Advent

On Saturday our family will begin our Advent preparations. Maren and I have had a few talks on the way to preschool about Advent...and preparing our hearts for the celebration of Christ's birth. We'll be using Truth in the Tinsel this year, and we'll decorate the printable ornaments (found here). I'm planning to use the same book next year, and we'll do the more time-intensive ornaments when Maren and Truett are able to work on them together next year. Remember my desire to simplify this year? Well, using the simple printable ornaments fits into our plan. *wink*

Last year Maren and I made an Advent Tree out of toilet paper rolls. You can find the original tutorial here.

Hello, 3-year-old Maren!

Do you have any special Advent plans? I'm looking forward to pausing each day to reflect on the wonder of the season...and to be sure our focus in on Christ, the true miracle of Christmas.

Christmas Palooza 2012

Cousin Jodi and her family introduced us to the concept of Christmas Palooza, and we've embraced the tradition ever since. We opted out of Black Friday shopping, and enjoyed a day of decking the halls around our house. The kids woke up to our elf, Robert, who delivered a special letter from Santa...an idea I stole borrowed from here. We like the idea of mixing in a little bit of make-believe with the true reason for celebrating...Christ's birth. We enjoyed a special breakfast together and the kids opened their new Christmas pjs. We like to give them their pajamas early so they are able to wear them all throughout the Christmas season. (Again, thanks cousin Jodi for the idea!) They also got a new Christmas movie and book...we're loving our growing Christmas library!

Maren was quick to spot Robert hanging from the light above the table.

I love my Christmas dishes. This year we decided to get them out and use them everyday...not just for parties. I also collect vintage red goblets, and this year I added some miniature ones to my collection so the kids are able to enjoy them, too. (Well, Maren enjoyed hers...Truett still has tendencies to throw things, so he hasn't graduated from a sippy cup quite yet!)

And, a humorous collection of pictures of the children...

Finally...both kids smiling and looking at the camera!

Maren had her shirt stuffed with ornaments...she loved helping me with the trees this year. We have a smaller tree in the family room decorated with Swedish ornaments. We'll also put our handmade ornaments on this tree.

This is the first Christmas with our new-to-us hutch. I loved making it look festive for the season! I'm hoping to share a more complete tour of the holiday decorations sometime soon.

Maren decorated the bottom half of the bigger tree with kid-friendly (aka, non-breakable) ornaments and I put the more fragile ones near the top.

Truett mostly did this...

While the kids and I spiffed up the inside of the house, Brett lined our roof with lights. I love this time of year...the lights, the smells, the music, the celebrations and parties. I'm hoping to share some of my favorite Christmasy 'things' in the coming weeks. For now, I'm off to watch an afternoon installment of Christmas Curious George with the two cutest kids I know.

Rainbow Party Details

 Long ago Maren determined that her 4th birthday should be celebrated with a rainbow themed party. I was happy to oblige. I have found that my collection of paper lanterns is quite versatile. In this instance, the lanterns were transformed into a rainbow.

Maren helped me sort through her box of crayons so we could arrange them in rainbow fashion for the centerpieces. I rolled out ikea art paper on the table and the girls were able to color while waiting for dinner. This served to be a brilliant idea, as containing 10 hungry, excited girls could have potentially started the party off on a crazy note. Instead, they all giggled and colored away. I found the colored cups and napkins at Ikea a while ago, and knew they'd be perfect for the party.

 I sewed little circle garlands for the light and just draped them around. Love how this turned out, and I'll definitely keep the garlands for future use.

Maren and I sorted out rainbow beads so each girl would have the right amount to make bracelets.

Rainbow pudding cups...just vanilla pudding with food coloring.

Rainbow fruit skewers...

I made cupcake toppers out of toothpicks and cardstock...

Simple cupcakes with rainbow sprinkles and flags...

...and look what the inside of the cupcakes looked like! These were a huge hit for the girls.

It was fun this year to have Maren's help in planning and preparing for the party. One of the neighbor girls came over to help us make the cupcakes. Thankfully, the actual party turned out to be fabulous. I'll share those pictures tomorrow!

Here's where I found some ideas (via my Party Pinterest page):

Pudding
Cupcakes
Crayon Centerpieces

Happy Valentine's Day!

We've been in a Valentine's flurry around our house. Maren and I made all her Valentines for her party at church. She used a stamp to put her name on the back of our little heart birds. I cut everything out and she glued it all together. We had such a great time working on these. Have I mentioned before how much I love that Maren is into creative projects? She is...and I love it!

I wanted to put up a few Valentine's decorations, but didn't want to spend any money. My mom gave me a square berry wreath a few years ago for Christmas. I love having it out during the holidays, and this year I transformed it (temporarily!) for Valentine's Day. I cut out letters on my cricut, glued them to some book pages and used mini-clothespins and string to attach them to the wreath.

I also strung up some vintage Valentines that I've collected throughout the years.



Maren dressed herself for her party yesterday. She was sure to wear plenty of red.

In other news...Truett is completely mobile. He has been for over a month now. He has been quite pleased to discover every nook and cranny around our home. We're working with Maren to keep her little things up off the floor. Nothing is safe from this little guy. He is so curious and quiet, which is an unfortunate combination for such a small boy. Or, maybe just unfortunate for his mother. I think he quite likes it, actually!

Red Door {not the perfume}

We did something brave a few weeks ago. Actually, my husband did the painting {as usual!} and I instigated the project and bought the paint. That's typically how it goes around here. Brett is my hero-painter and I love him for it. Well, I love him for that and a million other things. Remember when he rescued August? He's such a good man.

I originally found my inspiration on Pinterest. Aren't these red doors fabulous?

{1, 2, 3 via Pinterest}

Believe it or not, this is the only 'before' picture I could find! That's baby Maren with her Gigi when we were first looking at this house. The color we chose is Caliente by Benjamin Moore. It was a recent Pottery Barn color and it really was the perfect red for our door. {Thanks, Mom, for suggesting it!}

Here's our shiny, red door. I love how unexpected it is in this space. I also love the cheerful pop of color it adds to the front rooms in the house. You can actually see the door from the family room and kitchen area, too.



Ah! Please excuse the crooked shade on our dining room light. We really don't like this light. I think it's too small, and those shades are always crooked. I've thought about painting it, but I'm not sure what color. Suggestions are welcome. Please...share your 'bright' ideas. {Sorry...couldn't help myself!}

Have you painted any interior doors in your home an interesting color? If you've thought about it, I say go for it! And let me know if you do...I'd love to see!

Linking up here this week:

My new habitat {pillow}

A couple months ago, I was lucky enough to take home some fat eighths of Jay McCarroll's Habitat fabric for a little quilt guild challenge. The fabric reminded me of time spent playing in the woods near my parents' cottage. I was inspired to make a funky little pillow cover that now reminds me of playing in the woods, or as we called them, 'the birches'.

I cut random sized strips from my favorite fabrics for the 'branches' on the front. I left the edges raw so the stripes would have a messy, frayed look.

For the back of the pillow I pieced together some bigger strips of the fabric. I snagged a few extra pieces from guild friends who hadn't used all their fabric.



I love the way the pillow turned out, and I love the little reminder of a favorite autumn childhood memory that now sits on my entry bench.