(Photography credit Chelsea Robbins)

A delightful variation on the standard cupcake for a dessert table. Doughnuts have made their way into the sweet scene of my life quickly, leaving a trail of powdered sugar loveliness behind them! To top them off I created doughnut flags out of ribbon and string. The flags would give any dessert on your table an easy dose of celebration cheer.

Materials needed for doughnut flags:

• Differing size candy sticks and toothpicks.
  
• Ribbon and string in coordinating colors.
  
• Liquid starch.

How to Make doughnut flags:

• Cut your ribbons and strings to varying sizes.
  
• Dredge in liquid starch.
  
• Place around sticks to dry, lifting up portions of each ribbon to create a natural looking flow.
  

More to come soon from this super playful Christmas in July shoot.

blessings.

Just in case you need a last minute card to send and don’t want to pay the Hallmark $4 here is a quick and incredibly easy idea.

• Find any old card laying around your house (mine is an unused thank you card).

• Cut out a heart shape with adhesive felt, or paper, or tissue, or really anything you can find lying around.
  

• Attach to card with glue, covering up the current sentiment to make a last minute Valentines Day card.
  

You could also send last minute kisses and hugs this way.

Happy Valentines week.

PS. The winner of the lovely earrings is Emily (random.org #5). Congrats, please email me with your mailing info and enjoy the pretty lace earrings.

blessings.

These were so simple to make and can be personalized with whatever words you would like. Simply write with a piece of chalk, erase and repeat until your sentiment is just right:)

Directions- Download the link below and print out on heavy white card stock, your page will look like this-

Using a small paint brush or a Q-tip paint in the center of the hearts with chalkboard paint. Let dry and then cut out the hearts. Attach to candy sticks that can be found at most craft stores- or toothpicks if you are running a bit late.

Write away, stick into cupcakes and enjoy spreading the love.

The small print: The downloadable pdfs on this page are free for personal use only, not for commercial use. If you wish to incorporate any of my designs in your own personal projects, please attribute it to me by linking to my site. As a courtesy, if you wish to link to anything on this article, please link to this page and not directly to a downloadable file. Thanks and enjoy.

blessings.

Because I added a small square of chalk-board paint, wrote out the word LOVE.

Bought a few pink tulips,

and made this…

Which, I think might be my favorite project yet,

and so incredibly easy to make.

In case you missed the Advent Wreath tutorial here are the simple steps to create these vases:

• Collect a few wine bottles
• Spray paint them white, doing multiple light coats to prevent dripping
  
• Using a felt brush paint on two coats of chalkboard paint in an imperfect square, centered on the front
• Write in the word LOVE
  
• Add water and then a few simple, pretty flowers

They make me smile. I am excited to share with you tomorrow a few other lovely items going into the store to continue our Black & White LOVE for this Valentines Day.

PS. Here they are in pink for spring!

blessings.

I will be busy setting up our new home this weekend and will be taking a short blog break to do that. In the meantime I thought you might enjoy this New Years label with two cute birds that I have made.

The sizing is perfect for a wine bottle (or sparking cider if you’d like). It would be an easy way to bring a hostess gift over for New Year’s Eve. Simply print out the label on heavy card stock, cut along the image and attach it to the bottle.

You could also print out three and use them to cover a few bottles for a New Years midnight countdown. I am hoping to do this and use it as a wine tasting countdown to ring in the New Year. 3…2…1….

Here is the label (pdf)

I am hoping the site change will relieve the PDF problems of the past, if for some reason you cannot access this file-please email me for the label and I will be happy to send it. Please also do not reproduce this for any other purpose than personal use.

Hope it is a lovely evening for you, however you decide to celebrate.

blessings

PS. See you Monday with new house pictures.

PSS. Thanks for your sweet comments and emails about the new site, we are still working on it all and you guys have been so very sweet about it, you make me smile:)

I spent a little time making a string of them last night. Have you ever strung Cranberries? It is super easy to do- just get a thick needle, thread and dive right in. They are easy to poke through but be careful to have protection because when one pops, and it is inevitable that one will, they do stain.

In working with our decorations-that-must-be-disposable theme this year I wanted to incorporate a few words around our house. Cranberries seemed to be the prefect way to do that.

For this project I used one small bag of the berries and about a yard of thread.

Thread enough cranberries for your entire word onto one length of thread. Then once you have the berries up on the wall arranged how you would like simply cut the thread off between the letters. To hang I used a nail/thumbtack combo but you could also use heavy tape or small mounting pieces.

Make one word to encapsulate your season or make a bunch to cover an entire wall for a striking display. I love how the simple word JOY looks above our bed.

Fair warning from me- make sure your berry strings are out of the dogs reach;)

P.S. If you’d like an eatable Cranberry project instead THIS RECIPE is the only recipe I ensure is made every year! It is my favorite- the cranberries are perfectly sweet and look beautiful out on display. I have a batch waiting for me to sugar them later on today!

BLESSINGS

Welcome….

We are moving soon-2 weeks from today-yikes! I am taking this challenge as a chance to be creative with our Christmas. Here I present our easy-to-make and no-need-to-pack-but-completely-recyclable Christmas decor plus a few tutorials as my gift to you.

Making our home feel like Christmas amidst packing has allowed me a chance to really focus in on the little details. A wreath hanging above the kitchen with a ribbon of seemingly homeless buttons makes Christmas stand out a bit from the chaos around us.

A snowflake made out of an empty tissue box greets you though the front window-

Our advent wreath made out of wine bottles and a little spray paint has been encouraging us to stay true to the reason we celebrate-

The advent calendar that has mark the days for us with words of hope-

A tree of blessing that has been warming our hearts so far this season-

And finally a snow-man that we can eat when we are all through smiling at it-

The snowman was created by stacking 3 oranges of descending sizes and piecing them together with toothpicks. The face was made out of whole cloves, a peppermint, licorice and a jr. mint to top it all off. He currently sits on my stove and where he is making me smile each time I walk by.

I am finding this year that there is a great amount of happiness to be found in the little details of the season. Check back later today for another food creation as I show you how to find JOY in cranberries! Until then, thanks for stopping by and Happy Christmas decorating to you all.

BLESSINGS

We are focusing this year on celebrating the complete season of Advent so it seemed necessary to have a traditional advent wreath guiding us through the weeks. Here is my mostly-free-to-make, disposable (since we are moving), modern take on the tradition.

I used our left over wine bottles from the Thanksgiving centerpiece and put 2 coats of white spray paint on them. Then I shaved down four taper candles to fit inside the bottles and surrounded it all with moss balls for a simple, modern take on the traditional evergreen wreath.

Each bottle is wrapped with ribbon and has an important Advent word affixed to the front for our family to consider as we enjoy the festivities in these weeks leading up to Christmas.

We celebrated the first Sunday last night by lighting a candle and reading a chapter from our new Advent book. Each week we will light one of the candles, read together and savor the passing of the season. On Christmas day all four bottled candles will glow as well as the single taper in the middle symbolizing the center and purpose of the season for us- the birth of our Lord.

BLESSINGS

*PS. This project was inspired by the beer-bottle-Menorah seen in the December 2009 issue of Ready Made.