holidays
No Sew Denim Heart Bunting
A denim heart bunting is a little bit country and a whole lot of cute! If you have a pair of jeans to cut up, you can make one, too. I used my husband’s jeans. An old pair. Not his favorite pair. I’m not a monster. The jeans that are past the point of no return and ripped out in not-safe-for-work places. How does that even happen? Anyway, let’s not get distracted. Here’s What You Need to Make a Denim Heart Bunting: denim fabric pen or marker ruler or other straight edge fabric scissors craft knife cord, string, yarn, or embroidery thread yarn needle/large eye needle optional: pom poms or other…
DIY Grapevine Heart Garland
Anthropologie is currently selling a grapevine heart garland for Valentine’s Day, and I thought I could make one for cheaper and put my own spin on the craft. I was right, for once, about the cheaper part. And I love putting my own spin on a craft, so this one was right up my alley. I did not consult the Crafting Constitution to determine if there is a rule decreeing that a garland must be composed of like-sized items. As you can see, the hearts on my garland are different sizes and don’t connect at the same point, but they are all strung together. I could hang it below the…
Christmas Around Our Home 2025
It’s almost Christmas! Today, I thought we’d relax a bit, and I’d show you what Christmas around our home looks like right now. I walked around the house and snapped photos over the course of ten minutes, so most of what you’ll see today are those candid photos. We’ll start in the music room. Perhaps my most creative craft ever, in terms of upcycling, is the piano hammer Christmas tree sitting on our antique radio. It’s subtly festive, and most people probably wouldn’t realize what it is made from. If you’re my piano tuner, though, this is the sort of decor that tickles your ivories. He probably does think we’re…
Giant Paper Angel – Christmas Mantel Decor
I’ve watched creators making paper angel ornaments for a few years, and I wondered if the idea would scale. Could I make a giant paper angel using brown kraft paper? Spoiler alert. I could, and I did. Here she is in all of her glory. No word on if the heavens declare her amazing, but I do! For reference, our mantel is 7 feet across. The angel is just shy of 4 feet tall. As you can see, I couldn’t leave well enough alone with just the angel. Not me. My holiday fireplace decorating always escalates. (See here and here for evidence.) The paper angel looked lonely up there. She…
Blue and Metallic Christmas Tree
Welcome! Come, join me in my living room. I’d love to show you my blue and metallic Christmas tree. It’s a little bit rustic, a little bit glam. We’ll call it an opposites attract situation. This year, pretty much all of the ornaments on the tree are handmade or semi-handmade, meaning I put my own spin on an existing ornament. Truth be told, it’s more fun for me to make Christmas ornaments than to decorate with the things I make. However, decorating a Christmas tree isn’t exactly a chore. This blue and metallic Christmas tree is decorated with all sorts of fun ornaments, most of which are reused from prior…
Five Ways to Decorate With Nuts for Christmas
Decorating for the holidays with natural ingredients is a hoot! This year, I have come up with five ways to decorate with nuts this Christmas. Three of these ideas are mine. Two are not. I consider the two ideas that are not mine to be crafts-in-waiting. There’s only so much time in a day. I can either buy something another maker has made if I really want it now, which is okay! Â I can also save the idea to make it another year. At my current rate of idea saving, I have enough crafts to keep me busy for the next 1,413 years, give or take a decade. Can you…
Nutcracker Holiday Mantel Decor
Fair warning. Your jaw may drop after viewing my Nutcracker holiday mantel decor. (There also may be a pun or two in this blog post.) You know I love a theme, so I chose nutcrackers as this year’s holiday decor theme for our dining room fireplace. This theme has been a long time coming, as I have been in possession of my mother’s nutcrackers for years. Decades, actually, but who’s counting? I don’t always decorate with the nutcrackers because they don’t match anything that I own. I also can’t seem to get rid of them for sentimental reasons. I’m sure you have your own version of this in your house.…
A Rustic Carriage House Christmas
It’s beginning to look like a rustic Carriage House Christmas! Or, as rustic as it can get with four faux Christmas trees. Just roll with it, folks. That’s what I do. Speaking of rolling with things, please go along with me for a minute as I set up this story. A year and a half ago, we repointed this fireplace in our Carriage House. I’d venture a guess that it had been covered for well over 100 years. Then we immediately covered it, so to speak, with a weight machine because we use this part of the Carriage House as a gym. Not too long after that, we went to…
DIY Giant Plywood Christmas Trees
Decorating for the holidays? The thing your front porch is missing is giant plywood Christmas trees. They can be painted any color, made in most any size, and can fold flat for storage. That’s it. That’s my pitch. Blog post complete. Kidding! You know I’m chattier than that. To make giant plywood Christmas trees, you need to cut two isosceles triangles out of plywood. I might have had to Google how to spell isosceles, but I do know from high school that it’s a triangle with two equal sides and two equal angles. We used rough plywood, not finish-grade plywood, because no one is examining these trees up close. I…
14 Beautiful Christmas Ornaments
Hold your candy canes, folks, because today we are dipping our toes in the sweet inspirational bliss known as beautiful Christmas ornaments. I haven’t started decorating for Christmas yet, but I have Christmas ornaments on my mind. It’s an actual treat for my brain to think about Christmas ornaments instead of what to make for dinner (again), work deadlines, the driver’s license I need to renew, anything on the news…you get the point. I love making Christmas ornaments, and I always buy or make a Christmas ornament for my kids. The “it” gift of the season comes and goes, but those Christmas ornaments last forever…because Mom stores them in her…
