Smoothies Anyone?

 My daughter told me about a smoothie recipe she found on Pinterest. It's very pink and oh so yummy!

The recipe is pretty simple:

1 cup Frozen Mixed Fruit

1 cup Light Vanilla Soy Milk (or 1 c milk + 1/4 tsp Vanilla)

Handful of Baby Spinach (this is optional - I didn't use it because I didn't have any spinach)

1 Tbls Ground Flax Seed

1/4 tsp Ground Cinnamon

The best part is the website where she got the recipe from (Budget Bytes) suggested making individual ziplock packets of the mixed fruit and having them on-hand in your freezer. This makes putting the smoothies together quick and easy. Enjoy!

Merry Christmas

Wishing you all a wonderful Christmas!

Hey Doll!

One last post on Christmas crafting before taking a break to celebrate Christmas with my family. These Matryoshka Doll ornaments are another result of taking Christy Tomlinson's 12 Artsy Ornaments of Christmas e-course. I got so many good ideas and inspiration from taking this course both this year and last year, that I highly recommend taking the course if she offers a third round next year.

I love the color combination of red and turquoise. It's a contemporary spin on the more traditional red and green Christmas color palette. I bought a bunch of gift bags, tissue and tags from Target in the red and turquoise theme, so it seems to be really big this year. So I decided to paint my Matryoshka Doll ornaments in these colors. Have you been able to guess what I used as the base for these little cuties?

It's a light bulb! What a great way to up-cycle your burned out bulbs! Maybe next year Christy will teach us how to make something out of those curly CFL light bulbs :)

Pom-Pom Wreath

I believe the pom-pom wreath trend all started with this wreath from Anthropologie. It sells for $298! Wow!

But leave it to crafters to figure out a way to make an alternative to the pricey Anthro pom-pom wreath. The one above was made by Linda at It All Started With Paint. She has a tutorial for making this one on her blog.

Jeanne Oliver has a large fluffy pom-pom wreath hanging from a curio cabinet in her home.

Jennifer O'Brien made one to adorn her front door.

And Jennifer Rizzo made this smaller version to hang on the back of her dining room chairs. She also has a tutorial on her blog, which is the one I followed when making my pom-pom wreath.

 I decided to leave my wreath plain, without any ribbon or bow adornment. 

 I just love the soft, creamy color of the pom-poms.

And the texture too! 

What have you been making for this holiday?

Paper Clay Ornaments

Another one of Christy Tomlinson's projects from her 12 Artsy Ornaments of Christmas e-course is making ornaments using clay. I remember doing this when I was a young girl, so making these brought back some wonderful memories.

There are all sorts of clays you can use. For these particular ornaments I used Paper Clay, which is in my opinion the easiest to work. Once I cut out the shapes using cookie cutters, I pressed words, images and textures into the ornaments using rubber stamps, paper lace doilies, and natural elements like evergreen needles.

After the ornaments air dry completely, I decided to add some color. I did a few test runs on some of the ornaments using different mediums and techniques before coming up the one I used here.

These were all colored with layers of Tim Holz Distress Inks applied with a sponge applicator. The sponge applicator is key because unlike a brush the sponge keeps the ink on the surface of the ornament and not in the stamped design sections.

Then to add more detailed color to the flowers, etc. I used a Q-Tip and the Distress Inks to those specific areas. I sprayed the ornaments with a light layer of sealer and once dried I brushed on some Mod Podge. The Distress Inks are water soluble which is why I sprayed the sealer before applying the Mod Podge.

And a few ornaments I just left plain without any color just because I like the way they looked that way.

White Christmas?

Well, the big blizzard that was predicted for the midwest, fortunately didn't make it to the Chicagoland area. We did get snow and lots of howling high winds (still going on as I write this) but a blizzard was a bit of an exaggeration, at least in my neck of the woods.

The temperature is supposed to stay below freezing, so the snow that is already on the ground may stick around until Christmas. I'm just hoping the sun will melt the snow off my driveway so I don't have to go out and shovel!

Coffee Filter Crafting

Recently I shared with you my polka-dotted coffee filter wreath I made to hang in my kitchen. (You can read about it here.) Well I continued on in my coffee filter crafting and created the natural wreath shown above using unbleached coffee filters this time. You can tea-stain white filters too if you can't find the unbleached ones. Tea-staining will create a lighter natural colored filter.

Well, I just couldn't stop there - I was on a coffee filter roll! In Christy Tomlinson's 12 Artsy Ornaments of Christmas e-course, one of the projects was to make a topiary tree using a styrofoam cone base and covering it with beautiful silk bridal flowers. I didn't have access to those flowers, so I improvised a little and used the natural coffee filters instead.

This natural tree actually goes much better with my home's decor anyway. Instead of putting the tree in a flower pot, as the class suggested, I simply placed it on a round gift box I had bought at my favorite go-to store, HomeGoods.

I felt the tree needed a tiny bit of sparkle, so I found this glittery gold star pick at JoAnn Fabrics and attached it to the top of the tree.

Paper Trees

There's still lots of crafting going on around here. I've hardly made a thing all year, but I seem to be making up for lost time during this past month. I found a tutorial for making these cute trees at Sweet Paul.

These stacked book page Christmas trees are one of those projects that can be done while watching television at night. I threaded/stacked the squares of book pages on a bamboo skewer that was attached to a discarded wine cork for the trunk. And then the cork was hot glued into a votive holder to create the tree stand.

As a final step I sprayed the entire tree with a light coat of spray glitter and then added a paper star at the top which I embellished with glitter glue. The round tree is made the same way but instead of cutting out squares from the book pages I cut out circles and crumpled them up a little before threading them on the skewer. If you want to make some trees for yourself, you can find the complete Sweet Paul tutorial here.

Christmas Shopping

Mary Gulbrantson (aka Urban Farmgirl) recently opened a new shop in Rockford, IL. Mary usually sells vintage furniture pieces at various markets around the area. But she wanted a place where she could sell the "smalls" she loves as well, so when the opportunity to rent this awesome store front presented itself, Mary jumped right in.

I simply had to make the trek out to visit this shop for myself. Urban Farmgirl has already had two sales and I've been to both of them! The merchandise is ever changing so the shop always stays fresh.

The interior of the shop is amazing to look at. You can see more photos of it on Mary's blog here.

While I was at Urban Farmgirl last week, they were putting together this "Merry Christmas" banner by using some cards they sell from a vintage child's game. So simple and yet such a great idea.

I bought some of the cards to create my own banner which says "Merry Everything" so I can keep it all all year long.

All you do is punch two tiny holes at the top of each card and string the cards on baker's twine and it's ready to hang. Easy-peasy!

Snow Globe Ornaments

These days I've been a busy elf creating ornaments and decorations in my "workshop." I was catching up on my friend Cerri's Blog the other day and came across some darling snow globe ornaments she made from a tutorial she found on Ashlee's Blog.

I have a thing for snow globes and cloches and just about anything you can put under glass. There is just something about these miniature scenes that has always fascinated me. So I couldn't resist making my own collection of these ornaments.

I used vintage elements and bottle brush trees that I've collected from flea markets and resale shops to create the ornaments.

Well, I think I hear Santa calling so I'd better get back to work!