last december (2010)

{snapshots from last December's posts}

I've been noticing that a bunch of my posts from Christmas time last year have been getting a lot of hits lately since people are searching the webs for Christmas inspiration, so I thought I'd do what I did in November. I made another little snapshot of what I was doing this time last year. Maybe I'll keep this up. It's fun for me to look back and see what was going on in my life a year ago. :)

The main posts that have been getting hits are..

Christmas Villages
I shared my family's own Christmas village that my dad has been carefully curating throughout the years. I also linked to some other Christmas village inspiration where you can see some other cute villages and also some resources for starting your own.

Letterpress Cookies
Technically a November post but since it's cookie time, a lot of people have been looking for these super cute cookie cutters. Charlie's mom got them for me last year and I think they're kind of the coolest thing ever. I just gave a little overview of how they work but this year I'll actually show the cookies that come from them! (Don't know why I didn't last year!) :)

Christmas Packages
Just a little collection of Christmas wrap I put together based on the trends I was loving last year (and still love!).

Doe Eyed
This one is a little stamp I carved with a tute of how to create your own envelopes and use the stamp for a little seasonal embellishment. :)


What were you doing this time last year? Have things changed much? They certainly have for me!

Happy weekend! :)

handmade ornaments

In the crafty holiday post I mentioned some ornaments I made in my high school art class. I thought I 'd share them with you as one idea for how you can go about making your own decorative Christmas balls for your tree or to hang anywhere really. I may do a full-on tutorial later but I don't have the supplies at the moment. I'm also in the midst of finals so if I'm absent any the next few days, that's why. My last class is next week so I won't be silent for too long. :)

We took foam balls, covered them in bits of tissue paper with a glue wash, and painted images from Christmas cards onto them. They were displayed on our school's Christmas tree and then we took them home afterward.

We painted them with acrylic paints and used glitter and fabric remnants to decorate them. On the blue one, I used a paper doily as a stencil and painted metallic silver paint over it to give it a fun pattern.

On the red and gold one I wrapped a piece of lacy trim around it to separate the colors. I topped them both off with a big lacy bow and a hook for hanging!


Anyway, they're no masterpieces but I love unwrapping them every year when we decorate the tree because it reminds me of fun times. I really loved my art class in high school. It was stress free and fun. And then there's art school. Just kidding. ;)

Now I have to finish putting together my activity for class tonight. I have to do a 2nd grade math activity with my grad school class. I kind of love being an elementary ed major. :)

Hope your week is going well!

christmas stockings

A couple weeks ago I read about this amazing little Christmas stocking idea over on Kyla Roma's blog. The idea is that you and your special someone hang your Christmas stockings and set a limit for how much you're going to spend filling them. As you buy things, you wrap them up and add them to the stocking and watch it grow! No peeking! ;) I fell in love with this idea because going through my Christmas stocking has always been one of my favorite traditions since I was little. I just love finding all of the tiny little treasures that can be stuffed inside.

I decided I wanted this to be a part of mine and Charlie's developing traditions so I presented the idea to him and he agreed to go for it! We set the limit at 20 just as Kyla did because we always end up overspending on each others Christmas gifts so we didn't want to add an extra 50+ with the stockings. I was a little nervous about the limit at first but now I'm excited about the challenge of finding super cool things for super cheap. They're obviously going to be silly little gifts but those are the best kind!

I really want to make our stockings so that they are something special we can use for years to come so here is some inspiration I have been looking at!

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I really like the ones that look like Christmas sweaters so maybe I'll go in that direction. I also really like the simple linen and burlap ones with the lace or ruffled tops!

What do your Christmas stockings looks like? Will you be doing a similar challenge? I'll post a photo of my childhood stocking when we dig them out because it's definitely my favorite. :)

**tape strip from Pugly Pixel**

family things

That's why I have been a little absent lately. My brother leaves for boot camp in about two weeks and we had his going away party last night. I haven't ever mentioned it on here before pretty much because I felt like if I didn't think about it, it wasn't going to happen. Around the same time I was deciding to go to grad school, he was researching the Navy's special forces. He finally got his SWCC contract a few months ago and can't wait to get started.

I'm excited for him since he is excited and it's what he really wants to do, but I'm obviously a little sad too. It only started hitting me this past month as we started preparing for the party and talking about our early Christmas since he leaves two weeks before the 25th. I think if I wasn't living at home right now it would seem a little easier because right now I see him pretty much everyday.

He's four years younger than me and we definitely fought a lot growing up. But when I want away to college something changed. I think it was a combination of us both getting a little older and having time apart that suddenly made us closer than ever. I feel like we're finally on the same team and get along really well and now he's leaving. It just sucks a little.

But anyway, enough sad stuff. The party was a lot of fun and we had sooo much food. I got to pulverize cookies in my food robot for dirt and sand - my brother's very specific dessert requests. :) We capped off the night with Christmas movies and wine.


Today we put up the Christmas tree and we'll decorate later. Unfortunately, because of all the prepping and thinking and spending time, I didn't reach my goal of finishing Christmas cards when I wanted to. There's definitely not enough time to get everything together now and make it worthwhile but I do have one design done for our own cards so I'll share that one with you later!


So that's a little update on my life and a quick instagram dump. ;) Hope your Christmas season is starting off well! What have you been doing to kick it off?

crafty holiday

I've been collecting holiday craft ideas for a while and today I wanted to share some of my favorites! Some of these are things I'm holding to until I have my own home (such as the gorgeous tree skirt) and others are things I might whip up this year! It was totally unintentional, but after selecting ten items to show you, I realized they all have a sort of a natural or earthy feel, either in color scheme or materials. Crazy how your brain just does that sometimes without you really noticing until after the fact. :)

First, this stunning handmade tree skirt. Such non-typical colors for Christmas but I think that gives it a lot of class and style. Plus I love the ruffles.

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And it would go great with these gorgeous ornaments!

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Keeping with the ornament thing, these ornaments would be perfect for a bookworm's Christmas tree. Love. They remind me of ornaments my art class made in high school but we painted Christmas scenes over the paper. I'll have to post them when we dig em out. It was a fun craft!

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And these, believe it or not, were made with spray paint and a stencil!

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I've always wanted a fun advent calendar and this one is like a little seasonal work of art. It's actually from Pottery Barn but the blog I spotted it on made an excellent point that it could be easily duplicated with a little craftiness!

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By now you probably know how much I like seasonal terrariums. ;) And these are no exception!

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And here's a mini terrarium for your Christmas tree!

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These snowflake inspired ornaments from Martha are amazing. I kind of would want to display them in these boxes just like the photo! The whole set up is stunning.

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I think I have enough etching cream leftover from this project to attempt some pretty Christmas candle holders!

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That's my little crafty roundup. Are you making any decorations this year?