Holiday Apron

This week I will be spending alot of time in our kitchen.  Between parties and relatives visiting (and really I just want to cook every tasty looking holiday cookie in this month's Bon Appetit issue), let's just say I have alot of baking to do.  So I figured every good cook should look stylish, right?  I love collecting aprons (see here for my most recent tie-die acquisition), & this year I figured I would craft one up for the marathon of baking I am about to embark on.  I found this darling idea on marthastewart.com and even though it says it's meant for kids, I just made a bigger version for myself.  All you need is a solid colored apron, some rick-rack ribbon and a button for the top of the tree.  Just start gluing and about 10 minutes later, voila! You have the makings for a very stylish chef.  :)  Now comes the hard part of trying to not eat all the yummy batter.  I guess I will have to add "eat less cookies" to my new year's resolutions.  Yea right.

Frosted Pine Cones

Ok, this one is so easy.  I had a few pine cones left over from my lovely little garland and wasn't quite sure what to do with them. And then I remembered all the extra glitter from my snow globes (what can I say, I don't like to waste anything). Add these two together and there you go - frosted pine cones! To get the glitter to stick, I coated the pine cones with spray mount and then I gave them a once over with some clear spray paint.    These pretty sparkly little things took no time at all to make and look great scattered amongst our other holiday decor. :)

A Very Merry Tablescape

As some of you know, I am glutton for a gorgeous table setting, especially when it's holiday themed.  This post really is about two projects but both of them were for my holiday table decor, so I decided to combine them. Lucky you - two for the price of one. :)  First, I saw these darling (and super easy to make!) epson salt luminaries here.  I decided not to tint mine so I could reuse them year-round with different colored candles.  This is a craft I plan on making again, as I think it would be so easy to do this on pretty much anything glass (I'm thinking wine bottles, vases, etc.).  The second project is for some simple yet festive place card holders I found here.  I already had the mini candy canes on hand for some baking I will be doing later this month and thought these made for a cute addition to this holiday tablescape.

Tomato Cage Christmas Trees

One thing I have learned being a gardener in this amazing city, is that tomatoes just won't grow here. Or at least in our foggy neighborhood they won't. Wasn't it Mark Twain who wrote the phrase "the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco"?  So true.  And those of you with a green thumb know that of all the veggies you can plant, tomatoes need sun the most. When we moved into our new place, I had grand ideas of having a garden out back, with the largest and most prominent of my plants being tomatoes. After 7 plants and two huge tomato cages later, let's just say it was an epic fail.  I finally gave up on that crop and moved on to what works in colder climates.  And finally, now I do have a great garden of root based plants and herbs (hello yummy carrots and radishes!).  After a few months of seeing those tomato cage trees sitting lonely and unused, I was thrilled to stumble upon this cute blog post about alternative Christmas Trees.  This project was so simple to construct and cost me nothing to make, as I already had the twinkly lights on hand.  And hey, I might not have gotten any tomatoes this year but at lease I was able to reuse the cages for some fun holiday decorating.

No-Sew Christmas Tree Skirt

All of this DIY stuff has me paying alot of visits to our local craft stores.  I am practically on first name basis with the ladies over at Beverly's (my favorite one so far!) and each time I go in, I am armed with my inventory list for that week's crafts.  This last visit, however, I ended up leaving with materials for two projects I hadn't planned on.  One of them (the second one will come in another post soon) was for a Christmas tree skirt.  This year we finally have a normal sized tree, but a skirt for it had somehow completely slipped my mind.  I guess I would have ended up throwing some old blankets around the base (boring!) but instead, I thanksfully stumbled upon a really cute one at Beverly's.  They had a bunch of gorgeous handmade skirts dorning the bases of the decorated trees on their floor and given that I love all things vintage, I was instantly drawn to the tree covered with antique ornaments.  At the base was this simple yet darling no-sew tree skirt, made only of blue felt and white rick-rack.  I was about to ask if it was for sale when it occurred to me that I could easily make it and add it to my list of projects.  It literally took me about 20 minutes to asseble and looks great under our tree. The only downside is that our cat has taken a liking to it and I don't think she will be too thrilled when her cozy new sleep spot is covered with presents.  :)

*The last photo below is kind of random but I had to include it since it's by far my favorite and most treasured holiday decoration.  This Santa & Mrs. Claus were passed down to me from my folks and I can't wait to have them out each year!  They sit by our tree and since you can kind of see it in the wide shot below, I thought it would be fun to share a closer view of the darling pair sharing a smooch. :)

Holiday Doormat

Since we moved into to our new place early this year, there has been a hideous doormat outside our front door. I have no idea why it's still there, or rather, why I have allowed it to be there.  You see, I am a major nester. I am constantly redecorating our place (much to the frustration of my husband) and if I don't like the way something looks, it's usually the first thing to go.  And that doormat, ugh! It's been 11 months and it's still there. I think I have been so focused on fixing up the inside of the house that the outside has been ignored.  Well, that's about to change.  Last week I saw this tutorial for an adorable holiday doormat and I realized this was it - the perfect excuse to chuck that old ugly one.  And it was so easy! I got a new straw doormat at Ross for $8 and already had a ton of paint left over from my gold fall pumpkins.  I used some cardboard evergreen stencils I had as guides for my triangle trees (just because I'm not so good at freehand drawing) and then filled them in with white paint. I am so happy with the way it turned out and I think this makes for a much better welcome to our new place!

Frosty the Bottle Cap Snowman

These darling bottle cap snowmen are a super quick but fun project and would also be a great DIY to do with kids. I found them here and just had to make one.  All you need is three bottle caps, white glue, colored sharpie markers, glue and ribbon and voila!  I hung ours on our bathroom mirror (so fun to see it there every morning!) but I think it's intended use was as a tree ornament. They would also be really cute accent on the front of a holiday gift!