Christmas Cheer

I know it has been forever since I posted anything! However, I am back now with a few ideas on decorating for the holidays.

Since moving into our bigger apartment, I realized that I have hardly any Christmas decorations at all. I felt like I was missing some of the "filler" type decorations. You know, the ones that take up space, but aren't your big items like your tree or nativity.

Well, I have been struggling to buy any because one, it's hard to find cute little things that don't feel like junk, and two, I have just been so busy and I would rather spend the money right now on Christmas gifts for others.

Well, I was at Michael's the other night and got in the creative mood to make my own!

Below are two of the items I created for under $10:

The first piece is one of my favorites because I love the smell of cinnamon. I bought these cinnamon sticks at Michael's for $2.49 for a pack of six, and at the time I had no idea what I was going to do with them. I only bought them because I liked how they smelled. So, I brought them home and put them in my grandmother's milk jar that she gave me before she passed away. Don't underestimate what you have lying around at home. Get creative and find ways to re-use things.

After that, I decided it needed a few extra touches, so I found a cute green ribbon I had lying around (you can buy ribbon at Michael's for a $1), and added the red berries I also bought from Michael's for $2.49 to add a touch of red to the piece.
In total, this piece cost me: $4.98

The second item I made was an accent piece for my dining room sidetable. I had this glass vase already, but I think you can get them for around $5 from Michael's. I love having unique glass vases on hand because I always seem to find uses for them some way or another.
I used the same berries from the above mentioned box that I bought for $2.49, and I decided that I wanted some other fillers to fill my vase, but you can use whatever you want (all berries, pinecones, christmas ornament balls, etc.). I bought one stick of pinecones (with three attached) for $.29 - usually you can find these in the aisle with the "make your own wreaths." I just snipped each pine cone off the stick and stuck it in my vase. I also did this same thing for the greenery. I just found a stick of evergreen for $2.09 and cut pieces of it off. Then, I combined them all together and filled it up. It was so easy! Literally, it took only 5 minutes to do!
In total, this piece cost me: $2.38
(I already accounted for the berries in the above estimate).


Well, I hope you can have fun and get creative this season while decorating! I sure enjoyed finding cheap ways to fill my new place up with Christmas cheer.

Photo Books

I just wanted to write and say how much I love making photo books! My sister introduced me to this idea over a year ago and ever since I have been hooked. If you have not made one, I am telling you they are awesome! My favorite places to make photo books are at http://www.snapfish.com/ or http://www.walmart.com/. I think Snapfish produces a better print quality, but Walmart is cheaper so you decide! Anyways, these books are great for "scrapbooking" and providing reading material for your guests. I love to create these books after I take a trip because usually you take a ton of photos and then what do you do with them, nothing! So, I decided to make a story out of each of my trips. It is a nice way of capturing memories and a great form of journal writing. You can format the page how you want it to look by changing the page layout, change the font, and add text to the page. Photo books also make great gifts! I made one for my mother-in-law for Christmas of our wedding and she loved it. If you are looking to scrapbook a ton of pictures and haven't gotten around to it or need a great gift idea, here is your solution!

I have provided a couple of pictures of one of my memory books:

My trip to NYC

(It is hard to take a photo of a photo book, so keep that in mind when you look at the pictures)

Color Me Mine

Last week, two of my friends from church and I went to one of my favorite places in Provo, called Color Me Mine. It is a pottery place where you pick a piece of pottery you want to paint and you paint it however you want. They have tons of stensils and paint options to choose from. We were there for over 2 hours. We had so much fun choosing which colors to use, what designs to paint, etc. I chose to do a Santa Plate and here is the finished product! It turned out as good as I hoped. A few of the details I painted ended up not showing up, but it turned out alright anyways. I think pottery is the hardest craft to paint because you never know exactly how it is going to turn out! Talk about stressful! You can turn your piece in thinking it looks great the way you have painted it, but then once it is fired it can come out looking totally different. I am glad that wasn't the case this time! Let's just say I have had lots of "practices" at this, and I am still "practicing" to master this art.

Here is a close up shot.