Thrifty Decorating: winter ideas

Showing posts with label winter ideas. Show all posts

January 21, 2012

Family Game Night. . . .

Winter is creeping upon us for real now.....the excitement of Christmas is over and the temperatures in the Northeast are finally cold enough to support snow instead of rain....

What that really means is that evenings can get very L-O-N-G.....and siblings

can start to argue.....wrestle.....annoy....and drive their parents CRAZY!!

I never like our default family activity to be watching t.v. or a movie, so I

thought that I'd share some of our favorite things to do on a cold night....

We love to grab some popcorn, hot chocolate and play games....here are some unique games that we have that go beyond Uno and Go-Fish!

Sleeping Queens

This game was designed by a 6 year old but even my almost teen-aged son loves it. The goal is to "awaken" the 12 queens who are worth a certain

amount of points...along the journey there are opportunities to steal queens and put them to sleep....a great game that lasts about 20 minutes and encompasses ALL ages!

Rat-A-Tat-Cat

This has been a family favorite for almost 7 years! Our dear friends in Wisconsin sent it to us and this game now goes on every family vacation with us! The goal is to get the lowest amount of points....the challenge is that you can't keep looking at the cards! Yep...for the mom of the family who answers a million questions during the game, it's a killer on your memory, but I figure that somehow it's strengthening my brain!

You can finish one round of this game in about 10 minutes.

Bananagrams

We purchased this game at Christmas and LOVE it! (except for the fact that my

husband kills us all because of his extensive vocabulary!)

Let me preface this with I HATE the game of Scrabble...there is something tedious and OCD about that game for me.....crooked letter tiles drive me crazy?!

In Bananagrams, each person builds their own board and you are racing against

all of the other players.....the game goes SO much faster than Scrabble!

All ages can play this one....you'll just have to supervise whether your new reader is actually making real words!

Here are some other games that we are in the process of learning.....

Ratuki

This game resembles Dutch Blitz.

Carcassonne

A little bit like Settler's of Catan

Dominion

Yeah..if you know how to play this, let us know...we're still deciphering the instruction manual!

I added the Amazon widget to my side bar that includes all these games...obviously, if you purchase from the widget I earn a percentage.

But truly, these are just games that were recommended to our family and have provided hours of laughing....some arguing....and a great basis for family time!

Happy gaming!

January 10, 2012

Winter Mantle. . .

After I took all the Christmas decorations down, my mantle was empty,bare....and just plain lonely...

I am always trying to save money....it's just my life....so I really

didn't want to spend anything for a winter mantle.

Yesterday, I showed you how I made these sweater vases from a $1.50 thrifted sweater.

Now, I had to decide what to put in them...I have seen glittery sticks and

other cool ideas, but, again, I didn't want to spend any money.

Here's a glimpse of how glamorous my life is.....as I went out on the porch to clean

up the MOUSE GUTS that our cat keeps dragging up for us, I saw our

grasses from the summer....they had turned a lovely soft brown!

I grabbed my kitchen shears, hacked some off some of the grasses and stuffed them
in the vases.....perfect! Then, I shopped the house....

My total cost.....$1.50 for the thrifted sweater!

January 8, 2012

Sweater Vases. . . .

I am working on putting together my winter mantle and I

just do NOT want to spend any money.....

I've seen these sweater vases and candles on Pinterest and

decided to try to make some myself.....

Our local Mennonite Relief store has 50% off on Friday evenings, so I

nabbed this cable-knit sweater for only $1.50!

The only problem was that it was sleeveless......I didn't realize that this was a

problem until I went home and checked out Pinterest and realized that

people were using the SLEEVE portion of the sweater....UGH!

Time for Plan B...

I decided that I could use the bottom ribbed portion of the sweater

and just hot glue it around my vases......close enough, right?

I wasn't quite sure what to do with the bottom so I just

trimmed the sweater along the very edge of the vase and let it go.

I did start running out of sweater by the end and just pieced

together the one candle, but as long as it is angled the right way,

you can't even tell!!

Tomorrow, I'll show you the rest of my mantle....

January 5, 2012

All Free Holiday Crafts

Are you familiar with All Free Holiday Crafts?

I wasn't until they contacted me about featuring my Rose Wreath....

While I was over at the site I found a bunch of other really fun ideas...

{16 Easy Art Ideas to Make a Snowman}

{Faux Snowballs}

{Foil Pie Pan Rose Topiary}

I feel incredibly honored to be featured there! There are SO many

more ideas over at All Free Holiday Crafts!

Be prepared to pin!

December 20, 2011

Hot Chocolate Bar

My husband has an amazing job and works with a wonderful staff of people....

I look forward to every December when staff and spouses gather together with Jason and Jenny.

Jenny is a true Southern gal and knows how to host an awesome party!

This year she outdid herself with a hot chocolate bar....

Her whole party had a sheet music theme...

Jenny had all types of fun mix-ins to add to the hot chocolate....

Look carefully at the labels for the mix-ins......they've all been switched!

And that's why they're youth pastors!

January 13, 2011

Coffee Filter Wreath

Does your door have the January blah's?? Maybe this wreath can help......

This is another one of my friend, Jenny's, crafts......

Materials:

Coffee Filters: bought from Weis.....not even tea-stained. Weis has that color available.
Styrofoam ring
ALOT of hot glue
10 very burned fingertips

Directions:
Fold your coffee filter in half and glue. Jenny started gluing at 12:00 and worked her way around the wreath clockwise.

She would fill-in a section from the bottom of the wreath until the top and then move to her right and work from bottom to top again. She said that it took about 900 filters....and that hers is possibly a little "too fluffy."

In person....it's absolutely gorgeous! Her husband, Jason's, nickname for it......the "A-wreath-a" Franklin wreath....you're so funny, Jason!

You can glue these filters on pretty much anything....styrofoam balls to make "puff" balls that you could hang from your window.....styrofoam tree forms to make "puffy" winter trees....lampshades....your child's head....be creative!!

January 6, 2011

Winter White Wreath

Over Christmas, I had the opportunity to "tour" my friend Jenny's house.....she

had done some amazing crafts.....her beaded initials are one of the

amazing projects that I can't wait to do next Christmas.

When I saw this wreath, I couldn't wait to make it for my front door after Christmas.

Materials:

wreath form

White yarn

Sprig of something wintery

Scrap of ribbon

hot glue

I wasn't able to find a foam wreath big enough for my front door, so I bought a

straw wreath....there are some drawbacks to using the straw......it's bumpy!

I think that my straw wreath was 18 inches and really, it could have been

bigger....Jenny's was on a mirror so it looks bigger than it really is....

Hot glue your starting piece of yarn and begin wrapping the yarn....and

wrapping....and wrapping....and wrapping.....

You can see the bumps in this picture.....a foam wreath would look a lot

smoother.....I also ended up doing 2 layers of the yarn so that it was completely covered....

Hot glue whatever embellishment you like to your wreath......I added a burlap

and fabric twisted flower like these on my homemade bulletin board.

I love the simple look of it.....now I just need to add a cool burlap

or ivory ribbon to hang it from....

January 5, 2011

Winter Mantle Reveal

I think that my winter mantel is done for now....at least until Valentine's Day!

As I was putting it together I remembered the pile of rocks sitting in my neighbor's driveway.....after a quick call asking permission, I went and grabbed 12 river rocks...

.....and I sprayed them silver and put them in my Williams and Sonoma knockoff vases! Reuse...reuse...reuse!!

I took a votive candle holder and a tea light and put it in my Epsom Salt
jars next to my silver stick ....

As I was putting away Christmas decorations, I found a roll of silver ribbon and literally scotch-taped it around tall pillar candles....

I had just enough ribbon leftover to tie a bow around my rock jar!

Okay....here's a confession....you know my big pillar candles wrapped in

ribbon....they were those Jesus candles you can buy at the grocery store.....I

just ripped the picture of Jesus off.....I think God forgives me because He

understands that I am saving money!!

Simple and glittery......exactly what I picture a winter mantle to be......

January 3, 2011

The Silver Stick

Once again.....I must confess....the is not my original idea....I saw it HERE at Domestically Speaking's Power of Paint party......(that's where my PB Knock-off Lanterns were featured...)

So go out to your backyard and grab a stick.....I got 2 little ones and tied them together because we have baby trees and the hubby would kill me if I chopped off a real branch.....

Grab a can of silver spraypaint and spray.......It was 50 degrees so I actually sprayed outside... (I know the can says don't spray unless it's like 55 degrees, but it's been 20 degrees....50 feels like 80!)

Grab your Epsom salt and Mod Podge and add a little "snow" to your branches.....

I can pretend we have snow since we've really had nothing but cold weather and tough mud this winter...

Sparkly gorgeous-ness....

Set the stick on your mantle and realize that something is still missing....

But breathe a sigh of relief because it looks so free of any Christmas clutter.....(how does what was beautiful on November 30th become clutter by December 27th???)

It was at this point that I remembered the piece of foam board that I bought to make glitter musical notes for Christmas and never got around to........ask the hubby (who is an amazing artist!) to draw what you are calling a "snowbird".....