Silhouette Giveaway!

Thrifty Decor Chick (one of my fav blogs!) just posted a Silhouette giveaway...a $299 value...yowzazzz!!  She has made so many cute things with hers...head on over here to enter!  I would love love love to win this!

My New Life

Check out this video from Stephanie Nielson, airplane crash survivor. It's so inspiring to watch...

DIY Burlap Christmas Stockings

I've seen so many homemade stockings lately that I wanted to make my own.  By no means am I a "sewer"... meaning I've never maybe once picked up a needle and thread.  That being said, this tutorial is filled with step-by-step pictures for those of you like me :)  My grandma helped me with this project, therefore, you will see grandma-hands throughout:)

I forgot to take a picture of the materials you will need, but depending on how many you will be making your fabric length will vary.  I bought 1 yard of burlap-type fabric, 1/2 a yard of fuzzy fabric for the top and 1/2 a yard of felt for the lining. I should have bought a little more felt, but it ended up working out by patching the lining.

Here we go...

First, create a template of a stocking.  I chose to go bigger because you will have to turn the fabric inside out to start, so it will lose some of it's size when you are all finished.

I traced along the folded side to start.

Second, I cut out the traced stocking and squared the edge.

Next, I placed the stocking on doubled up felt {cut once = two pieces} and as I said before, I should have gotten more felt, but this was a remnant so it didn't quite fit the tip of the stocking...

So we used the scrapes and pieced it together to create the whole lining, first by measuring how much scrape we needed...

Then piecing the scrapes together and sewing them like this:

Next, we lined up the felt into the burlap {the reason I chose felt was because it would give the burlap some body to hold the stocking shape}

Then the sewing process began...

And ended up like this:

We went all the way to the edge of the burlap, unfortunately the felt didn't fit the entire tip, but that's ok we're first timers! ;)

After the sewing was done, we flipped it back from being inside out.  Now, I can never explain that correctly...inside in, outside out...whatev you get the idea :)

For some reason, this picture refuses to rotate...

Anyway, this is what it looks like when it's all sewn and lined.

Next step...the furry top!  This was interesting... first, we rolled it over to create a cuff then tried to sew it together.  

After the sewing machine refused to sew after fifteen  a bunch of tries, we gave up and started to hand sew it.  Thanks to Grandma for having patience!  Both the burlap and furry fabric needed to be sewn by hand at that point.

The hand sewing I did on my own, that's why it looks exactly like I did it on my own :)

I sewed the frayed edge into the cuff like this:

Then pinned the furry fabric on using bright pins...easy to see that way

and went to work...

I had a little helper the whole time too:

Here is the sewn product:

Now for some accessories, I tried little hanging ornaments, glittery snowflakes, etc and ended up with a simple bow:

added a little loop for hanging...

and there you have it!  Not too bad for a first-timer...I love it!

and again...

Hope you enjoyed & can use this tutorial!  

I'm linking to:

Super easy sparkly Christmas candles!

I've been drooling over all of the Christmas ads, magazines, etc lately and I've been seeing these lovely candles everywhere:

...for $15, seriously?? I love them but $15 for a candle!

Anyway, I knew I could make them myself super cheap and equally sparkly :)

Here's what you need to make your own:

I'm sure you can find the candles from the Dollar Store, Target, etc.  I got mine from Ikea as a set.  

Now on to the directions:

1.  Coat part of the candle with glue (I used my finger to spread it, if you don't like being sticky use a brush) and sprinkle some glitter

2.  Add more glue around the candle and sprinkle all the way around.  Try to keep an even line around...if it is slightly uneven run your finger across the top to even out

Here's what it looks like compared to the plain one...I looove sparkles

I did the next one with all silver sparkles...

Bright & Sparkly

There you go!  Total cost: under $5...I'd love to see if you try this sparkly project!

Pumpkin Espresso Muffins

So I wanted to try this yummy recipe I found online (I can't remember where, thanks to whoevers recipe this is!) for Pumpkin Espresso Muffins...mmm.

Here's what you'll need:

2 cups of flour

1 cup of sugar

2 tsp. baking powder

½ tsp. salt

2 tsp. of cinnamon

2 tsp. espresso powder

2 eggs

1 can of canned pumpkin

1 cup of milk

½ cup vegetable oil

¾ cup of chocolate chips

Espresso sugar (optional)

§     Mix dry ingredients together, gradually add wet ingredients.

§     Stir until all ingredients are incorporated. 

§     Fill muffin cups 2/3 of the way (I use a cookie dough scoop)

§     Sprinkle espresso sugar on top.

§     Bake at 350 degrees for 24-25 mins. 

And....unfortunately, I was too busy tasting these little treats forgot to take an after-baked picture :)

Enjoy!!

Christmas Eye Candy

There are so many inspiring Christmas pictures out there I thought I would share some of my favs with you!

This mantle is rustic & beautiful...

I cannot wait to make this pretty pillow from Tatertots and Jello

I looove this banner, I'm going to recreate this and make it my own using wooden blocks {check back soon for tutorial!}

I'm also making our stockings this year, similar to these lovely ones:

And this is inspiration for my Christmas Eve dinner tablescape...

Thats it for now, before I have the urge to run to the store to start decorating!! Enjoy your evening!

Silhouette Machine

Does anyone out there own a Silhouette machine?? I'd love to hear some reviews on it...it might end up on my Christmas list ;)  My main concern is it's compatibility with Mac.  I would love comments and reviews ~ thanks!!

Visions of sugarplums are dancing in my head!

Is it bad that Halloween is officially over in 40 minutes and I'm totally psyched to decorate for Christmas??? I CAN'T wait! Ok...I'll wait a few weeks but I'm already planning my projects! How about you??

Recipe Wreath!

A while ago, I saw this great tutorial over at Jones Design Company on a book wreath.   Such a cute idea!  I decided that I wanted to make mine for the kitchen area to bring some life to it.  As I've said before, right now we are renting so we can't change much physically, although our landlords completely renovated the kitchen and it's a wonderful change, but I thought adding the wreath would be a nice touch.  I basically followed Emily's tutorial & changed it ever so slightly.

These are the materials that you will need:

Old cookbook {I loved how it looked vintage with the yellowed pages}

Glue gun & glue sticks

Foam wreath {it looks small here, but it gets much bigger once the paper is added}

Satin ribbon & two pins

So lets get started...

First, rip out the pages of an old book.  I chose an old cookbook from my grandma to go along with the kitchen theme.  I loved how it had a vintage feel with yellowed edged and old-fashioned recipes.

Then after your glue gun has heated, fold the pages like this:

I varied each page going back and forth between the ripped edge and the yellowed edge.  I chose to glue the bottom pages together before gluing the whole page on the wreath. Once you fold the paper like what shown above, put little dabs of glue between each fold at the bottom where my finger is...then once the bottom is glued {it will look like a small paper fan} put glue on one side of the paper on the bottom like this (sorry so blurry):

Then push onto the wreath...

Continue around until it looks like this:

Now, flip it over so it looks like this:

Start your second layer by doing the same as above {gluing the bottom} and fold slightly to attach to the wreath like this:

Continue your way around for the second layer...

Watch out for glue gun burns! Ouchhh

Moving on to the next layer, do the same thing and overlap the second layer.  Since I was using a cookbook, I tried to vary pages by recipe titles and directions.

Once you are done with your third layer, it should look similar to this:

Side view, LOVE it

Then add a fourth and fifth layer and leave the bottoms hanging off slightly in the middle.  You will glue those to the back layer next.

and...

Now, turn the wreath over, and glue each of the front flaps back like this:

Flip it back over and fill in any areas that are looking a little bald :)

Now measure your ribbon for the correct height you need and add a pin to hold the ribbon in place

Then add another:

The final project, in all it's glory: 

{Don't look at the icky decorative titles}

I'm picturing it hanging in a beautiful window over the kitchen sink in our future home!

Hope you enjoy this!  If you create you own, I've love to see! These would work great for dining rooms (using music sheets), baby rooms (vintage baby books), family rooms, anywhere..Enjoy!!

Happy Halloween Eve!