I heart you...

Mr. W was out of town the day before Valentine's Day, so while he was gone I used post-it notes to make this message on his mirror.

I wrote cute little notes on the leftover post-its and left them all over the house...on the door from the garage, the microwave, the fridge, his closet door, his pillow, everywhere. Very simple, but a fun surprise for him to come home too.

We also had been needing a new wine stopper for a while, so I picked one up from Pier1 and left it on the counter with a post-it saying "Your smile can stop my heart." Awe.

We had a wonderful evening together with a delicious meal at a Brazilian steakhouse. [Yum!] Hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's Day also!

P.S. Our walls do not actually look yellow-ish like they do in this picture. That's just my not-so-awesome photo taking skills at work again. :)

P.S. [Again] I think it's funny that you can see my peaking out from my closet where I was trying to hide from being in the mirror.

Gifts | stationary sets

This is the last installment of the wrap-up of my homemade Christmas gifts. Well, not quite. There are two homemade gifts that I have yet to gift...so I can't post about them yet.

Anyways, this was one of my favorite gifts I made this year, because not only do I really like how it turned out, but also since it was perfect for the recipient. My sister loves sending hand-written cards [and I love receiving them], so I made her eight different styles of cards. I am always impressed by how often my sister takes the time to write and send cards. She sends cards for all holidays, including Christmas, birthdays, Halloween, Valentine's Day, etc. [And the cards are always on time, which is extra impressive to me, since I can never seem to send cards on time.] She is also great about sending thank you cards, cards with pictures of my cutie nephew, cards to just say hi, and anything else you can imagine.

When I was cleaning out my old room at my parents' house a few months ago [fun, fun], I found a entire stack of cards, notes and letters my sister sent me while I was in college. When I say stack, I seriously mean a stack that was at least four inches high. Isn't that so sweet? And anybody that sweet deserves some personalized cards to send. :)

The letters and designs were all made using my Cricut. The cards include her first and last initial, thank you's, and just fun designs that can be used for anything.

I punched circles from each of the papers and ran them through my sticker machine for her to use as coordinating envelope seals. I also made stickers out of more K and D cut-outs so she can further embellish the cards or envelopes. I wrapped the cards, envelopes, stickers, an address rubber stamp, and some matching pens all up in a pretty box - that way everything she needs to send a cute card is all together and ready to go. :)

[I linked up to the DIY Project Parade and Lovely Crafty Home - check them out for some DIY, crafty awesomeness.]

Gifts | bulletin and magnet board...

I made customized this bulletin / magnetic board for my precious little nephew's first Christmas. I painted the cork board on the left side with orange craft paint, so it would be a little more exciting looking and match his nursery. [I also painted the push pins, because once I start painting I just don't stop.] Also, the gift will totally grow with him, because I'm sure as his room evolves over the years, there will always be plenty of Longhorn's orange around. :)

The cute little wooden jungle animals were originally from his baby shower - I just glued some magnets on the back. The animals make me smile every time I see them, not only because they are so cute, but also from the memory of when we bought them. At one point while my sister was pregnant, I was shopping with my parents at Jo-Ann's and we must have been hilarious to listen to - literally, every aisle we walked into, at least one of us found something the baby would have to have. Everything from fabric, to stickers, to books, to stuffed animals, to little wood animals - we wanted to get him everything. We were probably the most excited, proudest family to ever shop the aisles of Jo-Ann's. :)

And in true, proudest-aunt-ever fashion, here is the adorable little guy with his first snowman...

Gifts | fun frosted flower-holders for family...

Are you impressed by my awesome alliteration in the post title? No? Sorry, I just get super excited when I get to use my frosted glass spraypaint. :)

I made these vases [three of the bazillion vases from our wedding] for my sister using simple techniques with my favorite frosted glass spraypaint. Seriously, it is so fun. And there are so many ways you can use it to personalize things around your home or as gifts. I also used it to make these Longhorns glasses.

But back to the vases [aka fun frosted flower-holders]. Here's the lowdown on each of them...

Left: Wrap painters tape [masking tape works too] around the vase in straight lines. Or you could do diagonal lines for more of a candy cane effect. Give the vase a few light coats of frosted glass spraypaint and then remove the tape carefully.

Center: Do not spray with any spraypaint. Clearly. :)

Right: Put circle-shaped stickers on the vase in your desired design. Give the vase a few light coats of frosted glass spraypaint and then remove the stickers carefully. For these vases, I used silly "You're #1" stickers from the dollar store and they worked perfectly. I have also tried nice scrapbooking stickers that I got on sale and they did not work at all. They were much too high of quality and stuck too well. This is definitely a time when cheaper, less sticky, stickers are better. :)

Gifts | paw necklace...

So, have you ever seen anything cuter than this picture?

It's Mr. W's little sister and their family dog, Goldie. Incredibly sweet, huh? His sister is a huge animal lover and especially loves Goldie, who just joined their family last summer. For Christmas, I made her this little paw necklace using a chain from Michaels and a cute black paw charm from Hobby Lobby. I like how it is very simple but totally fits her personality. :)

Gifts | desk calendar...

I made this calendar for Mr. W this year using a simple template I created in PowerPoint [I clearly have a strange obsession with PowerPoint and use it for everything]. I added major holidays, birthdays and anniversaries to the calendar. Since Mr. W works in public administration, each month has a picture of a city hall from a city we have visited together. I got the calendar pages printed to Office Depot, cut them to size, and then punched a hole in the tops for him to hang the calendar on the wall in his office.

Gifts | Big E...

My dad has always gone by Big E [or Dad E to my sister and I], so gifts with a big E are clearly perfect for him. When I saw a big metal E hook in the clearance aisle of Hobby Lobby, I knew I had to get it for him. The hooks come painted white and look like this...

This picture is from Rocky River Farmhouse, partially because I forgot to take a before picture of what they look like to start out. But more importantly, because the project she made with the hooks she bought is amazing. You seriously have to check it out.

My project with the hook is a little less amazing, but was still a fun, personalized gift. I just spraypainted the hook a dark silver, so it would fit in well at my dad's man shed at our family farm. :)

Gifts | tile and coaster sets...

This Christmas I made many personalized, handmade gifts for our family. The first of which were these tile sets which included a plague on a wooden stand and four coordinating coasters. They were made using the same method as this monogram tile set.

The first set was made for my mother and father-in-law. Tiles similar to this would also make a great gift for a wedding, shower, anniversary, or even Valentine's Day gift....

The next set was made for Mr. W's stepmom. I love the saying that is on them. I also like how the tiles can use any quote you want, which means they can also be good gifts for birthdays, graduations, or any other occasion. :)

I don't use anything fancy at all to make my tile designs...actually, I just used PowerPoint for each of these using a variety of different fonts and lines. 

To make the tiles, you have to flip the design over for it to transfer properly. So I "grouped" each of the text boxes and lines. Then I copied the design and did a "paste special" to paste it as a JPEG picture. Then, you can use the rotate option of flip horizontal.

DIY ornaments...

So, I realize most people have probably put away all of their Christmas decorations already and are not thinking about making any new ones at the moment...but I still wanted to share the three types of ornaments I made this season. And actually the last of the three types was made after Christmas. :)

Glittered cookie cutters: 

I have wanted to make these ever since I saw them last year at Centsational Girl and even posted about them. They were incredibly easy to make and free, since I already had the plastic cookie cutters on hand and the glitter was from my magazine tree project [seen here]. Here's how I made them:

1. Spray paint the cookie cutters the same color as the glitter. In my case this was white [actually white primer to be exact, because that's what I happened to have on hand].
2. While the paint is still wet, sprinkle glitter all over them.
3. Let the ornament dry and then tie on a ribbon. [As I side note, last year I tied sparkly silver ribbon on all of my ornaments in place of the standard ornament hooks and it was definitely time well spent. I was able to catch up on my soap opera and easily add a little extra pizazz to my Christmas tree.]

Metal stars:

Amazingly, the second set of DIY ornaments I made was even easier than the first. :) Also, I made five ornaments for $1. I found a pack of five simple metal stars at a dollar store last summer. They were originally a brassy gold, but I spray painted them a pretty silver instead. I just hung them directly on the tree. In future years, I think they would also be fun hung with ribbon from door knobs or in the center of a wreaths. I love simple, cheap, versatile things. :)

Spool Christmas trees:

I made these spool ornaments with my mom and although more time intensive than the others, they are a lot of fun to make. To make your own, you need 1/2 inch wooden craft spools [we got these at Hobby Lobby], various colors of embroidery floss, clear craft glue [not hot glue], and ribbon. Here's how:

1. Cover a wooden spool with clear glue and wrap tightly with floss. Put another dot of glue at the end. You will need to make eleven spools for each tree. We always use brown for the tree trunk, yellow for the "star", and all different colors for in between.
2. After completing the spools, glue them together in the bowling pin formation. We found it is easier to glue each line together first [i.e., three for the bottom and two for the middle]. Then glue the lines together and add the star and trunk.
3. Cut a piece of ribbon to the desired size to hang your ornament from. Loop the ribbon and make a small knot with the cut ends. Put a drop of the clear glue into the hole in the star spool. Use a toothpick the push the knot of the ribbon into the hole.[I'm not sure these directions made much sense, but they really are very easy to make. :)]

Goodwill Christmas trees...

Last year after Christmas I picked up these two glass trees at Goodwill. [If I recall correctly, they were $1 each.] They were so much fun to play with during the Christmas season...

First I left them empty for a while. Then I filled them with red and silver strands of beads from IKEA. Then I swirled the red and silver strands together. Here's the evolution: 

I also think they would be cute filled with candies like M&Ms, kisses, or peppermints. Or I could fill them with something like acorns for a more natural look. So many possibilities. This reminds me that I still need to go check if Goodwill has any good Christmas decor this year. :)

Christmas home tour...

Mr. W and I had a great time decorating our new home for Christmas. Mr. W did the lights outside and I did the inside. Here are [were] the highlights from the inside...

The card holder was simply a red ribbon [hung by a push pin] with clothespins to hold the cards. I spray painted the clothespins a shiny silver to make them a little more festive. :)

The garland on the railing was one of the very few purchases made this year for the Christmas decor. It was $2/strand at Walmart and was quite possibly the best $12 I have ever spent. I wrapped it with extra lights and added in some red and silver ornaments.

The magazine trees were inspired by my friend and I loved how they turned out. If you want to make some yourself next year, I suggest using Real Simple magazine - the pages are thicker than most magazines so they are very sturdy. The red sign in the background is a canvas painting temporarily covered in wrapping paper.

This was one of my favorite areas - I just added the candle in the background and some pretty dollar store ornaments. Love them!

Thanks for checking out my very late Christmas home tour. Hope you all had a very merry Christmas and New Year! :)

Thanksgiving table...

This Thanksgiving Mr. W and I hosted our first family holiday. Not only was it our first holiday to host, but it was also the first time that our families came to stay at our new house. We had so much fun planning, organizing, and just figuring out how to feed and sleep seven guests. One thing that we had to decide on was where all nine of us would sit for Thanksgiving dinner. Our house has an eat-in kitchen with a table that seats four, a bar that seats three, or a dining room that we use a reading / sitting room. Umm...that doesn't really add up to nine very well.

This will all make more sense once I show more pictures of our new house, but we ended up moving the big chairs, coffee table, and end table out of the sitting room to make room for a "dining table." The table actually consisted of two six-foot long folding tables from Lowe's and the tablecloth was a drop cloth from Home Depot. I had this all planned out in my head and kind of completely lucked out that it worked as well as it did - the tables fit perfectly in our dining room, the drop cloth was the perfect size, and the people fit perfectly.

A few days before Thanksgiving, Heart of Light posted about her holiday table planning, including that "You can squeeze in with 18" of space per person around the table if you all like each other - if not, you'll want 24-30" instead." This was the perfect information to put me into full nerd mode - I mapped out our table in PowerPoint to measure that we would in fact all fit and plan how it would look. Here is what I came up with:

As you see, we didn't have enough of any one color of plate or glasses for everyone, but since it was planned out I was able to make it look intentional. The horrible wrinkles in the drop cloth were not so intentional...oops, probably should have ironed. The finished table did end up looking very similar to the plan though. 

We kept it very, very simple and didn't even have a centerpiece so we could all see each other easily. And so we could easily clear the table to start playing our favorite game. :)

 

This last photo has nothing to do with the table or planning, but it is us with our amazing family the day after Thanksgiving at the boardwalk [and random photos and posts in weird orders seem to be my thing lately]. It was such a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend with our families!

[P.S. In case you're just dropping by, I do realize it is now January, but it's better late than never, right? :)]

Our Christmas table...

To say that I love setting our table would be a major understatement...I love playing with different place settings. I love walking in the door and seeing the table set. I love mixing everyday items to come up with something that looks nice. I just love everything about it. So, without further ado, here was our table decorated for Christmas this year...

The overall look was very similar to our holiday table last year. The pieces that were the same were: the red scarf as a tablerunner, the silver chargers, the white dishes, the white candle in the centerpiece, and the wine bottle cover.

The pieces I switched up this year were: the red plates and snowman goblets [both were from Walgreens a few years ago], the bread bowl filled with silver and red Walmart ornaments, and the candlesticks/holders [which were a wedding shower gift]. I really liked the mix of playful and elegant. [I say liked because I've already changed the table setting as the Christmas decorations slowly make there way back into the boxes around here. :)]

Happy [early] New Year!

I seem to always be late on my holiday posts, so I thought I would go ahead and be a few days early on this one. I'm not big on New Year's resolutions, but this year I came up with a list of people who I would like to learn from in 2010...

1. Martha Stewart - I want to do more cooking, baking, cleaning, crafting, organizing, entertaining, and all around amazing "homekeeping" - all in my effort to become a little more like Martha. :)

2. Katie Bower and Sherry Petersik - In 2010, I plan to take on more DIY projects around the house. And of course, blog about them - Katie and Sherry style. Who knows? Maybe I'll even make some bloggy friends next year.

3. Stacy London - I love What Not to Wear, but I'm gonna have to kick my wardrobe into gear so that I don't end up on it. :) Okay, it's not actually that bad. But I probably don't need to immediately put on sweats everyday after work either. And some of the sweatshirts in my closet (i.e., the two almost identical high school baseball hoodies) can probably find a new home this coming year...at least in a different closet.

4. Donald Trump - So, I needed someone to represent working hard at work...and the Donald is a businessman [obviously]. I know he throws off my all female thing I had going on, but I do love The Apprentice and I can't think of anyone else at the moment. :)

5. Jillian Michaels - No list of New Year's resolutions is complete without the cliche fitness goal. So with the help of my adorable little cheerleaders, my husband's new boxing stand and bag, and my new Wii fit - I plan to be more active this next year and get in at least a little better shape.

6. My Grandmas - Growing up I was lucky to have two of the most amazing grandmothers ever imaginable, so this one incorporates a lot of different things. One of which is to get back into some "old school crafts", like crocheting, knitting, cross-stitching, embroidering, etc. But the most imporant thing I ever learned from my grandmas and most hope to do in 2010 [and every year] is put God, my husband, and my family first at all times.

Happy New Year! I wish you all a wonderful 2010!

Merry [belated] Christmas!

I hope you all had an absolutely wonderful Christmas with your family and friends. I know we did. We were lucky that despite the weather we were able to celebrate with both my family and my husband's. We are so thankful for the time with our families, wonderful memories, incredible gifts, and most of all, the "reason for the season."

I know this is delayed, but since I was late in putting up any Christmas decorations this year, they will be staying for a while and I might as well share a little. :)  So, here is our table decorated for the holidays...

I love to keep our table set all the time [mostly because it keeps us from piling mail and other junk all over it], so I like to keep it fairly simple. The "table runner" is actually a red scarf my grandma gave me for a Christmas a few years ago...a very Katie Bower-ish table decorating idea.

By the way, I am so not the only person with holiday posts after the holidays. Check out all sorts of fun post-holiday posts here...

More DIY ornaments...

I can't get enough of all the beautiful DIY ornaments - like these from Centsational Girl. We will certainly be seeing a lot of these ideas on our tree next year...

I love these glittered cookie cutter ornaments. Making sugar cookies with my mom and sister has always been one of my favorite Christmas traditions, so these ornaments would be both beautiful and memorable.

And these are another gorgeous use of glass ornaments. They are painted from the inside out...very clever.

Check out the whole post at Centsational Girl to see the rest of her ornaments and the 117 entries into her DIY Ornament Party.