Our new home has these great built in shelves that surround the fireplace in our living room. Coming from a tiny one bedroom condo we have few decorative items to display. I’ve been on the hunt for unique looking vases, pots, statues… not exactly sure what but I keep telling my husband I’ll know it when I see it! The problem is there are 6 selves. Only two of which are filled (one with photo books and the other is a charging station for our i-devices). Four of them have been sitting empty just waiting for the right item – which I’m reluctant to admit may never come.

Then last week it hit me. I can dress them up for the current season/holiday! We won’t be looking at the same items year round, it will keep my creative juices flowing and give me a great place to use all these free printables I keep downloading (is there a “download anonymous” group? I think I have a problem!)

It’s still a work in progress but I’m so proud I had to share what I’ve gotten done so far.

Shelf 1:

I’m in love with Oohmoon’s “One illustration a day, free for one day each day of the year” project and knew I had to incorporate one of the Fall Foliage illustrations. We had just done some pumpkin painting at Mary’s house so it was an obvious choice and a favorite of the Little Peanuts. The left side are scrapbook printables from Canon’s Creative Park site. The right side is  a cutout pumpkin with a 3-d paper twig. I think the brown backing on the pumpkin weighs that side down a little but I had already glued it on and was committed!

Shelf 2:

Can’t forget about the spooky side of Halloween so this shelf has a mini haunted house – another Canon Creative Park printout. The printable includes a cat, witch, zombie and ghost too but all the little pieces seemed so daunting!

The spider in the frame is made from some foam stickers I had picked up last year. You can’t tell but it’s sorta 3D-ish with the spider popping out. Hmm some real web action in the corners of the shelf would probably finish the look really well. I’m putting that on the list for next year!

The three mini vases were an impulse buy from the dollar bin at Micheals. With 3 for a dollar who could resist? They were a frosty yellow color, but I’ve jumped on the chalkboard paint bandwagon and gave them a good spray. It may look like a little alien on the first one but it’s really a skeleton. I’m not the best artist… I may have to get my nephew to do them for me next time. He’s a wonderful artist and he’s only 9! Anyway, I’m thinking of making some black roses to place in them.

So that’s two shelves down and two more to go! Do you decorate for Autumn/Halloween? I’d love to hear about them!

You don’t have to be an expert in the kitchen to try this gift idea – homemade chocolate bark! I actually got the White Chocolate Peppermint bark recipe from Food Network’s Paula Deen, but I’m not a fan of white chocolate so I modified the recipe and also created other variations of it. This gift idea is ideal for friends, family, neighbors, teachers and co-workers because it’s quick, easy, inexpensive and most importantly…yummy!

The recipe calls for 2 lbs. of chocolate. But since that’s a lot of chocolate to work with, I just modified it for a 12 oz. bag of chocolate morsels so that there’s no measuring involved and 1/2 cup of crushed candy canes.

My other variations included: dark chocolate/peppermint, semi-sweet chocolate/toffee bits, semi-sweet  chocolate/walnuts & toffee. The other modification I made was to sprinkle the crushed candy canes (or toffee bits/nuts) over the spreaded chocolate to make it look prettier.

I did end up making the white chocolate peppermint bark for neighbors. It was a pretty contrast to the darker chocolate. I just put a medley of them into holiday Chinese takeout boxes and will be delivering them to my neighbors this weekend!

One of my nieces mentioned that she wanted a spa trip for Christmas. Well, I couldn’t buy her an actual trip but decided to give her (along with my other two nieces) a spa experience. So I’m putting together some spa bags filled with nail polish, manicure/pedicure accessories, facial masks and more! I wanted to personalize it as well so I included a personalized towel for each. Here’s what I did:

1) Cut out the letters of their names from cute fabric prints. I used interfacing to add some stiffness.

2) Place the letters onto the towel and pin them in place.

3) On the Singer Simple (TM) sewing machine, I used the ‘C’ zigzag stitch and size 1 stitch to sew the letters to the towel.

These turned out really cute and didn’t take me long at all…and all I purchased were the towels. I hope they enjoy and get a lot of use out of their gifts!

Stay tuned for last-minute gift ideas – Part 2!!

The day after Thanksgiving, I went into full holiday decoration mode. I strung garland on the banister, the mantle, and put up my Christmas tree. I wasn’t sure what do with with the narrow window next to my front door until I came across some snowflake garland I made last year. It was a great way to recycle an existing item and add some whimsy to the window.

All you need is: holiday cardstock, snowflake punch (or any other holiday themed punch), string and stapler

1) Punch out the snowflakes. The number of snowflakes depends on the area that you’re decorating. I decided to use multiple strings hang the snowflakes

2) Holding two snowflakes together (decorative side facing out), staple the snowflake to the string. In my case, I carefully placed the string in between the staple so that I could adjust the placementof the snowflakes by sliding it up or down.

3) Continue to staple the snowflakes to the string until you reach the desired length.

4) Hang on a rod and voila!

In addition to a window, you can hang the snowflake garland just about anywhere: on a door, above your child’s bed, on the ceiling (that would be super cute), on the mantle, etc.

Cathy and I are throwing a Halloween party for the kids this weekend, and we’re having a fun time planning it! One of the many decorations I have is a Halloween wreath. It’s a super easy way to change a regular autumn foliage wreath into somehing fun and cute for Halloween!

All you need are: orange cardstock , string, glue/tape and of course, a wreath

(NOTE: For the spiders/bats, cut them out from black cardstock or do what I did and purchase Martha Stewart Crafts Spider Silhouettes)

Step 1: Cut out 4″ circles (the number of circles depends on what you want the wreath to read. Mine is “BOO!” so I cut 4 circles)

Step 2: Write the letters out in a thick black marker

Step 3: Glue or tape to a ribbon or string and tie to the wreath

Step 4: Adhere the spider and bats

Step 5: Hang on door!

This weekend my family will be celebrating two occasions…Our Vietnamese New Year (a.k.a. Lunar New Year) and, of course, Valentine’s Day! This year is the Year of the Tiger which is one of the 12-year cycle of animals that appear in the Chinese calendar. Here’s a little description of those who are born in the Year of the Tiger:

Tiger people are sensitive, given to deep thinking, capable of great sympathy. They can be extremely short-tempered, however. Other people have great respect for them, but sometimes tiger people come into conflict with older people or those in authority. sometimes Tiger people cannot make up their minds, which can result in a poor, hasty decision or a sound decision arrived at too late. They are suspicious of others, but they are courageous and powerful. Tigers are most compatible with Horses, Dragons, and Dogs.

We will be visiting family and presenting them with traditional gifts and will also be attending a festival at church that is bound to have lots of games, music and food! This will be my son’s first time to really enjoy this holiday! He’ll be showered with lucky money too (bills put into red envelopes that is a symbol of luck and prosperity)!

For Valentine’s Day, we’re planning on taking our son out to lunch and just spending good ‘ole, quality time with him! We started a tradition last year of getting him a stuffed animal for Valentine’s Day (He got Raffey his giraffe last year that he just adores). So we continue the tradition this year with a red dog named Aldo.

Happy New Year – may the Year of the Tiger bring you joy, peace and prosperity!

Happy V-Day too…give your loved ones a call and an extra kiss (I got a faceful this morning!).