Easy DIY Felt Advent Christmas Tree Calendar...

Seriously… so easy…

Materials:

The stiff sort of felt like here
Scissors
Sharpie or Fabric Marker
Command Hooks

Directions:

*Cut out a Christmas tree in the size shape and color you would like.
*Adorn with a star on top
*Cut out 25 ornaments in the size and shape you would like.
*Write numbers 1-25 on them.
*Hang on the wall using a command hook.
*Done and Done

Uses: 

This is our first Christmas with it!  I had to watch to make sure she did not eat the ornaments,
but she still loved it!

*Older kiddos can find the number of each day and put it up.
*Younger kids can just spend time decorating the tree.

***I am thinking about using this for coming months as well!***

The kiddos sharing a moment :) Be still my heart

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Guest Post: Do it Yourself Refinished Chairs!

My blogging friend Lauren is stopping by today from Sincerely, Lo… her blog inspires me in my marriage and home!  She did an awesome DIY project to share here with my readers today!  

Hello! I'm Lauren, the lady behind Sincerely, Lo

I am a follower of Christ, a wife to the man of my dreams, a fur mama of four and a lover of sweet tea, interior décor and some DIY projects!
Stasia has been so sweet and generous by letting me stop by and share one of my DIY projects on her blog today!

I love home decor. I mean I LOVE home decor. I constantly move furniture around to make our home look fresh, I constantly think of new décor ideas for our home and I love taking junk-y furniture and making it beautiful. I love decorating and making a cold space into a warm, cozy place that I like to call my home. 

If you think you may like the idea of remodeling furniture, GO FOR IT! Seriously, I just started remodeling an old china cabinet one day for the heck of it...and now I cant stop. I am constantly paining or coming up with new ideas for every single piece of furniture I have.
Also, if you are wanting to start remodeling furniture, go to some yard sales! Don't worry about quality. Most of the time when I buy pieces from yard sales, they need some tender loving care with some sandpaper. But, yard sales are a great place to find all types of furniture and it is always so important to stay in a small budget!

These two chairs I purchased at a yard sale about a year or so ago.  I paid only $ 7 for both which I thought was a steal!

What you will need
- chairs that need to be refurbished, painted and made beautiful
- sandpaper to make the chairs smooth
- any color paint that you would like (just go for the quart size, you will have plenty!)
- any fabric that you choose
- a screwdriver to take the seat off of the chair
- a staple gun to attach the fabric to the seat cushion
- your favorite tunes to listen to
- oh, and a glass of sweet tea. because you can never do a project without it :)

Starting out, they were old looking with horrible seat fabric. Just blah and boring. But, they only needed a good cleaning and I was able to get to work pretty quickly :)

PS- Please forgive me for my lighting. I have no idea what was going on with my camera. 

First, I removed the seats from the chair. If you have a chair you have been wanting to fix up, this is very simple. Just take a screwdriver, flip the chair over and unscrew the bottom screws. 

 I am pretty sure it took me thirty minutes to pick out a paint color. 

I am one of those people who will take ten minutes to order at a fast food place because I think it has to be the perfect choice. 

Yes, horrible.

For this, I just chose a small 32 oz can of a very, very baby blue. To some it may look white unless you really take a hard look at it. 

I then took a trip to Hobby Lobby for some fabric. It took me what seemed like 40 minutes to pick out fabric. But they have SO MANY CHOICES. So I had an excuse this time :)

After the painting, I let it dry and then took a staple gun and surrounded the existing fabric with the new fabric. Sometimes, people completely throw out the seat and start fresh with a new seat but the seats on this chair were in great shape so I felt no need to completely start over with a new seat.  

I LOVE the way the chairs turned out!

 They now have a new home in our very front room. 

.....and then my OCD self had to do something with that small table in the middle.
Plus, who doesn't love some pale pink?

PSS- Also, please excuse that light outlet back there. Currently searching for new ones
PSSS- For some reason my lighting made the chairs look splotchy and unfinished on the bottoms. Please ignore :)

There you have it sweet ladies! Super simple and a wonderful first project to start on!
Thank you so much to Stasia for allowing me to share my DIY today!
I would love for you to head on over to my lifestyle blog and travel along with my husband and I as we take on this huge adventure that we all call life :)

XOXO
Lauren

Sweetest goodbye celebration...

We have some sweet friends that are about to move overseas.  They will not be back for three years!  God is leading them and their three kiddos there to take the gospel to the ends of the earth.  You can be praying that God uses them in BIG ways!

   Another friend of ours, Anna Leigh and her mother-in-law, organized a small surprise going away celebration.  It was such an amazing time!

Also celebrated sweet Abby's birthday! :)

Our many attempts to a picture with all the kiddos...7 including the 2 not quite born yet!  Which is the best... you be the judge!  And I wonder how many kiddos will be in this picture in 3 years...

  I have always thought it would be too expensive/difficult to decorate for a party. Anna Leigh and her mother-in-law made me think that I could get crafty when decorating for a party... and it could not be that difficult our expensive!  I did not come up with any of the ideas below, but Andrew and I helped in the execution and it was not hard!     

We made the above place mats and napkin cards!  We took an old atlas (who uses those anymore anyways???) and cut them into place mat sized pieces. We used sections of the map that had special meaning.  Then we took colored duck tape to the back side.  On the front we used modge podge and painted two layers.  For the napkin rings we cut a portion of the map and just put a scrapbook sticker on.

And the tablescape... We just took a couple globes that they had around the house and put them on the tables.  Add some vases with free flowers from the garden and done! :)

  Last we made two banners.  again we just cut pieces from the map and painted using stencil over them! Attached them to a string using mini clothespins. 
Next party we do... I am totally being crafty... or at least trying!
 

best cards ever...

 I don't like the Hallmark greeting card section.  Nothing against you if you love it, but I have just never been much for the mass produced cards.  In fact, when I have to pick one up, I get frustrated about paying $2.99 (or more) for a piece of paper and choose to pick one up from the 99 cent section.  If I have planned ahead I just use a plain boring notecard. Melissa, a sweet friend of mine hand-makes the cutest cards... seriously.  Here is the link to her etsy shop.  And she makes them out of recycled things!  Bits of paper, fabric etc!  I am trying to start using these instead of cheesy mass produced cards or plain card stock.  The last set I bought cost $8 for a set of 5 unique cards.  That is less than $2 a card... and they are truly special and individual.  I can also write a personal note in them that is more meaningful.   Since these cards are so cool, I am doing my first giveaway! The winner will get a set of 4 cards, pictured below!  

This set is so cute... I want them! So how do you enter??? You can enter 3 times... and that means 3 chances to win! 1.  Favorite Melissa's Etsy page. 2. Leave a comment below. 3. Become a follower of my blog. Get excited... I will pick a winner Sunday night!

Baby headbands...

So... one of the latest crazes for baby girls are these adorable headbands...

For sale on etsy- $25 for 10

For sale on etsy- $14.25 for 1... this is the one I LOVE... but just can't justify $14.25 + shipping

As I have said before, I am not that girly. but I still feel the need for Bailey Drew's little head not to be missing these cute little adornments.  The definitely go on the not necessary but so cute list for babies.

Besides not being very girly, I am not very crafty.  It is one of those things I have denied for years, but have come to terms with.  I am just not very detail oriented... more of a big picture person.  So if you look at most of my crafts from a distance... they look fine... just don't get too close.

All that being said I still decided to tackle this project.  I bought elastic lace and ribbon from Mary Supplies , went to JoAnn's Fabric to buy some fabric swatches and felt.  In all I spent about $20.  I figure If I can make at least 15 headbands from that it will be worth it.

So first I created a couple of complete headbands.  I just cut out a piece of felt to the size flower I wanted.  Cut the fabric I wanted, and glued in on in a way I thought would look cute... it was trial and error.  I cut another piece of felt the same size as the first, measures the headband to the "correct" size and glue gunned the elastic between the two pieces of felt.

After making a couple of complete headbands I go worried that I was not making them the correct size for her head... so I just made flowers and figured I could glue gun them together when she gets here and I know how big she is.

 Things I learned...

• Most of the elastic ribbon/lace I bought were in 2 foot increments... that means I will only be able to make 1 head band out of each, but I will have just short of a foot leftover.  Seems kind of wasteful, but most of the elastic I can use to make hair ties for me.
• Even buying the smallest fabric swatches are about $2 a piece and have way too much fabric for the 1-2 headbands I want to make with that fabric.  This would be a great project to go in on with someone else... anyone with a little girl want to make some more headbands with me???
• Think I would pick plainer fabrics next time... match more things???
• Just mess with the flower until it looks right... or at least that was my strategy!

Anyways in all I was able to make my goal of 15 headbands for $20 with a supply left to make many many more.  Definitely a savings from etsy.  Hopefully I will share pictures very soon of little Bailey wearing them.

Side note...  have you done this before???  Any suggestions???