advent calendar day 2...santa spotter

yesterday was the second day of our advent calendar...and rai made a santa spotter!!! so that on Christmas night, she can use it to help her see santa flying in the sky! you will need a paper towel roll, white glue, a piece of copy paper, and crayons, markers, glitter, etc for decorating! i think you may see were i'm goin here...so take your paper and decorate it...or in my case, have your 3 year old decorate it. like this (we used a yellow piece of paper b/c she insisted...if you use colored construction paper you will have to trim the ends...)

after decorating the front of your paper with the crayons and marker drawings...flip it over and spread glue all over the back of the paper (mom, you may want to do the edges)...

can you tell she liked the glue?   :)

after you get an agreeable amount of glue, line up your paper towel holder with the edges of the paper, hotdog style, and roll it around the roll, so that no paper towel roll is visible..

here you could add pompoms or glitter or whatever other dodads you want...however, my santa spotter went straight outside looking for that jolly lil elf...and everything else we own...

hope you like!!!

advent calendar, day 1

so we started our advent calendar today...and i decided to tell you guys what we did! :) i know you've probably seen it before on a paper towel roll or something, but i think everything is better with wine...well a wine bottle at least :) ok...so you will need a wine bottle, your favorite wrapping paper cut into one inch strips, and some scotch tape...i know you have all this stuff around your house...and if you have to drink a bottle of wine in the name of Christmas...well what better reason is there?

take your wrapping paper and cut it into strips...depending on the shape of your bottle, you may have to use different lengths to give you the desired shape...i used 8 inch strips on the bottom layer, 7 inch strips on the second layer, 6 inch strips on the third layer, and 5 inch strips the rest of the way up. (my wrapping paper had a grid printed on the back which made this task a lot easier to give you measurements for...if it wasn't marked i promise you i would NOT be sitting around making sure that i had perfect 6 inch strips :) haha lol have fun with this!!! my 3 yr old loved HELPING!!) :) ok, so take one strip at a time and fold it in half, without creasing it, tape both ends (with one piece of tape) near the bottom of the bottle about an inch from the bottom...

make a ring with the loops that goes all the way around the bottle. start your next layer about an inch above the bottom row...centering the first strip between 2 of the bottom ones (to stagger the strips). continue up the bottle like this...

when you get close to the top, take a 6"x6" piece of wrapping paper and fold it in half, then roll into a tube and tape to the rim of the bottle...

 

after it's taped, take one of your strips of paper and cover your "scar" where you taped the tube in :) then use a sharp pair of scissors, and to make slices around the tube making a little "fire-cracker" on top of your "tree." 

finish your taping your loops and display somewhere beautiful in your home!!  :)

hope you like!! :)

mmmmm GOOD!!! :)

ok sooo we put up our christmas tree yesterday...SOOOO much fun by the way ok...ok...you talked me into it, here's a pic :)

ok...so that was more of Princess :) so here's the tree 

ok so ignore the sippy cup on the counter and the slice of Hubs and Li'l Man on the side :)

well to continue...Princess wakes up this morning and says she wants to make christmas cookies...soooo my wheels start turning...and i decide that i want to make some apple cookies...i saw someone make them on the "make me hungry channel" (aka food network) a while back...so i get online and start looking for a recipe...well i found one that i sorta liked...but thought a few tweaks would make it perfect...well Hubs came home for lunch and ate half a pan...so i thought it good enough to share :) so here it is! :)

and this is what you will get!!!!!  :) enjoy!

PS...Daddy i think you will LOVE these!!! These are very cake-like cookies, and i think they would make GREAT woopie pies with some cream cheese flavored whipped cream!!! :) LOVE! ...hmmm maybe i will blog that... :)

thankful

i am so grateful, words cannot express

how i feel this thankfulness...

i feel like i have the best secret in the world, 

i feel like my oyster has a pearl.

i want to whistle, scream, and shout,

i want you to know what thankful is about

i'm thankful for life, for breath, for rain,

i'm thankful for kisses, and love, and pain.

i'm thankful i have two sweet angels with me, 

i'm thankful for a husband who always says WE.

i'm thankful for the blessings i take for granted each day,

i'm thankful HE came to show me the way. 

i love my life and all that comes with it, 

though there are days when i feel like the windshield ;)

happy thanksgiving to everyone that i know

please take a moment to cherish the gold 

NOT the physical kind in your hand,

the gold all around you in your friends and your fam.

 

functionality meets modern elegance dining room

ok so everyone knows that a great dining room starts with a great table...and for tiff and donnie, this table designed by Ana White is PERFECT! She blogged the how-to HERE yeah...a lil elbow grease..but SO worth it!!

we're gonna put six of these BEAUTIFUL white chairs around the table...

LOVE IT! : ) now...we're gonna need some nice pop of color to really make all this black and white shine...so i'm thinking a nice aqua blue like Sherwin William's Holiday Turquoise

and continue the trim color from the living room into the dining room on the crown, baseboard, and chair rail since they open into each other...(in case you forgot its Sherwin William's Black Magic)

let's hang something like this awesome original by Susanna S.

set the table with some nice white china...fiestaware is my FAVORITE!!!

and lets put a red accent plate with those clean white plates! :)

and you guys know i can't let them eat on a hard floor!!! gotta have this bold striped RUG to give donnie that modern touch he likes :)

love it...hate it...tell me what you think!!! :) hope you like tiff and donnie!!!

sexy spa space...for tiff and donnie

ok so for her sexy...spa...space we are starting with tiffany's dream bed...and i do have to say i think i could have some NICE dreams in this bed!!! it's BEAUTIFUL like the one HERE

we don't want that LOVELY bed to BLEND into the walls...so we're gonna give those walls a nice SPA-like blue like maybe...Sherwin Williams's Blue Sky???

but we're keepin' the trim clean with a nice creamy white like Sherwin William's Antique White...

i wanna keep the clean lines that tiffany and donnie love so much so i'm going with this white comforter with some straight pleats sewn in and the best part...its from WALLY WORLD...

loving this lil throw to add some softness to all these lines...like this one from TARGET.com i just wanna cuddle up in it!!!

and whacha think about this awesome rug to tie it all together??!! LOVE IT...

a lamp like THIS or THIS on each side of the bed...i think i would do one of each! you and donnie can fight that one out!!! :)

hang one of THESE funky chunky mirrors...

and flank it with some pics of those beautiful babies!!! :)

also...after looking at the pics of the room...i think we can work in a little reading/sitting area??? so this is what i came up with for the area opposite the bed...

love the CHAISE...can we say story time with mommy!!!!

 

with this awesome sheepskin underneath

what about THIS ADORABLE floor lamp??? cause i mean what is a reading nook without a lamp? :)  

what about these killer ledges for $10?!!!!???!!! why not right! good for displaying pictures or the occasional book! (P.S.  AnaWhite blogged the how to HERE)

i love it!!! but i guess i'm kinda biased...whadda YOU think?

tiff's modern living room

there is so much color in this room that it needs a nice calm neutral as a backdrop like this Sherwin William's Whole Wheat

  

give the trim a nice dark coat of Sherwin William's Black Magic

her dream couch...found HERE...

i likey this pillow...from DecoFamara

 and this one from glamdesign

lovin this awesome rug from target.com 

 a couple of these to die for metal chairs from overstock.com

 

throw a couple of pillows made with THIS fabric in each chair... 

how about some cool geometric paintings like THIS

ok i saw this lamp and it just belongs in this room!!! from target.com