like me it was mistakenly shrunk).

Take your favorite purse pattern or draw your own. I’ll post a my own free pattern here for your to print and use, please don’t repost it though, link to this blog post if you wish to share the pattern/ instructions with your own readers.

Place the top edge of the pattern along the bottom part of the sweater so that the decorative ribbing/ edge of the sweater becomes the top portion of the purse.

Place right sides together and stitch the sides and bottom of the purse. Note do not stitch the top sides of the bag that this time!

Turn right side out, clip and and press the edges so that the purse has the desired shape.
With right sides out you will now sew the top sides of the bag (the seam you are sewing should be on the outside of the bag, opposite of the rest of the bags seams).

Next cut two 8 inch strips from the sweater for the straps. Mine were 1 inch wide. If you prefer you can use cording or belting inside the strap.

If using belting or cording wrap the sweater fabric around it press with iron and hand stitch.
If you are not using belting you can sew the pieces together (wrong side out) and then turn the strips right side out after sewing them.

Place the sewed straps into the strap slits and hand sew the slits back together with the straps inserted. Fold the top portion of the bag down and you are done!

This homemade gift bag/ purse is very customizable and can be made into any shape or pattern you like. You can sew buttons or beads onto the purse for decoration or you can even iron on some decorative patches to customize the purse even more.

I found some cheap bath items that I plan to fill the homemade purses with, then I’ll give these as hostess/ host gifts this holiday!

At last the pattern I used is available for download! Simply click the link and when the photo displays righ click it and choose “save image as” – sweater-purse-pattern.jpg Print out he pattern an cut the blue outside away and your ready to begin crafting. Enjoy!

The post Recycled sweater purse and glove instructions appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

I do not enjoy the crowds and chaos of “black Friday” and I do my best to avoid it at all costs. Last night we had thanksgiving dinner at 11pm because that is when my boyfriend was off work. Eating so late was perfect because it kept us awake and ready for the black Friday deals online that posted at midnight! I wrote a sponsored post about a company that complied all the black Friday deals for many stores, the site is really helpful (http://www.black-friday.net) and I actually used it last night to buy some great gifts at killer prices!

Okay, so back to the black Friday experience… Today I was honked at while driving the over crowded streets, I was in a good mood and was trying to be courteous and spread holiday cheer. I was letting people who were waiting forever to turn left go ahead of me and I was taking care not to block driveways etc.. Some lady hauled off and blared her horn at me, The light was red so we couldn’t go anywhere but I guess she was annoyed with my good cheer or something… Where is the Christmas spirit in that? So when the light turned green I pulled forward and break checked her- my evil side surfaced for a moment…

We headed over to home depot first to get that the sale priced chainsaw with my gift cards. We looked everywhere for it and did not see it so we asked a sales associate about it. Some older man overheard me asking a sales associate about the special and he said “you better beat me there cause I want it”. Then he actually broke in to a sprint towards the chainsaw so he could get to it before I did… I was stunned but brushed it off, I figured I would go to the other home depot in town to get it instead. The customer service rep standing behind the desk witnessed what had happened and offered to call the other store to see it they had any left. She was very helpful and polite. I did end up getting the chainsaw at the other store without having to stoop to the undignified level of many of the other crazies out shopping.

I am just appalled but the way people carry on in while trying to score the great deals. That’s not what the holiday spirit is about… Giving the most expensive gifts does not make you a better person and people actually wont love you more for them. They are just materials guys and if you are trampling others and carrying on like that it defeats the whole point of the season!

I made it a point to have most of my shopping done before black Friday because it’s just easier and less frustrating these days! It’s sad but I can honestly say I have had my fill of being around people today- Some people are just so nasty ans self involved!

Dare I ask how your black Friday experience went?

The post Rude people suck!! Black Friday Experiences Shared appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.