Blog Of The Week ~ Transforming Home

So many wonderful bloggy friends stepped up and volunteered to be Blog Of The Week! I am glad to say that I have several in the line-up {yes, I will be using each and every one of you!}.

Today the spotlight is on Danielle at Transforming Home! And transform she does! You have to see what she did to this faux fireplace ~ just fantastic.

Danielle also tackles the practical. Check out this post she did about her recycling center. She knows her way around a drill and she's not afraid to use it!

How organized is this?! Check out what goes on in this area.

Don't you just love this pot rack! Love the garland Danielle added here.

Thank you, Danielle! I really enjoyed strolling through your blog and I know that others will, too!

Wreaths In Windows ~ Are You An Inny or An Outy?

Image from Country Living {I wish it were my house!}

I decided I wanted to try something a little different this year and put wreaths on my front facing windows. I just naturally assumed that they would hang on the outside of the windows, but after having some very heavy winds the past couple of days, I've been wondering if that is the best way to go.

I've never done this before, so I searched for pictures showing both and I'm wondering which you all prefer. Inside or outside?

Photo from Flickr

Photo from Country Living

Photo from Apartment Therapy


Photo from Apartment Therapy

Here is a great post by Apartment Therapy with some ideas of how to hang wreaths on your windows and in other areas of your home.

Do You Want To Be Blog Of The Week?

Every Monday I've been highlighting specific blogs as Blog Of The Week. I usually ask for bloggers to let me know if they'd be interested {you can email me}. The only thing I ask is that it be related to interior decorating in some way and that it not be text only posts.

Presently, I've got no one in the line-up and if you'd be interested in being Blog Of The Week, I'm putting the call out! If you are not familiar with this feature, you can read some of the past ones in my archive.

Edited to add: You're all so wonderful! Starting next week, I'll go in order down the comments and everyone who comments will be a Blog Of The Week!

Using Christmas Fillers & Picks

I like to pick up Christmas filler and picks {usually at the end of the season clearance sales}, but the dollar store makes it so easy to buy them now. I'm not always sure where I'm going to use them, but I like to have them on hand.

This piece below is all dollar store items. The holder it's in is the glass vase and candleholder I put together last week. The bells are sold in packages, with glitter and without; and there are four berry filler pieces. I wound up not using them on one of my mantels, so I put this together. The bells help hide the stems. This makes for a nice tall arrangement and I will probably use it on my dining room table Christmas Eve for the buffet I will have set up.

You might recall that my second trip to Goodwill netted me the finds below. The next two projects include the two pots you see sitting on top of my fab window panel find {that will become pillows}. The black and polka dot pot had cream/beige polka dots and I decided to keep the design ~ I just painted the polka dots white. The smaller pot was a peach/pink. Both were $.99 each.

Once the polka dots were white and dry, I took my floral foam and glued a piece inside.

I took this filler piece that already had the berries and a couple of pine cones on it, purchased at Michael's, and just stuck it in the foam.

A red ribbon, some reindeer moss, a few dollar store ornaments tucked in and Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown! A nice size table top piece.

Trying to incorporate some of the lime green color that is so popular this year, I found this craft paint at Michael's to be the closest to the color I was going for. I painted that little peach/pink pot, two coats plus a little bit of touch-up here and there. The existing paint was shiny and I sanded the pot before painting, but it still needed that little extra.

I had found these pick/filler pieces at Michael's and loved the pink color. When I saw them I thought they looked like they had a Christmas tree shape to them.

The other side appeared flat. So I put the two flat sides together and wired them together. This wire is great and so handy to have around. It even cuts with scissors. I've used it on numerous occassions for many different projects.

Added some foam {that I had to shave off bits to fit in this little pot} and stuck in the piece that I wired together.

Stuffed in some reindeer moss and added a ribbon around the edge. A perfect size topiary piece that will fit in just about anywhere you need a little decoration!




Okay, back to decorating. I've got Holiday house parties I'll be linking up to soon!

Linking this post up to DIY Day at A Soft Place To Land.

PaperAddict.com Giveaway Winner

I don't want to keep everyone waiting so . . .

The winner of the PaperAddict.com Giveaway is #14 {via random.org}.

Carla of Cosmogirl's Emporium!

Congratulations Carla!

Please email me with your email address.

A big thank you to Marisa of PaperAddict.com for so generously offering this giveaway!

Look What Started Today . . .

. . . besides my Christmas decorating! Another phase in the living room refresher.

I'm so excited and it will be ready for Christmas!

Stay tuned!

A Medley Of Christmas Decor Projects

I have a slew of different projects I've been working on. I'm hoping to share them with you in upcoming posts because I think these would be great decorations for yourself or to give as gifts. Just about everything is inexpensive and some use things you may already have around the house. So let's get started.

My hubby was making something and had some scrap wood. Because he's quick to either a) burn them in the fireplace or b) put them out for the trash pick-up, I left him a note that I wanted them. As soon as I saw them I knew they would be perfect for these projects.

This first one was based on a blog post I read {I'm sorry I don't remember who it was, but it was one of those that I found clicking through two other blogs} and I believe I've got the word "Noel" covered with this project. I used a scrap piece of wood, wrapping paper that I had and I printed out the letters N, O, E, L. I had printed out the letters before I found I had this wrapping paper! I like when things like that happen.

I painted the wood with my red craft paint, but not the whole piece since I knew that most of it would be covered with the wrapping paper. While this was thick wrapping paper from Current, it was a bit tricky to work with when using the Mod Podge. I'm wondering if it would be easier to cut it into two pieces and just piece it together on the wood.

I waited for the Mod Podged wrapping paper to dry then I placed my letters in a haphazard fashion {that's whimsical, in case you were wondering}. When the letters dried, THEN I did a coat of Mod Podge over the top of the whole thing. I added some "Noel" ribbon along all the edges. I'm glad that I have 3 more pieces of wood this size to work with because adding the "Noel" ribbon I think was a bit of overkill. I liked it better without the ribbon.

Then there were these square plaque-like scraps of wood. I painted them red too. {Might as well, I had the sponge brush in use already}. I got this snowman graphic from my sister. I just Mod Podged the snowman on {trying the matte Mod Podge this time}. I added a line from the cartoon Frosty the Snowman and a snowman ribbon I found at Michael's. The quote says "For when the first snow is also a Christmas snow . . . Well, something wonderful is bound to happen".

Because I am a brazen hussy and never afraid to ask, if you don't have wood scraps and are close to a Home Depot, Lowes or lumbar yard, I would go ask for the scraps they are most likely going to throw away. In the same vein, I would also go to a paint/wallpaper store to see if you can get any of the wallpaper books they are throwing away. They may not be Christmasy papers, but they could make a great background for your Christmas and holiday images.

Next using Christmas picks and filler!

The PaperAddict.com giveaway ends tonight at midnight! Be sure to enter for your chance to win a $35.00 gift certificate.

5 Things You Didn't Know About . . . .

Welcome to my regular Wednesday feature. We're traveling to Arizona for this week's edition of 5 Things You Didn't Know About . . . .




That's right! We're visiting with Karen from My Desert Cottage!



Favorite music at the moment: Colbie Caillet, Toby Lightman, Rob Thomas. I used to be a HUGE 80's hair metal girl...but Adult contemporary is more my speed now.

If you didn't live where you do, where would you live: My husband and I visited Tennessee a couple of years ago and fell in love with it. The area we were looking at has fairly mild winters, not to humid summers and lots of trees and water. The perfect place for me!!!!

Favorite cocktail: Strawberry Margaritas

Best advice you ever received: Don't let fear hold you back from doing something that you love or that is important to you. (Although I don't follow that advice as much as I would like to)

Person you most admire: Anyone who works hard to make their dreams come true.


Thank you, Karen!


Next Wednesday we visit with another blogger to find out 5 Things You Didn't Know About . . . .!




Don't forget ~ the current giveaway to PaperAddict.com ends Friday!

Covering Christmas Cones

I decided to start covering my cones and so I got some things together. Some very high-tech tools here ~ glue gun and glue sticks, scrap card stock, scrapbook papers, ribbons, scissors, coffee filters and two different size flashlights.



All kinds of trims from my stash.



And a paper plate, which I used to get the proper size from the scrapbook paper, that would wrap around the cone.



Coffee filters become trim and those circle ruffley things. I've seen them on other people's projects. I love them, but I don't know what they are called, and I don't think I've seen them to purchase at Michael's. So ~ I made my own. I've taken to calling them a "medallion". For the "medallion" portion I just kept scrunching the filter holding it from the back and working it into a smaller circle. I glued it a little bit just so it wouldn't straighten itself out.



I used a graphic from The Graphics Fairy. Using the larger of the flashlights, I traced a circle on the card stock and used the smaller flashlight to trace out the image. I glued the image to the cardstock and then glued that to the filter "medallion".

The top part is also a filter. I just put it on top and pushed it inside the cone to where I wanted the "ruffle" to fall. I then glued underneath the outside to secure it. I didn't cut it yet, but you could then cut the inside of the cone where the filter is and either glue it down so it hides that portion of your unfinished cone or cut it out altogether depending on what you put inside.

Here's another using some trims:

This one is scrapbook paper and trim used at the top and bottom, and ribbon as a hanger. I just stuck an ornament in each one for the pictures.

I tea-dyed two coffee filters and I'm going to try using them next. Still have several of these to go!

Don't forget to enter our current giveaway from PaperAddict.com! Ends Friday!

Brag Monday With The Graphics Fairy

As soon as I saw this great looking label that Karen from The Graphics Fairy was offering up, I immediately got a couple of ideas for using it.






I reserved one of the glass holders I made using dollar store items and put some of the scrap pieces of ribbon I have in it. I cut out the above label design and put it on a piece of card stock for stability, punched two holes in it and used some ribbon to make it a tag. I was originally going to Mod Podge the label on the glass, but thought if I wanted to use it for something else I could still do that this way.

Nothing special, but I think if I get a glass canister to make a permanent home for these scraps of ribbon, I will attach the label right to it.

Linking this up to Brag Monday over at The Graphics Fairy.