Our Holiday House Tour

It's no secret that I love decorating for different seasons and holidays-Christmas is no exception!! There's something so special and magical about this time of year.

Here's a quick tour of our Holiday Home!! Enjoy!!

We don't go all out with lights, but I couldn't resist these Evergreen wreaths!!

I layered a Country Star Welcome hanging with a sparkly wreath to add some color.

Excuse the cord-here's another Goodwill Holiday find that I couldn't pass up! Just a few bucks and it lights up at night!!

Upon entering our home-our stockings are hung on the staircase.

Each stocking is personalized with a picture-here's my cutie pie son!!

Found these brand new holiday pillows at Goodwill a few months ago! Love them!!

Here's the second Goodwill pillow-so cute!!

Our little entry Christmas tree-was decorated by our six-year old!!

The boys love watching the Polar Express train go around and around!!

"All Aboard!!!" this probably goes down as one of my son's fave Christmas gifts & has become a tradition!!

Had to Holiday-Up the guest bathroom!!

DIY DECOR-placed wrapping paper in a frame & added a yarn wreath with ornaments!!

Love the cottagey snowflake bath mat!! Gotta love Kohls!!

Our dining room tablescape! Table runner was from Hobby Lobby!

Our Guest Room

Matching kitchen towel from Hobby Lobby

More DIY Decor-our 24 days til Christmas Advent Calendar.

Close-up of the Advent Calendar!

Ornaments in a bowl add a festive touch to our kitchen table!!

It's been tough keeping our boys away from the Christmas tree!!

Another fun Holiday pillow!!

Had to Jimmy-up a tree topper! Mod Podged wrapping paper onto a paper cup and mounted a figurine on top!

My little guys can't wait to open these!!!

All of our ornaments are pretty special-I especially love adding pics and years so that we can see how much our boys change from year to year!

Love, love, love this handmade one!! So stinkin cute!!

Some night shots of the tree-love the way it reflects off the glass!!

Our tree truly lights up the room!! It's my fave place to sit with a hot cup of tea.....

Another view of our Christmas tree!!

Simple DIY felt garland for the mantel! Nothing fancy!

Ornament clusters on the mirror!!

Found this awesome plate at a thrift store for a quarter-I've had it for 4 or 5 years now!! It's one of my faves!!

Copied this look after watching the Nate Berkus show!! So cute & easy peasy!!!

That's all folks! Thanks so much for popping by!

Hope that your holidays are filled with lots of love & laughter!!!

DIY Decor: Easy Advent Calendar

I've seen tons of super cute advent calendars all over the place. Since I'm cheap thrifty, I decided to recreate my own.

Supplies used: blank art canvas, paint (spray paint works), matchbooks (24), scrapbooking paper, stickers, velcro & tape (glue or Mod Podge works too)

1) First step was to simply spray paint the canvas. I used Rustoleum's brown since it was already in my garage.

2) While the canvas is drying, it's time to work on whip out the matchbooks & scrapbook paper. Cut strips of the paper, wrap around each matchbook and seal the back with glue or tape.

3) Decorate the front of each wrapped matchbook with number stickers for each of the first 24 days of the month.

4) Once the canvas is dry-figure out how you want to arrange each the matchbooks ( I went for a Christmas tree design) and start applying the velcro tabs onto both the canvas & back of the matchbooks.

5) That's pretty much it-once it's complete you can insert small gifts or notes for every day leading up to Christmas! Today's special message revealed that we'd be having breakfast for dinner which is one of my oldest son's favorite things!!

Most of our advent days are filled with fun (and free) family activities like hopping in the car to check out Christmas lights, decorating cookies, making ornaments/crafts, watching Polar Express, reading a fun Christmas story, enjoying some hot cocoa (with extra whipped cream)....and the list goes on!!!

I'd love to hear your thoughts and/or fun ideas for Advent Calendar activities!!!

Thanks for popping by!!

My So-Called Slipcover

PB's Holiday Anywhere Chairs

I've been obsessed with finding the perfect chair for my little guy's room. I wanted something cute and comfy-the perfect little chair for grabbing a book or just cuddling with one of his plushy, stuffed friends.

My first thought was to just splurge on a Pottery Barn Anywhere chair-aren't they the cutest?!

But then reality set in (in the form of a $100 plus price tag)! So I knew I had to find another option! Armed with my inspiration photo below-I was up for the challenge of re-creating this look for less!!


Pottery Barn Anywhere Chair



During a trip to Tuesday Morning, I spotted this adorable little chair. Well let's be honest....it really wasn't so adorable at first glance. The animal print is just a wee bit much for my taste-but the chair had potential. Super comfy, well made, plus it's a combo chair/rocker-adorable. It was on Clearance for just $35 plus an additional 50% off-so I scored it for $17.

I found the perfect blue twill fabric at Garden Ridge. Also on Clearance-25 cents for 2 yards!!! I grabbed every decent fabric they had and still managed to spend just under $2. Amazing!!



Here it is! My so-called slipcover!



After perusing the web for slipcover tutorials, I stumbled upon the perfect one-The Laziest Slipcover Tutorial Ever-over at Pink & Polka Dot.

This was my very first slipcover and despite most blogs making it look oh so easy-it was a lot of work and it didn't turn out as perfectly as I'd hoped.

I was actually a bit disappointed with how mine turned out, but my disappointment faded when my little guy jumped into his cool new chair the next morning!! He was sooo excited!! 



He likes it, he really likes it!!!

His Monkeys are loving his new chair too!

I honestly thought long and hard before writing this post because often times when you look at blogs people write about their triumphs versus their attempts. You generally see perfectly decorated spaces or beautifully crafted projects.

My main reason for sharing is because I think so many of us Moms can agree that we try so hard to be perfect when the quest for perfection only sets us up for disappointments. Believe it or not, kids don't need much and they definitely aren't judging us as hard as we tend to judge ourselves. The look on my son's face when he saw his new chair was just priceless. He didn't notice the flaws-he was just HAPPY!!

I'd love to hear your thoughts and stories about projects gone wrong or parenting general!!

Thanks for popping by!

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Our Spaces: Kolt's Bedroom Makeover

The tweener stage generally refers to middle school aged children, but in this case it applies to my 18 month old son. He's a bit of a tweener in my eyes because he's no longer a baby in need of a nursery, but he's not quite ready for his toddler bed & boy room.

The thought of him in a toddler bed is just way too much freedom for my busy body!! I've been a bit bored with his room lately and decided to make some changes.

Here's a before shot of his room:

And here's Kolt's new & improved bedroom....

PAINT:
The biggest change we made is adding a fresh coat of paint. It's the most gorgeous and soothing shade of taupey brown-Behr Antiqued Leather. It's so nice to have some color on his walls-and best of all, the gallon of paint was just $20!! Behr just may be my new fave paint brand!!

BEDDING:
During my Goodwilling trips, I've scored a few more key pieces that were used in his makeover. First up-a Pottery Barn star quilt that I found for just $3. It was marked $5.99, plus it was another 50% off. Gotta love Super Saturdays!! This quilt would've retailed for well over $50 so this was a major score.

I also picked up the new sheets during a Super Saturday shopping spree. The entire brand new 4-piece Circo toddler bedding set was just $7.50!! I wasn't crazy about the comforter that came in the set, but the sheets alone were worth the purchase price!!




DECOR:

I'm all for decorating on the cheap-especially in kid's rooms.

For starters, I anchored the wall behind his crib Added some DIY canvas art frames!! Such an easy peasy way to dress up your walls. Also, spray painted an old frame that I had and added a star for an extra special touch.

To anchor the wall behind his crib, I used a star picture that was hanging in our Americana Guest room. I also re-used letters to spell out his name. Love the way it looks.

Used cardboard letters and a star emblem purchased at Hobby Lobby to spell out his name!

Love DIY Canvas Art! Such a cheap and easy way to personalize your walls!

Wish Upon a Star art-Kohls, Piggy bank-gift & Star lamp-Goodwill $5.

Kolt's changing table & other goodies!

Love his little toy basket!

I reused frames and just created easy DIY art using Publisher. You can probably use Word too.

Old Smokey loves his cozy updated space!

Easy DIY art inserted into frames!

View from the hallway door!

Love the simple canvas art pics!!

Another view of his room!

Kolt's closet!

Wasn't quite ready to get rid of his crib mobile-so I hung it in his closet!

Don't you just love decorating? Especially decorating on the cheap!? This makeover rang in at less than $50 since I repurposed a lot of items from other rooms, shopped Goodwill and was able to use just a gallon of paint!!

I'd love to hear your thoughts! Thanks for popping by!

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