Miscellaneous Christmas Decor

It has been a lot of fun getting ready for Christmas.
I love decorating for Christmas, and living on a student budget I have had to become extra creative to try to make it festive and fun.
Here are a few ways that you can decorate for Christmas on a tight budget:

The Tree:
We bought our tree off of Kijiji last year. It was only a few years old and from Costco. We paid a quarter of the price of a "new" tree.

The Ornaments:
I found these wooden words at Dollorama last Christmas and stocked up. My daughter (2 years old) helped me paint them red. The other ornaments are homemade as well, or I found in the clearance section at Michaels at the end of the season in a previous year.

The Porch Tree:

I had really wanted a tree for our porch, but just couldn't swallow paying $80 plus that a lot of places are asking. I had an idea and it worked out pretty well......I just bought the cheapest tree I could find (it's a 3.5 ft Walmart tree--$15), a strand of outdoor lights from Walmart ($8), a square pot ($10) to place it in and then just used decorations and ribbon that I had from previous years. It ended up being under $40 for the tree! I am wanting to add another one next year, but thought one this year was a good start!

The forest shutters and garland: I found these shutters at Homesense last January. The markdown stickers were about 2 inches thick on the back as they had been marked down so many times! They were originally $30 each, and I got them for $0.70 each! I saved them all year and was excited to use them!

The garland is just Walmart garland that I also bought in January at the end of the season when it was dirt cheap. I just doubled it up to add fullness and then added some berries that I already had and some of the dollar store wooden words. Total cost.....about $5.

I think that's really the secret.......buy things in January or at the end of the season, then just hold on to them for the year (that is the hard part, though). You will find some great deals this way!

Stockings

I have been working away trying to get our stockings ready, and am glad to say they are done and hanging!
I wanted something quite countryish and had a hard time finding anything like that. My mother-in-law gave a pattern from Under the Garden Moon to my sister-in-law, and it looked just like what I was thinkning, so I used that as a basic guide, added some of my own ideas, and with the help of Tess and Trina came up with these:

I think they turned out pretty cute, and because of the country look they complemented my imperfect sewing and embroidering skills! I wanted to have our names on them somewhere, and I think it turned out well to just embroider them at the bottom of the sock.

I made a matching tree skirt out of the same background fabric as the stockings and just added some roping I found in the clearance section at Wal-Mart. It's simple, with just the roping and some pleats, but looks much better than the fabric I had pooled around as a makeshift skirt for the past couple of years.

It has been really fun to get ready for Christmas this year and to try to make some things for our little family.

More Wedding Details.....Flower Pins

Now, don't mind the poor photography, but you will get the idea.

For the wedding our sister wanted all the girls in plum sweaters with pencil skirts. Seeing as flowers are such a cheap, fun and easy way to spice things up a bit, we decided to make a flower pin for each of the girls.
We took different shades of purple fabric, as well as a few different types of material (satin, taffeta, and netting) and cut out various sizes of circles. We then melted the edges of each circle with a lighter, placed the circles ontop of each other in layers and stuck a brad through to connect them all.
After this we just used some Aleene's Jewel-It embellishing glue (found at Michaels) and attached pearls (from neclaces at Dollorama). Allow glue to dry then place a few safety pins on the back to attach to sweater! Voila! They turned out cute and added that needed little touch of colour and texture!
*A good tutorial is found on the blog "Make It & Love It".

Stockings & Tree Skirts

Now that Halloween is over (yes, it has been one day), it is time to start thinking Christmas!

I really want to make some stockings and a tree skirt this year. Here are a few ideas I have come across on Etsy:

Plus:

Free Amy Butler patterns! So cute!

http://www.amybutlerdesign.com/pdfs/Tree_Skirt.pdf

http://www.amybutlerdesign.com/pdfs/Felt_Stocking.pdf

What are you dreaming up for the Christmas season this year?

A few more details from Sarah & Logan's wedding.....


The Cake: My cousin Christy was the mastermind and creator of the cake. I will have to post a picture the real photographer took, but this was the best I got, sadly.

Christy has been the one to make cakes for all our weddings, and she does such a good job.





Tess's cake by Christy.....

My cake by Christy.....

Next:

This floor decal was an idea I borrowed from my friend Jen C's sister's wedding. We had a lady in Taber (who owns a Cricut Expression) make it for us. She had to piece it together, but did such a great job that you would never be able to tell.

It turned out really fun and added a little personalized touch to the dance floor.

Family History Memory Keeping

I got to be a part of a Relief Society evening on Family History work. Here are some ideas for Family History Memory keeping. Enjoy!

https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B6ZRJ--P7lB5ZjgyNzk4OTAtZmRjYy00ZDA1LTk5NzctZmE0OWQ3MmUxMjQx&hl=en&authkey=COSc68MG

Love is Sweet

At my sister's recent wedding, we opted for a little spin on the ever-popular candy favour table. My mom, being the crazy and determined woman that she is, decided to make 450 carmel wrapped and chocolate dipped pretzel rods. Mmmmmmm. They were so good! We helped her wrap the rods with the homemade caramel, but she did all the dipping, and my dad even got in on the packaging. Good work, team!
We found the acrylic cannisters at Winners for $12.99. They are now being used as cookie jars and or flour containers at our various homes.
Tess was the mastermind behind the "Love Is Sweet" sign. She created it using Photoshop and then had it printed at Costco for under $2. The frame is Ikea.
Along with the pretzel rods, we had Wildberry Twizzlers cut in half as another option for those who weren't chocolate lovers. Both the licorice and the pretzel rods were a big hit.

Recipe for Mom's Caramel:
2 cups brown sugar
1 cup Eagle Brand Milk
1 cup Lily White corn syrup
1/2 lb. butter/margarine
Stir in sugar, syrup, Eagle Brand milk together before putting on stovetop. Then add butter. Have burner set on high heat. With wooder spoon stir continually. Turn heat down to medium, but make sure you stir all the time. With thermometer boil just to softball stage. To test for softball stage, have some cold water in a cup and pour a spoonful of the carmel in the water. When a softball forms, the candy is done.
Pour into buttered pan and let set up.

To make the pretzel rods cut the cooled caramel into approximately 1/2 " by 4" rectangles. Wrap around the pretzel rod and store until ready to dip with chocolate. You can drizzle with white chocolate after as well for a nice finished look, or roll in nuts or sprinkles.