O Christmas Tree.

 We love our huge, great smelling tree.  It looks beautiful from the inside and from the road.  We all had a fun time decorating and welcoming it into our new home.  The star we used is just an ornament from the dollar store.

 Every year I have some sort of theme for the presents.  I think next year I'm going to do vintage wrapping and tags.  This year I went black and white with some red ribbon.  It looks amazing under our silver, white, and glass decorated tree.

 

 

 

Dollar store ornaments!!  I could not believe the incredibly beautiful ornaments at the 99 Cents Only store.  We got some huge, beautiful ornaments that make for an expensive looking tree.  I liked them better than what Martha Stewart has this year...I actually think they're the prettiest I've seen.  I just had to share this great find.

Christmas Beautiful.

We were at my sister Heidi's house over Thanksgiving and she had her house decorated for Christmas.  She has the most beautiful house - she's also the best decorator I know.  She buys beautiful things for her home but she also buys things from thrift stores and makes them look like they are very expensive. 

She painted this armoire red and rubbed some black glaze over it.  I was with her when she bought it and I can't believe the difference!!  She also painted the knobs black.

For breakfast, Heidi had a beautiful spread.  She got a bunch of these vintage milk containers, cleaned and bleached them, and put different drinks in them for breakfast-egg nog, orange juice, chocolate milk, and the Naked mango drink.

She has these trees in a corner, by their window.  They have a view of the whole valley and city.

Love this coffee table.

She made the coffee filter tree.  Click HERE to see how to make it yourself.  She also made a coffee filter wreath (on the same blog site) for her sister-in-law that just had twins.

I saw HERE how to make a coffee filter light.  We're going to put it in our white beach-themed bedroom.

Lindt chocolate.  Yum.

Like this funky gold deer.

Place Cards.  I found this idea online and wanted to share with you.  We had two Thanksgivings (one with Carleton's side of the family and one with mine).  These next two pictures were taken at my parents' cabin.  We found the pine cones here in CA.  For Thanksgiving, I left them the plain brown color and for Christmas, I'm going to dip them in red paint and make a garland.

Christmas Ideas.

We have been enjoying Christmas cheer since just after Halloween.  I want to share some of what we've been up to so hopefully you can use some of these ideas for decorating or crafting.

We spent Thanksgiving at my parents' cabin.  Beautiful trees and snow-gets you in the Christmas mood.  We all went shopping for my parents' and sister's tree...in the outdoors-we cut them down ourselves.  The kids decorated them.  Look at how beautiful these yarn balls turned out.  Yarn wrapped around Styrofoam balls. 

 

 

 Stained Glass.  these are a buck each at Michael's.  The kids put the beads in and they melt in the oven.  They come with little red ties to hang.

 

 

 

Etched Ornaments.  These also come from Michael's.  They sell a bunch in a pack for a dollar.  They come with little tool and words like "Ho Ho Ho" and "Peace" and the kids scratch in glittery, metallic designs.

 

 

 

 Decorated mini stockings.  They have these felt little stockings at Michael's too for yes...you guessed it...a dollar.  Annie used confetti, Christmas puff balls, stickers, and eyeballs to decorate hers.  Apollo and Annie's mini stockings are now hung on the tree.

 

"Stained Glass" projects.  This is one of my favorite Christmas projects from Michael's ($1).  They look so pretty with the light shining through.

Here are my little elves.  To make the kits, the kids glued the foam shapes to the front of the clear plastic and glued colored tissue to the backs.  Afterwards, they went back to the front to decorate.

Here are the projects out to dry.

 Oh Christmas Tree.  This tree was made with an ice cream cone covered in frosting and m&m's.  Cute idea, Shannon!