Valentine's Day Argyle Heart Wreath

Some days I'm okay with imperfect. Not frequently, but it does happen. Especially if I'm not making it to sell or for a gift!

Today my friend texted me a picture of a cute wreath she pinned on Pinterest. I laughed because I had also posted a similar pin! I got home from work, had some free time before my volleyball game, and decided I was going to see if I could replicate it. I only had to run to the store for one missing supply, everything else I had on hand! Fortunately, I already had a smaller grey wreath that I needed to upcycle. I removed the previous decorations very carefully, cute some cute pink and red hearts-no template, just free-handed, hence the imperfections ;), and got to work hot gluing them to the wreath! I then wrapped some sparkly white yarn I had leftover from a Christmas wreath to create the argyle look. Overall, since the wreath was already wrapped, I think it only took me about a half hour and my only cost was the pink felt I had to run to the store to pick up. 

Not bad for under $1!

And here it is on my front door.

Valentine's Day Garland

The bestie asked me to join her to run errands today. I've limited my budget for the month of January, so when she asked me to join her at Michael's and Hobby Lobby, I knew I was pushing my luck ;)

I saw this adorable garland at Michael's made out of scraps of ribbon, felt, and fabric. I immediately fell in love with it! It was $14.99, and I could've used a 40% off coupon, but I decided against it. We then traveled to Hobby Lobby and I found the cutest wired, checkered burlap ribbon. It was 50% off, so I paid $5 and some change for it. 

I got home and found plenty of materials to make my garland. Here it is!

Not bad for $5 and some change!

(and time...quite some time, actually)

A little closer look at the pieces I used.

Decorating for January.

Happy New Year! 

I'm excited for what this year may hold, 

and I'm excited to continue sharing more and more with you all. 

So remember how I said I was going to come up with some decorations for January that I love? Well, I did! But first, I had some sad news. The shelf I hung back in the fall to make up for my "lack of mantel" was terrible. The wall it hung on in my ever so humble place of living was too bowed for the shelf, so it was learning forward to the point that nothing would stay on it! I literally had to sticky tack my Christmas decorations to it. I decided that was too much of a hassle because I also couldn't put any thing with significant weight on it. I decided to take the shelf down (sniff sniff), and just leave the table I brought in for Christmas decorating in the room.

I covered the wall then with two upcycled canvases covered with a pretty, grey damask fabric I found. They conveniently covered all the holes in the wall that the shelf left ;)

I scored those white candleholders at Target in their after-Christmas clearance for 50% off. (I'd been eying them all season!) I also scored the gold and snow-covered branches in Michael's 70% off Christmas clearance. The cute printable in the middle was part of a set I downloaded from here. It says "It's a good day to have a good day." A good reminder for those of us in the cold Midwest!

As you'll notice in the second picture, those white candles had to go. I replaced then with cuter, silver pillar candles. I just didn't like the white ones. 

Enjoy!

After-Christmas Decorations

Who likes what their house looks like after they take all the Christmas decorations down? 

No one. 

(Okay, except maybe my one friend who considers her Christmas decorations "clutter" and takes them down as soon as possible.)

But not me! I'm determined to work on some decorations that I love to have up for the month of January! So look for something soon...I'm working on it, and here are some of the elements below. 

Gift Card Packaging

Looking for a cute, inexpensive, and easy way to wrap up some Christmas gift cards? I took each gift card, placed it in a clear plastic treat bag, added some Hershey's Kisses, and sealed them up with some ribbon and a jingle bell!

Happy Holidays!

Craft Show Fun

Today my sister and I setup for a show at a local retirement village. It was the first year they offered the "marketplace" to their residences, so traffic was pretty slow. It was still fun to hang out with my sister for the day and meet some new people!

A Little Mantel Love

Today I went over to my sister's house for lunch and ended up helping her decorate her mantel for Christmas. I do have a little mantel-envy due to my lack of mantel (I know, I whine about that a lot...I'm sorry).

All of the glassware she had somewhere around the house, and we filled them with ornaments and some silver and white filler from Michael's. The cute little "let it snow" sign in the middle was in the $1 bin! Her super cute skate stockings were a gift from her sister-in-law from Canada. 

The best news about this mantel? All she has to do is take down the stockings, and it can stick around until Valentine's Day!