Valentine's Day Decor Finds!

 All our Christmas decor is neatly packed away and waiting for next year ... except our Christmas lights which are still up and will stay up until it is safe to take them down (I have no desire to have my hubby fall off an icy roof).  So, it's time to decorate for Valentine's Day!  The lights are white, so that counts as Valentine's decor - right?  I've never been one to decorate for every holiday ... Christmas, Halloween, and 4th of July are pretty much all I do but last year I made a couple of cute heart garlands and this year I want to add to our decor.  Maybe it's living in a new climate when Valentine's Day is just as likely to be snowy as Christmas!  It is nice to have a pop of pink and red and some hearts here and there when outside is so white and grey (but let me be clear it's beautiful outside).  Or maybe it is that I am finally starting to feel like this is a home worth decorating with our new floors and painted walls.  Feeling like an adult in our beautiful home ... an adult that decorates for holidays!

I'd much rather shop in person but let's be real - I have 3 young kids and it is exhausting shopping with them.  Mom, look at this!  Mom, can we get this?  Oh mom, I've always wanted this random piece of junk that I just saw!  Mom, look!  Mom, mommy, momma! My kids are pretty awesome but answering 100 questions from each child when I just came to look at the pretty cake stands and daydream about them in my beautifully decorate kitchen where my kids clean up their messes and we dance around the kitchen without crumbs being stuck to our feet ... oh, I got a little deep in that illusion for a second ... where was I?  Oh, that's right ... answering 100 questions while I am just trying to look at the pretty things is EXHAUSING!  I am honestly tired just thinking about it.  

Enter online shopping ... Hobby Lobby seems to be out of everything - annoying!  Target and Walmart have a weak selection.  I do love the heart plates and heart bowls (out of stock so no link) from Target.  Michael's and Joann's don't have a great selection online either - bummer!  Enter Amazon ... I found some awesome decor that I have to share with someone!  While I am probably never going to be the heart sheets (so cute) and heart bath towels kind of girl I'm determined to find a few pieces to add some love to our house!

I am loving wood, meal, along with some pink and red Valentine's decor - so many great finds!

Garland pack - love the different options!

Heart bowl

Heart bamboo spoons

Pink Buffalo Check Table runner (LOVE) matching napkins, tablecloths, placemats, and kitchen towels

Colander with heart holes - gold is not my thing but holy moly this is cute!

Metal Heart

Galvanized heart tray set

Heart cutting board 

Other items I couldn't fit on the picture:

Another heart cutting board

Heart Ramekins - would be so cute on a Valentine's table!

Mason jar heart lid inserts 

Corrugated Metal Heart

Red berry wreath

red love sign

Heart cookie cutters (great to fill a bowl or vase or to use as intended!)

Mini heart waffle maker - how fun!

Longhorn plates - who doesn't love a beautiful longhorn!

Heart measuring spoons

Heart batter bowl

Throw pillow covers

Love throw pillow cover

Heart throw blanket

Heart Doormat

Wooden heart serving tray

White heart serving bowl 

Heart dip bowls

I could go on and on but my littles want their momma to play with them!  That is not nearly as exhausting as going shopping with them!

Happy Decorating!  

Camo Initial

Last weekend was the opening of Duck season.  Ironically, my duck hunter hubby was bear hunting.  The weather around here hasn’t been ideal for duck hunting, but it will get there soon enough. 

This summer, I decided to make an initial with the intention of hanging it on a wreath on our door during duck season.  I don’t have the wreath I pictured, but it is still awesome sitting on a shelf in our living room. 

Here is how I made it:

The only supplies needed are a wooden initial (I got an S for Schwall), some fabric (I used an old dog bed in Michael’s camo of choice – Advantage Wetlands Max 4), some adhesive (I didn’t end up using the gorilla glue only the spray adhesive), and a hot glue gun.

Put the initial on some newspaper in a well ventilated area.  Underneath the initial put some square thumb tacks or chunks of cardboard so it doesn’t stick.  

Follow the directions on the spray adhesive bottle.  My bottle said to spray it on then let it dry for 10 minutes. 

Position your fabric and press firmly. 

Let dry then cut out the general shape.

I let mine sit a week or three while I figured out how to finish it. 

Hot glue the edges and onto the back – you will need to do a small section at a time.  Depending on your initial, you will need to do some cutting to have a smooth edge.  Keep your scissors handy. 

I didn’t take pictures, but I also painted the back brown – it makes it look more finished but nobody is going to look at the back, so that is optional. 

The finished S!

I just realized the S is upside down in these pictures (notice the tulles are growing down) but it still looks amazing! 

Very simple and I can now make an initial with anything I want on it for only a couple of dollars!

What do you think?

DIY Necklace Display

 This is probably the easiest and cheapest DIY project that I have ever done! AND it looks great to boot!

Our new house has lots of wall space in the bathroom but not a ton of storage. The last few years I have developed a small collection of inexpensive necklaces and was needing a place to store them. I figured a good way to do so would be to create a board to hang on the wall that would also display the necklaces to help decorate the wall a bit. My grandmother had cork boards for her necklaces growing up which gave me this idea.

Supplies
Cork board - I was pleased to find these framed bulletin board style cork board squares at Wally World. Less than $5 each.
Fabric - Black in this case and a bit velvety from the clearance section. Also from Wally for $2 total.
Decorative pins - I think these were upholstery pins also from Wally for $2.
Staple Gun

 Simply cut the fabric to be a bit larger than the cork board you want to cover. Enough room to wrap it around the edges of the cork like a canvas.

Wrap the fabric as tight as possible and staple gun it in place to the back side of the cork frame. Do one side at a time and be careful to keep the fabric tight. I folded the corners before stapling them to make them smooth.

Adding the upholstery pins was the final step. I added them along the top of course.Pick ones sturdy enough to hold up your necklaces.

The final product is a great looking fabric board for hanging your necklaces. I have a couple of these now and am so happy with how they turned out. Necklaces are easy to see and stored in a way that is organized and decorative!

Customize yours with a fabric that suits your rooms and add as many as you need! These would be a great compliment to Sarah's DIY earring holder.

Happy 4th of July!

Last year, I wrote about why I am proud (and thankful) to be an American. This, year I am still very thankful to be an American and excited to celebrate with some amazing food and fireworks. 

Every year I want to decorate the house, but I never end up doing it because of this or that or the other.  Our mantel is patriotic, but it always is. 

I would love to do more - so, I found a few projects and ideas that I would love to do from pinterest. 

A few projects I would love to make:

Source: autumnplacearts.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Source: sweetsomethingdesign.blogspot.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Source: naptimecrafting.blogspot.com via Sarah on Pinterest

I love this place setting:

Source: hostessblog.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Some yummy looking and patriotic food:

Source: ablissfulnest.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Source: blog.al.com via Leah on Pinterest

Source: thekitchn.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Hope you all have a great 4th of July!  Enjoy your day!

Heman's first Birthday

John Deere First Birthday!

The end of May marked the celebration of Heman's First Birthday! Frankly, we are all pleased to have survived the first year! His love is already tractors so it only made sense to have a John Deere themed party. We didn't take nearly enough photos but here are a few thanks to Sarah and our good friend Regina. 

We started with amazing invitations from etsy and favor tags to match. The listing has expired on etsy but here is the listing for favor tags. This shop was great to work with and the quality was very good. The invitation stock was very nice quality. Click on the photo to see the etsy shop.

The yellow and green cupcakes turned out great! We made these ourselves. The white ones are filled with chocolate mousse and the chocolate ones filled with marshmallow creme. To get the bold green and yellow frosting colors we used gel food coloring. To actually frost them we used a very large start tip and swirled it from the outside in for a very even and eye appealing look. We used a combination of cupcake stands and white cake stands to display the cupcakes.

Tractor shaped chocolates are expensive to buy - shipping seems to be the issue. So we went on ebay and found a mold for about $5 with shipping. Apparently this can be used for chocolate or soaps but not candy. We got melting chocolates from the bulk food section at out local grocery store. We got lots of comments on these cute tractors. But we made WAY too many.

We had 40 people attend the party which meant we needed some table rentals. We needed just 5 round tables and table cloths so of course we needed centerpieces. 

 

Initially we planned on candy centerpieces - see the mason jar next to the cupcakes - but jelly bellies from the bulk food store still cost about $10 per jar to fill with candy. So we opted for flowers from the farmers market in simple mason jars. We used checkered yellow and checkered green as well as burlap fabric to add more decoration to the centerpieces. At $5 per bouquet, this was much cheaper than candy.

We didn't get any pictures of the food. We served water and adult beverages chilled in a galvanized tub. 

We served lemonade and iced tea from the cutest green and yellow canisters, We got lots of questions about where we found them but they were borrowed from a friend who has had them for years. We served BBQ hamburgers (from Douglass Ranch beef of course) and hot dogs for the kiddos with fresh strawberries, homemade potato salad and a fantastic BLT salad. The food turned out well and most was able to be prepped ahead of time and then assembled right before the party.

 While we made the cupcakes, we splurged on a smash cake from a local bakery. This was such a worthwhile splurge. For $10 we got a delicious and perfectly simply decorated cake. I think the mold for the small cake would have been close to $10. And we did not have much extra time. 

 The little guy was slow to dive into the cake but really enjoy eating almost all of it.

How cute are these handmade tractor thank you notes from Puppies and Paper Crafts! My photography does not do them justice. So darn cute!

Something we failed to get photos of was the clothes line of photos we hug. We used brown paper twine strung between the patio columns and used clothes pins to attach snapshots from his first year. It turned out very well and was pretty easy to do. In hindsight we would also have brought out some of the professional photos we have had taken all year and used them in the decorations somewhere. Since people didn't go in the house much, most people didn't get to see his adorable professional photos hanging inside.

We also didn't get photos of the treat bags for guests. The treat bags included toy tractors, bubbles, green and yellow gummy bears, chocolate tractors and my favorite - tractor shaped soaps. The soaps were super cute and ordered from a shop I found on etsy. Green colored soaps were chamomile scented and the yellow soaps were lemon scented.

Overall we were very happy with how everything turned out. Heman was in great spirits the whole time and got to enjoy seeing family and friends. We know he won't remember it, but we sure will.

Christmas Decorations

We decorated our house in time for the dessert and drinks party we had last weekend. 

Our decorations are very simple.  here is a look at our dining room and bar area.

The dining room table.

Some garland my mom was getting rid wrapped around a candle holder I got at The Will the day after Thanksgiving (for $1.50), some ornaments and candle holders from Ikea.  All inside a tray I made for the table. 

Remember the platter holder? I added some over sized ornaments I got on super sale the day after Christmas a few years ago and look how nice it looks all dressed up for Christmas!

I love the red snowflake against the white platters!

And a reindeer family that my grandpa made years and years and years ago (before I was born maybe). 

I put random things in the hutch - just a little something here and there to give it a Christmas feel.  Like some red beads my mom was getting rid of and some more garland in a pitcher.  Holly and a pine cone on the cake stands. 

And a pine cone in a margarita glass. 

Another over sized ornament and some garland. 

Here is our beautiful tree!  Michael decorated it and it is just perfect!

We have a lot of duck ornaments since Michael is a duck hunter.  This ornament I bought at a Christmas store in Truckee (?) with his mom and sister after Christmas last year. 

A pink ribbon - Michael's mom is a breast cancer survivor. 

I wish we could find an orange ribbon for Leukemia or a cancer sucks ornament would be even better!

We have a few John Deere ornaments. 

My amazing mom used to make egg ornaments - we have two on our tree. 

My graduation ornament - I graduated with my B.A. 5 years ago - WOW!!

A Canada Goose ornament Michael's mom and sister brought back from their trip to Canada this summer. 

We have like 500 dog ornaments on our tree (and 1 cat).  Ok, seriously we have at least 5. 

And to top it all off we have this beautiful amazing wonderful star that I just love!!

And the bar ...

We put a random table in the corner with the chalkboard, my grandpa's old guitar, and a hurricane glass full of ornaments.  LOVE this corner!!

My grandpa made this reindeer, sleigh, and Santa set.  Why are there only 5 reindeer you ask?  Well, they are pretty old and the Christmas before my grandpa died Michael was hanging something on the mantel at our old house.  My dad and I were sitting on the couch and Michael dropped the thing (it was a wooden stocking) right on the reindeer.  A few reindeer lost their life that day ... We took them to my grandpa's house so he could fix them but he was battling cancer (we didn't know it yet but he had been for 4 years).   After he died they disappear from his office.  So, now we have only 5 reindeer. 

Here is a close-up of the sleigh.  That wonky looking elf - I have no idea where it came from but we have had this set since we were kids and we must have thought it was perfect.  We also wrapped all of those presents as kids.  Every year I think about making new presents but then I don't because they are pretty old and dated but I still love them!

So, there is it - our dining room and bar area all decorated for Christmas!  I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas and get to spend some time with those that you love!