Winter Wreath

First, thank you SO much for all your super-sweet comments after my last post -- it was such a nice welcome back! :)

So waaaaay back before Christmas even, I made a winter wreath for our front door.  And although I wish I didn't have to have a winter wreath up in January in February, we do live in Minnesota, and it is definitely still winter here.  Brrrrr!  Not to mention, we've had more snow this year than I've ever experienced in my whole life -- so yes, the winter wreath will be staying up for a few more months. 

This wreath is SO fun, and SO easy (and cheap) -- you know, my favorite things!

First, I found this wreath at Goodwill for only $.99.  I liked the twisted viney branches for my base -- and just took off the "Christmasy" decorations on the front.  I decided to paint it white for a bit of winter elegance. 

I gave it a few coats of white spray paint  -- oh yes, this was definitely painted quite some time ago -- with our below zero temperatures there is just no spray painting right now :(  

The next thing I did was spray paint some big pine cones. First I primed them so the paint would stay on through the cooold, coooold, months.  I chose a metallic blue for these pinecones -- another fun wintery color. :)

Soooo shimmery!  I love it -- the color just screams winter, right!?!

Next I glued three pine cones onto the front of the wreath with some trusty Gorilla Glue.

Finally, I found a pretty brown ribbon in my stash and tied it onto the front to hang it on the door:

I hung it on the door -- and viola!

I was pleasantly surprised at how easy and cute this wreath was!  I think it turned out pretty glammy from where it started, don't you think?

And the absolute BEST part was that I only spent $.99 on the actual wreath!  (Although I did splurge on the blue paint which was $3.29 -- still okay though, right!?!)

 

Linking up to:

Mondays:Between Naps on the Porch ; C.R.A.F.T; Craft-O-Maniac; Keeping it Simple; Mad in Crafts; Making the World Cuter; The DIY Showoff; The Girl Creative Tuesdays:  All Thingz Related; House of Grace; I'm Topsy Turvy; Lucky Star Lane; Sugar Bee Craft Edition; The CSI Project; These Creative Juices; Today's Creative Blog Wednesdays:  Blue Cricket Design; Creations by Kara; Debbiedoos; Domestically Speaking; My Backyard Eden; Night Owl Crafting; Seven Thirty Three; Someday Crafts; The Thrifty Home; Trendy Treehouse Thursdays: Beyond the Picket Fence; Craftastical!; Fireflies & Jellybeans; House of Hepworths; Life as Lori; Somewhat Simple; The Shabby Chic Cottage Fridays:  Chic on a Shoestring; Finding Fabulous; Fingerprints on the Fridge; Frou Frou Decor; Frugal & Fabulous Design; It's a Hodge Podge Life; It's Fun to Craft!: Just a Girl; Remodelaholic; Simply Designing; The Shabby Nest; Tatertots & Jello Weekend:  A  Little Lovely; Be Different Act Normal; Funky Junk Interiors; House of Thrifty Decor; I Heart Naptime; Kuzak's Closet; Under the Table & Dreaming

Fall & Thanksgiving Projects

Today I wanted to share with you all the fun Fall and Thanksgiving projects I shared with you this season.......and to tell you that TOMORROW I want to see all of your Fall Projects too!  And the best part is, there will be an awesome giveaway for tomorrow too; to celebrate your awesome projects!


So with that said, let me recap on what I whipped up this season:

 Fall Raffia Wreath

Floral Wire Pumpkins and Nautical Rope Pumpkin

 Fall Leaf Topiary

Raffia Vase with Fall Flowers

Thanksgiving Mod Podge Boxes

Thanksgiving Napkins with Silhouette's Heat Transfer Sheets

Be sure to stop by tomorrow to share your Fall and Thanksgiving projects and a chance to win our fantastic giveaway!! :)

 

Heat Transfer Pillows

Today is the last day to enter the awesome giveaway from Silhouette -- and to celebrate I'm going to be showing you one last project I did with their fantastic product.  

I've been wanting some Christmas-y (yes....Christmas....I know kind of early, but I couldn't help myself!) pillows for out on our bench in the entry way.  Usually, I have these pillows there:

But I LOVE decorating the house for the different seasons and some pillows seemed like they were just the thing to add to our entryway. 

I had some pillows left over from our last house that weren't really being used, so I decided to use them as my Christmas pillows.  I found a remnant piece of fabric at Joanne's for $2.50-ish.  It was a lovely grey piece of fabric and it had enough for my two pillows I was recovering. And then I this packet of red buttons at an Antique store I visited this weekend for $2.00.  That means these two pillows only cost me $4.50 -- I'll take it!!

I took my heat transfer material from Silhouette and cut out some white, bare, branches.  I decided it was WAY too much work to trace out some branches I found and then cut around everything; so I ended up drawing out my own branches and cutting them with my scissors.  They were supposed to look kind of like these branches I found online:

After my pillows were sewed together; I ironed the heat transfer on.  (You can see my exact instructions for ironing the heat transfer on here).  

Once the branches were on the pillows, it was time to put the buttons on.

I know I probably should have sewed these buttons on  -- but that's really a LOT of sewing, so I decided to glue them on.  I placed them all out on the fabric first; then I went to town gluing those little buttons down.

Then I put the pillows back into the cases and sewed the bottom edge.  

And now my entry is kind of ready for Christmas!  Don't worry -- I'll put these away until I get all the Christmas decor out. :)

Don't forget -- you can still enter the Silhouette Product giveaway here -- or you can order your own products with the special code just for Hand Me Down House readers until 11/13/2010:  MEDOWN

 

Linking up to:

Mondays:Between Naps on the Porch ; C.R.A.F.T; Craft-O-Maniac; Keeping it Simple; Mad in Crafts; Making the World Cuter; The DIY Showoff; The Girl Creative Tuesdays:  All Thingz Related; House of Grace; I'm Topsy Turvy; Lucky Star Lane; Sugar Bee Craft Edition; The CSI Project; These Creative Juices; Today's Creative Blog Wednesdays:  Blue Cricket Design; Creations by Kara; Debbiedoos; Domestically Speaking; My Backyard Eden; Night Owl Crafting; Seven Thirty Three; Someday Crafts; The Thrifty Home; Trendy Treehouse Thursdays: Beyond the Picket Fence; Craftastical!; Fireflies & Jellybeans; House of Hepworths; Life as Lori; Somewhat Simple; The Shabby Chic Cottage Fridays:  Chic on a Shoestring; Finding Fabulous; Fingerprints on the Fridge; Frou Frou Decor; Frugal & Fabulous Design; It's a Hodge Podge Life; It's Fun to Craft!: Just a Girl; Remodelaholic; Simply Designing; The Shabby Nest; Tatertots & Jello Weekend:  A  Little Lovely; Be Different Act Normal; Funky Junk Interiors; House of Thrifty Decor; I Heart Naptime; Kuzak's Closet; Under the Table & Dreaming

Silhouette Heat Transfer Napkins

So I've been just dying to use my new Silhouette products -- and I was SO excited that I couldn't decide what to use first!  :)  I finally settled on trying out their White Heat Transfer Material.   

I've been busy decking our house out in fall and Thanksgiving decor and I figured there couldn't be a better use of my new goodies from Silhouette than to use them for just that.   And at the top of my list was some cute cloth napkins.

I found these napkins at Kohl's last weekend while they were having a sale:

I decided I wanted to have a white silhouette of a birdie on my napkins -- even though I'm not a lover of real birds -- I still like the non-threatening-so-far-from-real-bird silhouettes. :)

I found this one somewhere online:

I printed out my bird silhouette on regular paper and cut it out.  Then I traced the shape of the bird onto my Smooth Heat Transfer Material from Silhouette.

Once I had it traced out I grabbed my scissors and cut out my silhouette that was on the heat transfer material.

Ooh -- it's SO close to getting on my napkins! :)  I peeled the clear plastic backing off of the heat transfer material and placed the back of the heat transfer onto my napkins.

Then I put a dishtowel over the top and ironed it on for 45 seconds on the cotton setting.  

Believe me -- this kind of ironing is actually fun. :)

That's it -- I repeated this for all my napkins -- and I was done!  

What do you think?

Don't worry -- we don't actually eat like this -- but it's fun to see in case we did!  And I'm sure the utensils and dishes aren't in their "proper" place either :)

Isn't this stuff just awesome??  And the best part is  you can win your own here!

And don't forget if you want to buy your own or buy different colors of the heat transfer material;  Silhouette has an awesome promotion just for The Hand Me Down House readers until November 13th:

**Silhouette is also offering 25% off on all their accessories with the code: MEDOWN

Linking up to:

Mondays:Between Naps on the Porch ; C.R.A.F.T; Craft-O-Maniac; Keeping it Simple; Mad in Crafts; Making the World Cuter; The DIY Showoff; The Girl Creative Tuesdays:  All Things Related; House of Grace; I'm Topsy Turvy; Lucky Star Lane; Sugar Bee Craft Edition; The CSI Project; These Creative Juices; Today's Creative Blog Wednesdays:  Blue Cricket Design; Creations by Kara; Debbiedoos; Domestically Speaking; My Backyard Eden; Night Owl Crafting; Seven Thirty Three; Someday Crafts; The Thrifty Home; Trendy Treehouse Thursdays: Beyond the Picket Fence; Craftastical!; Fireflies & Jellybeans; House of Hepworths; Life as Lori; Somewhat Simple; The Shabby Chic Cottage Fridays:  Chic on a Shoestring; Finding Fabulous; Fingerprints on the Fridge; Frou Frou Decor; Frugal & Fabulous Design; It's a Hodge Podge Life; It's Fun to Craft!: Just a Girl; Remodelaholic; Simply Designing; The Shabby Nest; Tatertots & Jello Weekend:  A  Little Lovely; Be Different Act Normal; Funky Junk Interiors; House of Thrifty Decor; I Heart Naptime; Kuzak's Closet; Under the Table & Dreaming

Thanksgiving Nested Boxes

While we were on vacation I got to visit lots of cute, unique little stores filled with lots of Thanksgiving and Christmas decorations -- yes, Christmas.   And while I was so inspired by seeing all the beautiful decor for Christmas; Thanksgiving does come first -- so I focused my boutique-shopping-inspiration on a cute little Thanksigivng project.  I was SO happy with how it turned out I just HAD to share with you guys!

Here's a list of the materials you'll need to get started:

Nested Paper Mache box set:  $3.65 (at Joanne's with a 50% off coupon)
Scrapbook Paper in Fall Colors and Patterns:  $1.20
Metal Book Plates:  $1.95
Mod Podge of your choosing
Paint Brush

Each box will get three different types of paper:  one for the top of the lid, one pattern for the side of the lid and one pattern for around the box.

Knowing that, you'll need to measure each box lid, lid side and side of base and cut your paper to those measured sizes.

Once you have everything cut paint some Mod Podge on the lid top and lay your paper on top of it.  Then go ahead and paint the Mod Podge over the paper.  Then let it dry while you Mod Podge the side of the base.

I found it was easiest to do the lid side last -- but I think you could do the paper adhering in any order.

Once the paper is on and dry, it's time to add the book plates with the Thanksgiving words of your choosing. :)  I could only find silver book plates, but I just didn't like the look of them on my boxes -- I needed them to stand out a lot more.

So of course I spray painted them -- the solution to everything, right?!  I also had to bend them slightly so they matched the curve of the box.

Once the book plates were ready I attached them with some brads and inserted my printed words.

The boxes are done!  Now stack them up....

 and maybe add some ribbon to the top.

With Thanksgiving around the corner I think these cute little boxes are just the decorations I needed!

 

Linking up to:

Mondays:Between Naps on the Porch ; C.R.A.F.T; Craft-O-Maniac; Keeping it Simple; Mad in Crafts; Making the World Cuter; The DIY Showoff; The Girl Creative Tuesdays:  All Thingz Related; House of Grace; I'm Topsy Turvy; Lucky Star Lane; Sugar Bee Craft Edition; The CSI Project; These Creative Juices; Today's Creative Blog Wednesdays:  Blue Cricket Design; Creations by Kara; Debbiedoos; Domestically Speaking; My Backyard Eden; Night Owl Crafting; Seven Thirty Three; Someday Crafts; The Thrifty Home; Trendy Treehouse Thursdays: Beyond the Picket Fence; Craftastical!; Fireflies & Jellybeans; House of Hepworths; Life as Lori; Somewhat Simple; The Shabby Chic Cottage Fridays:  Chic on a Shoestring; Finding Fabulous; Fingerprints on the Fridge; Frou Frou Decor; Frugal & Fabulous Design; It's a Hodge Podge Life; It's Fun to Craft!: Just a Girl; Remodelaholic; Simply Designing; The Shabby Nest; Tatertots & Jello Weekend:  A  Little Lovely; Be Different Act Normal; Funky Junk Interiors; House of Thrifty Decor; I Heart Naptime; Kuzak's Closet; Under the Table & Dreaming