Saturday, December 22, 2012

Holiday Lights

We went to see some holiday lights a few weekends ago, and now that I'm off for Christmas Vacation we're going to go see some more, but until then, here is your Holiday light fix!





Happy Holidays

Christmas Card Book and 2012 Card Display

I love receiving Christmas cards and I think it's a shame to toss them out after, so ever since we've been married I've been saving my Christmas cards and last year I finally found a way to save them all. This mini binder...

I haven't had a chance to create a cute cover for my little binder so until I find one... this will have to do.






For the card we are getting this year, I decided to display them in my kitchen which overlooks our family room to give it some holiday magic. Here's what I did to display them.

I bought red and green ribbon and taped it to the back of the cabinet doors. I used red clothespins to fasten the cards to the ribbon. As more and more cards come in, I used more ribbon and created the same effect over our hallway door near the tree, so we'll have room for them all.




Crafty Christmas Gifts

Ok so for Christmas for all of my cousins Big and small I made them each an apron.

The adult aprons are made out of a dish towel and some ribbon. The kids half aprons are made out of a fabric placemat. I also made the littles some snowmen beanies.

Here are the photos I promised.

Adult Arpons wrapped up

If only I had a better model... here's what they look like on.

Here are the kids half aprons and the snowmen hats

How I wrapped the kiddo's gifts

Friday, November 30, 2012

How to decorate for Christmas when all of your Christmas decorations are lost in your storage unit over 1.5 hours away

Long title, but you know how that goes.

Ok, so not sure if I told you all but... we went to the in-laws for Thanksgiving. I was so excited because when we first moved to Texas that's where we rented out storage unit, and I would be able to get my Christmas decorations out of the storage and take them back with me.

Well after we ate and before we went to see the new James Bond movie with the family, The hubs and I went to the good ole storage unit to fetch my WONDERFUL Christmas decor. We get there and all of my classroom and scrapbooking boxes (HEAVY, HEAVY, HEAVY) had been placed in front of all my Christmas boxes (I hope, we never found them). We moved a few boxes and peaked in what we could and couldn't find them. I was crushed, I mean REALLY crushed. I needed to then figure out how to make my home feel festive and Christmasy without braking the bank. Tough, but I clipped coupons and really hunted and here is what I came up with... so far.


I bought this cute snowman at a craft fair I went to a few weeks ago, $10. The mat underneath is from IKEA $1.50 (I love living so close to an IKEA). The candles and holders I already had.



Thanks to Pinterest I found a GREAT and super easy tutorial on how to make stockings, so that is exactly what I did. I made the 2 small ones first using their pattern and realized they were just too short for the ledge of our counter (since we don't have a fireplace), so I tried my best to create a larger pattern, and came up with the two larger ones. I need to iron them out a bit but I'm pretty happy with them. I bought the fabric at JoAnn's and it was 50% off. SCORE!


On our entertainment center, I bought some pretty greenery that was 50% off (and ended up being $4 at JoAnn's) along with the little items I stuffed in there (all 40 cents a piece),some lights from Big Lots $1.50 and the pinecones are from Walmart. They had a big bag for $3 and they smell like Christmas. The rest of the bag is hiding in the small rectangle basket on the bottom shelf there. The little Glitter Noel and HoHoHo signs are from the dollar section at Target.



The little mini tree sits on my computer/crafting table. I bought it at Big Lots for $7 and the star was also from BL and was $1. The ornaments I already had and bought on clearance from Anthropologie (my favorite store) after Christmas a few years ago. Under the tree are some blocks (my favorite kind of blocks... who else had them as a kid?) that spell out GingerBread.

Couldn't leave out the bathroom. I have a Beach-wood Whale that usually sits in our beachy themed bathroom(we are a coastal family, and lived by the ocean before moving here). Well I was at Home Goods yesterday and found this Nativity make out of beach-wood. PERFECT! I love it and bought it! I have two battery candles that hide behind Mary and Jospeh so it give a nice glow.

We are going to get a real tree, YAY, but are waiting until we can find a Christmas Tree lot because it's not the same buying it from the local grocery store.

So for a little money I have managed to bring some Christmas spirit into our home and I can't wait for more!



Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Where has the time gone

I have been MIA lately, due to well, me just not having the time, but I'm back in the swing of things.

I got a sewing machine for my birthday in October and have been obsessed in trying out new projects! Many of the things I've been testing out are Christmas gifts and can't post them yet as I don't want wandering eyes to see them. But as soon as I ship them out I promise you a MASSIVE, "What have I been creating post".

So, somehow my Christmas Decoration Boxes got stuck behind A TON of my school/teaching and scrapbooking boxes in our storage. Our storage unit is about 1.5 hours away from us, so when we went to my in-laws we thought perfect, we'll pop in grab em and I can decorate our new place (new since March) when we get back. WRONG, my loving hubby when moving our stuff to a smaller unit just shoved everything in, mainly because the boxes weigh a ton, and we weren't able to get to the boxes in the time we had to grab them, especially since we were in our nicer clothes. BOO! I did however find my box of ornaments, so that's a plus!

With that being said, I needed to figure out how to decorate for Christmas without breaking the bank or rebuying things I already have. So I went got some Christmas fabric (that was 50% off) from a local craft store and made some stockings. Thank you Pinterest for the idea.

It was SUPER easy to create with my wonderful sewing machine. The only thing I didn't like doing was cutting out the fabric. I need one of those cutting wheel things and the pad you lay down under your fabric... you know what I'm talking about. They are pretty expensive, so... until I can buy them, I'll just have to cut them the old school way.


Next Joann Fabric and Craft Store is having a 50% off everything Christmas sale that I'm going to go to and possibly pick up some greenery to lay across our entertainment center. We'll see how that goes.

Until next time I will leave you with a photo of Pudge sitting on the bed watching a video of himself when he was a puppy.

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Fab Fall Weekend

This weekend here in Texas has been AMAZING! The weather has been in the 50's and 60's, it's been overcast and WONDERFUL! Reminds me of living on the Central Coast of California (which I miss... A LOT).

With the crisp cool air and it being the first time pulled out a sweatshirt and pants, I got that warm fuzzy fall feeling, and decided I wanted to decorate the outside of my house for Halloween. Being all of my halloween decorations are in storage and the storage is about an hour and a half away, I decided to head to Target, and bought everything I needed to decorate my front porch for under $12!



I bought a shower curtain (the cheapo plastic kind) and used black duck tape to create a spider web mat for our front porch. It's super easy to do.

Start in the center and work your way to the outer corners (it's easier).

1.

2.

3.

4.

Then I got some of that spiderweb in a bag and decorated the door, window and pillars infront of our place, and bought 3 spiders ($1 each).










The dogs came out to check out all of the festiveness that was going on out front.... trying to get them to sit for a photo is almost as hard as getting a youngin to sit still and pose! HA!

Sammy and Pudge love the Spider Mat:

FOCUS SAMMY, look at the camera!


Sammy was a cake walk compared to Pudge. Focus boy, focus. HA!



I didn't want to buy anything to decorate the inside due to the fact that I do have some fun things packed away so I just picked up these little owl candles holders and towels from the dollar section at Target.



















Friday, September 28, 2012

Phase 6 done!

Phase 6 complete. Envelopes are inked and now I'm just waiting on maps and hotels lists so I can print and cut them for the pocket of the invite.


Phase 5 done... onto phase 6.

Phase 5 adhere the text to the invite.... check! Onto phase 6... ink the envelopes.

Phase 4, Check...

Phase 4= the fastest phase yet... Check!

On to Phase 4

I have 30 invite text cards printed and are adorned with brads. I used, 5 different brad colors and I think they suit the invites well(The next 15 will be done when I can use my Buy 5 get 5 free paper coupon on Oct. 16th). So, I'm going to put a nice big check mark on Phase 3 and now, on to Phase four Inking the edges of the cards that I have done.


Thursday, September 27, 2012

Phase 3.

Ok so I got 4 coupons for buy 5 get 5 free on any size card stock at my local scrapbook store. WAHOO. I used 2 of them to buy the card stock to print the invites on. So I got 20 sheets for the price of 10. SCORE.

After work and paper buying I went home and started printing up 20 invites (I only have 25 more after these). I cut them out and now I'm putting some cute brads on the top.


"Bradding" will continue tomorrow! For now, goodnight!

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Invitations Phase 2:

Ok so phase 2 includes, inking the sides of the invites, and the patterned paper. It also includes gluing the pocket, and the patterned paper down and adding a rose gold dot onto the pocket.


I almost finished all 45 invites. I'm going to trying to finish phase 2 tomorrow after work!

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Family Reunion Invites

It has been awhile I know, and I am sorry. I've been in a recipe rut, making the same things over and over. That's what happens when you have the world's pickiest husband. I've been busy crafting away for Christmas and will post about that later when everything is finished.

Today... today I want to share with you some invitation's I'm making. My mother-in-law is hosting family reunion out at her house in the hills (in Texas). She has asked me to make her invites, well I offered. Anyway, I came up with a design and she liked it, so the prep to make 45 invitations have begun.

*I have created the text for the invites and they just need to be printed and cut.
*The invitation card itself has been cut and scored
*The backing for the inserts have been cut as well.

Here's are my cut pieces.


Next on the "to-do" list, assemble these 3 papers...

I start a long term, first grade sub job on Monday, so I am trying to get as much done as I can before I become too busy to work on this.

Friday, September 7, 2012

Bedroom Furniture

Went to Ikea, and found a great piece I want to make into a dresser. It's $100 and that's what I'm going to use my visa gift card on (the one I found earlier in the week). Then I found these (in the black/brown color) that I want to use as bedside tables. $80ish for both of them. Maybe next month!

I'd show you a picture of the "dresser" but it's not on the website.
Here are the pieces I want to use for the bedside tables.




Thursday, September 6, 2012

Button Hair Ties

New: Button Hair Ties! SO CUTE. What you see is what I have.
$2.50 a tie. Super cute, and super fun for your hair or around your wrist.

Pick the button and color tie you want, and we'll make it happen.

These are not in my etsy shop yet, but if you want one let me know here or over on our facebook page.

Shipping:$1.50