Winter Wreath

I had such a wonderful girls weekend, but it takes longer to recover than it used too. I guess that means I am getting old. It was worth it though, so good to hang out with some awesome ladies.

Well I am back today to show you how to make this adorable winter wreath. It is so versitile. It could be any color or shape depending on the wreath form. I also have a red heart that I use for Valentines day. I love the look of these. They are easy but a little time consuming to make. A good craft to do in front of the TV.

I started out with a yard of white felt, a circle template, disappearing ink pen, straight pins and a wreath form (not pictured).

First cut out a bazillion circles, it might take a few evenings. I used a template because I had one on hand but a juice glass or other small bowl would also work.

Fold your circle in half so it is a semi circle, then fold it in half again.

Put your straight pin in the top corner as shown below.

And start pinning all the way around the wreath. You want to pack them in tight for a nice full look.

I pinned my ribbon on the back but you could tie a ribbon on as well.

I love how this wreath looks. It has so much texture and fullness to it.

It is a great easy project that is easy to customize. Pick a different ribbon or felt color and it has a whole new look.

Have a great day and Happy crafting!


Featured at:

Sharing over at: Lil Mrs. Tori, Someday I'll Learn, Carolyn's Homework,  A Bowl Full of Lemons, Hope Studios, A stroll thru life, The Life of Jennifer Dawn, 733 Blog, Someday Crafts, Cherished Bliss, Lamberts Lately, Imparting Grace, Made in a day, Jennifer Rizzo, Liz Marie Blog, The Dedicated House, Nancherrow, French Country Cottage, The 36th Avenue, My Love 2 Create, Suburbs Mama, Be Different Act Normal, Delineate your Dwelling, So much better with age, Skip to my Lou, Uncommon Designs, Cupcakes and Crinoline, Home Stories A to Z, Love Grows Wild, Blackberry vine, Coastal Charm, Someday I'll learn, Sugar Bee Crafts, A few minor adjustments, Elizabeth and Co, DIY by Design, Handy Man Crafty Woman, Oh my creative, My girlish whims, The Turquoise HOme, Mostly Homemade Mom, Remodelaholics, Thrifty Decor Chicks, Winthrop Chronicles, Living Well Spending Less, Bacon Time with the hungry hungry hypo, Simply Sweet Home, My Snippets of Inspiration, Be Different Act Normal

Winter Mantle

I finally took my Christmas mantle down, I really liked that one so it was hard to take down. Just when I think I have packed all the Christmas decorations away I find another wreath or bowl full of ornaments. Does that happen to you?  I hope I find everything soon, I didn't have that much out.

At least my mantle is done, for now. I would really like to find a mantle setup that I keep up longer than a holiday. It is too much work changing it with each holiday. We will have to see

I started with a bunch of S's (Our last name starts with an S) that I found at Joann's and Hobby Lobby.  And I painted them up in either white, gold or blue.

For one of the gold letters I added a blue edge. I love how it turned out. (If you will notice I added a thumb tack to the bottom to keep it from rolling away) S is hard, I had to eliminate several choices because I didn't know how I was going to get it to stand.

I love this little gold S. It is fun to add more gold to the house.

Since we are in Wisconsin and we got about 8 inches of snow the other day it is best to embrace it. So "let it snow" is very fitting around here. We might as well get used to it and try to enjoy it. I would rather have the snow than the bitter cold.

I hope you are staying warm. I am headed off to a girls weekend! It will be so fun to catch up with friends I don't get to see much these days. So excited!

Have a wonderful weekend yourself!

Featured at:

Sharing over at: The Dedicated House, Nancherrow, Yesterday on Tuesday, Love Grows Wild, Home Stories A to Z, My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia, So much better with age, Lil Mrs. Tori, Someday I'll Learn, Carolyn's Homework, A Bowl full of Lemons, Hope Studios, A stroll thru life, The Life of Jennifer Dawn, 733 Blog, Someday Crafts, Cherished Bliss, Lamberts Lately, Imparting Grace, Made in a day, Jennifer Rizzo, Liz Marie Blog, French Country Cottage, The 36th Avenue, My Love 2 Create, Suburbs Mama, Be Different Act Normal, Delineate your Dwelling, Skip to my Lou, Uncommon Designs, Blackberry Vine, Elizabeth and Co, DIY by Design, Handy Man Crafty Woman, Oh my Creative, My Girlish Whims, The Turquoise Home, Mostly Homemade Mom, Thrifty Decor Chick

Make your own Gingerbread snow (glue)

Every year about this time, we make gingerbread houses. Now it is one of the tickets they pull out of their Advent Calendar.  It is always a highlight for the kids (and my husband). We used to buy a kit but as the kids got older they each wanted to make their own house. So we moved to small houses so everyone can have their own.

I buy a few bags of candy for decorating (and eating).

I put the icing in a zip lock bag and cut a hole in one corner. Each house gets their own bag of "snow". The recipe for the snow is below.

We pass out graham crackers for each house and let the kids go to town. How cute, little sister is helping big sis with her house. I just love how helpful these two girls are. 

And here is big brother working on his creation. The glue works really well, you don't have to hold it  long before it sets up a little. The kids had a really easy time working with it. 

And here are our finished houses. Some cute houses there, and my chalkboard runner is the perfect place to display them. I think these houses have already been nibbled on, so it is a good thing I got pictures before they were turned to rubble. The other perk of making your own is getting to eat them. The kits never tasted that good so it just sat on the counter for weeks as candy was picked off.  These will be eaten within the next few days.

Now for the recipe:

Snow Frosting

3 egg whites - at room temp
1lb (3 1/2 cups) of powdered sugar
1/2 tsp cream of tartar

Place egg whites, sugar and cream of tartar in a large bowl. Beat at medium speed for 7-10 minutes or until mixture is very stiff. Store in a sealed container.
It makes about 2 cups

We made 4 houses and had plenty left over. It was super easy and tastes pretty good too.

Do you make gingerbread houses? Do you use a kit or make your own?

Happy Building!



Sharing over at: Jennifer Rizzo, The 36th Avenue, Life on Virginia Street, Aroma of him, Tatertots and Jello, Delineate your Dwelling, DIY Showoff, Flamingo Toes, I should be mopping floor, Thrifty Decor Chick

Winter Front Porch

My favorite season pots to do are winter flower pots. I love the look of the evergreens all winter long. They look so festive for Christmas but also work throughout the winter, which is good, because they are so frozen they aren't coming out until springtime.  Every year it is always challenging to get them done before the pots freeze solid. I have one by the garage that I can pull in to warm up over night. But the pots on the front porch have no protection and it is best to finish those before the first snow/sleet. I finished mine the day before our first snow/ice storm. No problem!

I think another reason I love doing the winter pots is because they are done right away. Unlike the summer pot that always look small and empty until they grow and fill out the pot, winter pots are done as soon as I fill them.

I had a little extra greenery this year so I kept my copper pots out and filled those too. I like using a variety of different greenery for different colors and texture and I always use some red dogwood sticking up in the back.

Well I attempted to get some night shots of the house with all the lights on. But that was much harder to do than I thought. I also was not that patient since it was -12 degrees with the wind chill the night I shot these pictures. Your hands get cold really fast at that temp. (the window above the door is my sons closet and does not have an outlet, bummer!)

I love the lights in the pots. I have a timer that turns on as soon as it is dusk and off again 6 hours later. I love it, it just does its thing.

Our pots have gathered some snow over that last week or so, I love the look with a little snow mixed in.

Do you do winter pots? What is your favorite pot to fill?

Have a wonderful day and thanks for stopping by!


Sharing over at: Yesterday on Tuesday, Home Stories A to Z, Love Grows Wild, Stone Gable Blog, Lil Mrs. Tori, Carolyn's Homework, Hope Studios, Coastal Charm, A few minor adjustments, Funky Polkadot Giraffe, A stoll thru life, Handy Man Crafty Woman, DIY by Design, Oh my creative, My Girlish Whims, The Life Of Jennifer Dawn, 733 Blog, A Glimpse Inside, Imparting Grace, Cherished Bliss, Liz Marie Blog, Jennifer Rizzo, The 36th Avenue, Life on Virginia Street, Aroma of Him, Tatertots and Jello, DIY Showoff, Flamingo Toes, I should be mopping the floor, Thrifty Decor Chick

Winter Centerpiece

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. It was so nice to take a few days off, now I just need to get caught up on laundry and email. I am almost glad Cyber Monday is over so maybe my email will slow down, so many ads. Anyway back on task.

We went to my parents for the Holiday and I volunteered to take care of the centerpiece. My mom does an amazing job at hosting around 25 people every year and a lot of them are overnight guests as well and she does it with ease. Everyone pitches in with the food but I thought I would also help with some decorations since that is what I really enjoy.

I was more inspired by a winter theme than a fall theme this year, and since my parents had about a foot of snow it seemed fitting.

I went hunting through my Dad's wood workshop and found this beautiful piece of wood. He had it cut from his own woods and plans to make some furniture with it, I call dibs on that piece. It worked perfect running down the length of their table. I also added burlap in three strips down the table. I found mine at Hobby Lobby, the roll was 15 feet long and about 7 inches wide.
We used a table cloth my Mom had and fortunately she had lots of white candles.

My Dad and I went hunting through the woods looking for different kinds of evergreens. There were several varieties to choose from, most of which where extremely pointy and sharp. Their was no danger of the kids touching this centerpiece, at least not more than once.

I brought some feathers to mix in with the evergreens. I picked them up at Michaels. I absolutely love that the bark is still on the wood. If I had had room in my car I would have tried to sneak this in.

I added glass candle holders at each end to anchor the centerpiece and added more greens inside.

 We had another small table off to the side for more people to sit so I added some log slices with greens and candles. Their is no shortage of natural elements to use for decorating at my parents house. My Dad and I found a log in his barn that he was able to cut into slices, it worked perfect. And these I got to bring home!

I need to finish my Christmas decorating, we don't even have our tree yet. This week for sure, the kids are so excited. I finished my outdoor flowers pots yesterday, just in time for some overnight snow. Every year I say we should do more outdoor lights, but then it is so cold to go outside and string them up. I still have time right?

Have a wonderful day!


Featured at:

Linked up at: Lil Mrs. Tori, Thrifty Decor Chick, Oh My Creative, DIY by Design, 4 You with love, Home Coming MN, Someday Crafts, The Happy Housie, The Life of Jennifer Dawn, My Girlish Whims, Cherished Bliss, A glimpse inside, Imparting Grace, Lamberts Lately, Liz Marie Blog, The Shabby Nest, Tatertots and Jello, Child at Heart, Urbane Jane, The Better Half, 36th Avenue, Thrifty decor chick - Christmas party

DIY Yarn Trees

My holiday decorations look very confusing right now. I have some fall, some Christmas and I am embarrassed to say Halloween. I have some work to do.

I am having to much fun making Christmas decorations though. I think this is my week to get organized and bring out all the Christmas decor. It doesn't feel like Christmas is that close but the calendar says otherwise.

Here are some cute yarn trees I made. They are really easy and you could pick any colors to match your decorations.

I started with card stock and rolled it up into a cone shape. I taped it then cup off the excess (sorry I don't have a picture of that). Then I untaped it and used it as a template to make more. I picked card stock colors that matched the yarn I was going to use, so you wouldn't see the card stock underneath the yarn.

Here is my collection of unfinished trees.

I left a hole at the top ( I actually couldn't get it tighter at the top, but it worked in my favor). I put the string through the hole and hot glued it toward the bottom of the cone. Then I just starting wrapping from the top and hot glued every couple of rows. I made sure not to pull the yarn tight, I liked the softer thicker look of the yarn.

To finish the smooth ones I hot glued the end of the string right along the bottom edge. For the chunkier ones I randomly wrapped the yarn over top the smooth yarn and then hot glued the end underneath the cone.

I made them for the girls rooms so they could have some festive decorations, but I really like them at the kitchen table. I love nontraditional Christmas colors.

I was going to make all of them "chunky"but once I finished the first layer I loved the smooth look. I really like both of them.

Are you getting your Holiday decorations out?

Have a wonderful Day!


The Silly Pearl

Linked up at: Mad in Crafts, Sew can do, I Should be Mopping the Floor, So much better with age, Home Stories A to Z, Yesterday on Tuesday, My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia, Lil Mrs. Tori, A Few Minor Adjustments, Carolyn's Homework,Handy Man Crafty Woman, Someday I'll learn, DIY by Design, Oh my creative, Someday Crafts, The Life of Jennifer Dawn, 733 Blog, The happy housie, Lamberts Lately, Cherished Bliss, creations by Kara, My Girlish Whims, Imparting Grace, The Frugal Girls, Liz Marie Blog, The Shabby Nest, Tatertots and Jello, My Love 2 Create, Or so she says, Keeping it Simple, Flamingo Toes, Uncommon Designs, Cupcakes and Crinoline, Thrifty Decor Chick, 4 You with Love, Child at Heart, Urbane Jane, The Better Half, 36th Avenue, Thrifty Decor Chick Christmas Party