A Clowder of Christmas Cat Ornaments!

November 25, 2019November 25, 201912 Comments

Good morning! How was everyone’s weekend? Mine was crazy busy, but it was fun. I celebrated one Thanksgiving already and I ate so much food! I basically had to be rolled out the front door to my car that’s how much food I ate. But it was a wonderful day with family and I wouldn’t change anything.

*This post is sponsored by DecoArt. All opinions given in this blog post are my own.*

Welcome to the 5th annual 12 Days of Holiday Ideas event, hosted by Shirley of Intelligent Domestications and Erlene of My Pinterventures Between Nov. 11th and December 6th there will be hundreds of new ideas shared by over 55 Co-host bloggers!

Go here to see our kick-off collection of Holiday ideas as well as all of this years talented participating DIY and Foodie Blogs. Download this years November and December calendars with all of the topics and dates so you can make plans to watch for ideas!

We are hosting a BIG GIVEAWAY from our Sponsors this year! Be sure to scroll all the way down for more information and to enter to win!

Today we are showing you how to make your very own ornament! And I promise, this isn’t super complicated. It can be done in one afternoon if you wanted.

Now as some of you may know, I have 2 cats named Target and Amelia. I love my crazy cats and I have cat ornaments that look like them. But, I knew I wanted some other cat ornaments for my Christmas tree to spice it up a bit. So I am here to give you instructions on how to make your own cat ornaments!

Things you need:

-Popsicle Sticks

-Paint

-Pipe Cleaners

-Colored Felt

-String

-Hot Glue

-Sharpie

Step 1: Paint the Popsicle Sticks

This step is pretty self explanatory, but it’s still the first thing I did. I used the awesome paint from our sponsor DecoArt! DecoArt is one of the sponsors for the 12 Days of Christmas and they graciously sent us 8 different paint colors to use to our hearts content. They are also part of the giveaway at the bottom of the blog posts so make sure to check that out! We appreciate them sending us the paint and sponsoring this blog post!

My personal favorites are the pink, red, and dark blue. The darker colors covered the popsicle sticks really well, but I had a bit of trouble with the silver. It didn’t show up on the wood, so I would suggest using it as a top layer to add some sparkle on your project. The light green was okay but it was kind of streaky so I was not a fan of that one either. But I painted the sticks to prep them for step 2.

Step 2: Make your Pipe Cleaner Tails and Glue to the Popsicle Stick

I tried to match the pipe cleaner to the correct paint but unfortunately I didn’t have purple or dark green, so I used colors that looked good together. I tried to make my tails look a little different so my cats had some character. Here is what my blue tail looked like!

I did have to bend the tails just a smidge so that way I could glue it to the Popsicle stick, but it didn’t hurt the tail at all. I put a small amount of glue on the Popsicle stick so that I could stick the two pieces together.

Here’s all of my cats with their tails!

Step 3: Draw a Face on your Cat

I used a fine point sharpie to draw a little face on the cat, but you might be able to use a regular sharpie on a bigger Popsicle stick. I drew two little eyes, a nose, a mouth, and 3 whiskers on each side.

Step 4: Glue a String Loop to the Cat

You can do this step a couple different ways depending on how you want to hang your cat ornament. I took a bit of thread and hot glued it to the back of the head side of the cat. You can use twine or even an ornament hook if you wanted, but you will need some hot glue to hold it together!

Step 5: Make Ears and Scarves out of Felt

Originally, I was going to end here. But I didn’t think the cats looked quite right without some tiny ears and some cute scarves. So I cut some felt that matched my cat bodies to make some tiny little ears and some red and yellow felt for some wintery scarves.

Step 6: Admire Your Cute Kitties!

I think they turned out so cute! I now have a clowder of cats for my Christmas Tree which will be perfect to add with my Target and Amelia ornaments. I hope you enjoyed this cute tutorial and thank you to DecoArt for the paint! See you on Wednesday for the next blog post!

MEET OUR SPONSORS who have generously donated fabulous prizes for the Big Christmas Giveaway!

DecoArt winner will receive a prize package valued at $100!

Dixie Crystals/Imperial Sugar winner will receive a Keurig Coffee Maker valued at $100!

Oriental Trading winner will receive an OrientalTrading.com gift card valued at $200!

Cabot Cheese winner will receive a gift basket of Cabot products valued at $75!

Burlap Fabric winner will receive a prize pack of products valued at $50!

Zulay Kitchens winner will receive one Milk Frother and a Lemon Squeezer valued at $21

It’s Home To You winner will receive one wooden Santa sign valued at $65

Giveaway begins Nov. 8, 2019 and ends Dec. 6, 2019. Winners will be notified by December 13, 2019. Sponsors will ship each prize to the winner. There will be a total of seven winners, one for each prize. Drawing is by random selection using the Rafflecopter widget.

Must be 18 to win. Open to U.S. residents only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Coastal Buoy Christmas Wreath

November 22, 2019November 19, 201913 Comments

Good morning! We are back today with another idea for the Twelve Days of Christmas-Wreaths! Here is a link back to the original post where you can see all the other hosts and their ideas! Don’t forget the inlinkz and the giveaway at the end of this post!

I love the coastal look, which most of you know already, so I made a Coastal Buoy for my Christmas Wreath! This will go much better with my decor!

Here are the supplies you will need:

Green or white foam circle form
White paint (optional)
Strips of cotton or muslin fabric
Mod Podge
Brushes
Silver Duct Tape
White paint and whatever other color you want to use
Christmas greens, berries, pinecones, ect.

I bought enough supplies to make 2 wreaths, but you only have to buy enough for one. I found these green styrofoam wreath forms at the Dollar Tree. Because they were green, I painted them white first, but if you buy white ones, you can skip this step.

While the wreaths were drying, I cut strips of muslin to wrap around the wreath. I cut them about 1 inch wide, but they don’t have to all be perfect or the same.

I wrapped each strip around the wreath overlapping as I went. When one ended, I overlapped the next one and continued all the way around. Once I got to the end, I used a little bit of hot glue to keep it from coming undone.

I brushed Mod Podge over the whole thing. Since mine will be hanging outside on the door, this will protect it a little bit, plus it looks a little more finished.

When the Mod Podge was dry, I used painters tape to mark off 4 areas. I will be painting 2 areas turquoise and 2 white, so this will keep the paint from going into the other area. I will be covering the taped area later, so it won’t matter that it’s not painted.

I used a turquoise with some sparkle in it since it’s for the holidays.

Next I cut strips of duct tape and then cut each piece in half lengthwise. These pieces I wrapped around the wreath on the unpainted areas.

I found the perfect rope at The Dollar Tree too! I couldn’t believe they had this. It was even called Nautical!

I made some loose loops, 4 of them and then wrapped another piece of rope around the middle, securing it tightly.

I also tied knots at the end of the loose pieces so it wouldn’t fray.

I used a separate piece of rope to go around the outside of the wreath. I loosely wrapped it around the wreath and secured it with duct tape over the other duct tape. I matched up the ends and secured them too.

For the greenery, I used 2 pieces of greens with berries and a small one with the rope pieces. I placed 2 going up and one going down and I tied them together with twine.

I laid the greenery on the back of the wreath and hot glued it in various places until it was secure.

Once they were attached, I placed the rope bow on the inside of the wreath and tied it on with twine too. I also added a twine loop for the back. I hooked it around one of the bent stems.

I took it outside and hung it on my porch! It’s the perfect touch to my coastal home!

I also made one to go inside the house. I can’t wait to find the perfect spot for it!

I love how it turned out and is perfect for my front porch! What do you think? Let me see what wreaths you have made!

Don’t forget about the giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thank you for coming by today! Our next post will be a DIY Ornament. See you next time!

Vintage Coastal Farmhouse Advent Calendar

November 20, 2019November 19, 201910 Comments

Good morning! I’ve lost track of what day we are on, but I do know I am sharing my advent calendar with you and I love how it turned out! But first, go here to go back to the 50 Christmas Ideas and see what the other hosts are sharing. Also, don’t forget the Inlinkz and the giveaway at the bottom of the post!

First, a little history about advent. I got my information from a wonderful blogger, Yvonne over at Stonegable. She is an excellent writer and designer! Please head over to see her site. She explains advent wonderfully. Anyways, the meaning of advent is ‘the coming.’ For Christians, ‘the coming’ is the coming of Christ. His first coming was over 2000 years ago as a baby in a manger. When he was a man, he died on the cross to save us from our sins. His second coming will be when he takes all those who believe and ask forgiveness, to heaven with him to live forever.

Most symbols of advent are a wreath with 4 candles and each candle is a symbol-for hope, peace, love and joy. Advent is a time to reflect on all of our blessings and to remind ourselves about the true meaning of Christmas.

Learning all this information about advent, I decided my calendar would have just 4 bags, one to represent each symbol-hope, peace, love and joy. The wonderful little bags I used were graciously given to me by BurlapFabric. The linen material is so beautiful! But I am getting ahead of myself!

I started out with this cupboard door. I don’t even remember where it came from! But I knew how I wanted to transform it. I started by removing the hinges and then spray-painted the whole door with Rustoleum 2X Satin Heirloom White. I didn’t worry about the patched holes in the middle because I knew I was going to be covering them.

Once the door was dry, I cut out a piece of pretty fabric scrap I had to fit in the middle. I love the crocheted lace going through the fabric.

I pinned it to the right size and then ironed the edges.

I hot-glued the fabric onto the middle section of the door.

Next I cut a small piece of burlap that I wanted to center on top of the crocheted fabric.

I frayed a little bit of the edges of the burlap, then I stitched around the edge to make sure it didn’t keep fraying any further. I pulled out a few extras that were beyond the stitching after finishing the edge.

I ironed the burlap onto the shiny side of freezer paper.

I created the quote in the font I wanted on PicMonkey. I saved it onto my computer. I loaded the freezer paper into the printer and then printed out my quote. I couldn’t believe how well it worked!

I used spray adhesive to attach the burlap to the crocheted fabric.

I found this cute white pom-pom trim at Walmart and knew it would look great on here. It reminds me of little snowballs! I hot glued it around the inner edge of the cupboard door.

I found these knobs at Hobby Lobby on clearance. Look at the price! I knew as soon as I saw them they would be perfect for this.

I measured out the bottom edge of the door and penciled in even marks to drill holes for the knobs. I drilled the holes and then placed the knobs in.

On these cute little muslin bags I received from Burlap Fabric, I decided to stencil numbers 1 through 4 on them. I used black fabric paint.

I hardly put any paint on my brush and dabbed it over the fabric.

I love the vintage look of the bags!

I filled the bags with little special items and hung them from the knobs. I don’t have any little children at home or I would have filled them with little toys or candy.

I hung my calendar right by my table, so if I was reading an advent story on one of the 4 Sundays, the bags would be right there. They make such a great reminder of the real reason for the season.

I’m excited to have this calendar to put up each year!

This project took me a little bit to get done, but I’m so happy with the results! Do you celebrate Advent? I would love to hear how you and your family celebrate!

Here is the inlinkz! Let’s see what the other hosts have created!

And don’t forget the giveaway! One of the prizes is from Burlap Fabric which sponsored this post.

MEET OUR SPONSORS who have generously donated fabulous prizes for the Big Christmas Giveaway!

DecoArt winner will receive a prize package valued at $100!

Dixie Crystals/Imperial Sugar winner will receive a Keurig Coffee Maker valued at $100!

Oriental Trading winner will receive an OrientalTrading.com gift card valued at $200!

Cabot Cheese winner will receive a gift basket of Cabot products valued at $75!

Burlap Fabric winner will receive a prize pack of products valued at $50!

Zulay Kitchens winner will receive one Milk Frother and a Lemon Squeezer valued at $21

It’s Home To You winner will receive one wooden Santa sign valued at $65

Must be 18 to win. Open to U.S. residents only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Fun Christmas Activity for Kids

November 15, 2019November 19, 20194 Comments

Good morning! How has everyone’s week been? I am so happy that today is Friday. Not because it’s been a really long week, but it’s the weekend and I have a lot of fun stuff planned. So I cannot wait for Friday to be over!

We are hosting a BIG GIVEAWAY from our Sponsors this year! Be sure to scroll all the way down for more information and to enter to win!

We are continuing on the 12 days of Christmas with a fun Kids Activity! Or, a fun day for kids, whichever you prefer. We decided to go with an afternoon of fun for the kids and Oriental Trading Company has helped us tremendously with this! They were gracious enough to give us some of the supplies needed to complete our fun afternoon!

My inspiration was a fun little girl Paris party. We wanted to have some Eiffel Towers and lots of pink! Of course this is my kind of party! We wanted white, Eiffel Towers, pink, silver, gold, snacks, and a fun activity. Thankfully, Oriental Trading was able to help us out with some of these things.

So we started our afternoon by setting the table. We had a beautiful faux fur table runner (I’ll just say that mom and I have really enjoyed petting it, it’s SOOO SOFT) and we used it as a faux snow for our centerpiece. We had some white houses that we used to decorate last year and some Eiffel Towers that I have as decoration around my apartment. And of course to make it Christmassy we added some cute sisal trees. Honestly, how cute is it?

Since this is a kids party, we knew we had to have some fun activities. We found these coloring page placemats on Oriental’s website and knew that these would be perfect for our party. Unfortunately, we didn’t have any kids who were there while setting up for our party, so mom and I got to color the placemats. And Munchy helped!

Since every good party needs some snacks, we thought the coolest thing would to have a cupcake decorating station. So we have some cupcakes that we decorated with pink and green sprinkles from Oriental Trading. Who knew you could buy a whole pound of sprinkles from Oriental Trading? We also got these cute cupcake carriers from Oriental Trading. There are so many different designs of cupcake carriers so you can pick your favorites. Of course, I picked the pink chevron design! The carriers fit two cupcakes or a lot of cookies if you wanted.

The other fun activity we picked out for kids was making an ornament. We found all of the items needed on Oriental Trading’s website. We found these cute open face clear ornaments and I knew what I wanted. I found fake snow, cute deer ornaments, and some tiny sisal trees. Now, some of the deer were too big for the ornaments but the little fawns were perfect size. So with a little hot glue, we were able to glue the deer and the trees into the ornaments before pouring the fake snow in the bottom. How cute are they! And even though the ornaments may require a little adult supervision but they would be cute gifts to take home.

And that’s it! This is totally my kind of party. How fun would this be for kids, or adults? We had so much fun making everything for this party and we can’t wait to actually have a party with our nieces! So thank you to Oriental Trading for helping us set up our Kid’s Activity Party. And thank you for stopping by! See you on Monday!

Don’t forget to check out the other kids activities in the inlinkz party! And enter the giveaway below!

MEET OUR SPONSORS who have generously donated fabulous prizes for the Big Christmas Giveaway!

DecoArt winner will receive a prize package valued at $100!

Dixie Crystals/Imperial Sugar winner will receive a Keurig Coffee Maker valued at $100!

Oriental Trading winner will receive an OrientalTrading.com gift card valued at $200!

Cabot Cheese winner will receive a gift basket of Cabot products valued at $75!

Burlap Fabric winner will receive a prize pack of products valued at $50!

Zulay Kitchens winner will receive one Milk Frother and a Lemon Squeezer valued at $21

It’s Home To You winner will receive one wooden Santa sign valued at $65

Must be 18 to win. Open to U.S. residents only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Hundreds of Christmas Ornament Ideas!

November 14, 2019November 11, 2019Leave a comment

Welcome to the 2019 Ornament Exchange Link Party! It’s my fourth year of the blogger ornament exchange and you’ll find hundreds of DIY ornament tutorials and inspiration. This link party runs from November 14th through December 14th, so make sure to come back to add as many of your own handmade ornament tutorials before it closes!

This year, we have 38 talented bloggers hosting the handmade ornament exchange link party! The rules of the challenge were simple: create a handmade ornament for $15 or under, create a tutorial (all tutorials are linked below), and ship the ornament off to a new home!