2014 Christmas Home Tour

Welcome! I finally got around to photographing my home so I could get a Christmas home tour up. I've been so busy since school started that I haven't been able to blog as much as I would like. Anyway, I finally had a spare moment to take pics, and I did want to document what I did this year, so let's start the tour!

Do you see that cute pillow??? Yep, that's the one I've been waiting on! I ordered it way back on November 30th, and after waiting over a week, I contacted them and apparently it was "lost in the mail." So, they sent another one and it DID arrive this morning (as I mentioned in my last post)...but it was the WRONG one!!! Then, my mailman delivered a second round of mail to my house just a few minutes ago and it must be a Christmas miracle, because this time it was the right one! Not sure what was going on with it, but I'm just glad to finally receive it. :) 

And just because I love it so much, here are a couple more pics...

I adore it! Cutest pillow ever!!! And well worth the wait. ;) 

Okay, here are a ton of pics and I hope you enjoy it. :) First up is the foyer.

This is the dining room tree. I had to remove the tree skirt because a certain feline would NOT leave it alone. Lol! She was captivated by it and would drag it all over the house. :) If you look closely in the pic below, you can see her.

Little wreaths (they're actually candle rings) on the backs of the chairs. 

A wider view of the dining room. 

Now we're in the living room. Love that snowman and his skinny legs. :)

Still loving my cable knit pillows. 

Now on to the kitchen...

I love my gingerbread/peppermint tree in here.

I think I mentioned this last year too, but I felt so lucky to find ribbon that had gingerbread men AND peppermints on it!

Even the pantry door got a little Christmas cheer. 

Did you notice the Norman Rockwell ornament on the lamp above? Do any of you remember those? I got it at JC Penney in 1996 on black Friday. They were giving them away and it's always been one of my favorite ornaments. 

Here's a closer look at the front...

And the back...

Now for the master bedroom.

I did a blue, white, and silver tree to match the decor in there. 

The rest are just some random pics from around the house...

Love the red car cookie jar below!

These birds look like they're planning their annual holiday party. :)

Below is the top of the armoire in the living room.

And of course the hot cocoa station... 

So, you may have noticed a certain theme I had going on this year...

And that's it! Hope you enjoyed the tour! Wishing everyone a safe and happy holiday season!

~Lisa

Musings

Just a few thoughts for today. First of all, my Christmas pillow arrived at my local post office today, so it SHOULD be delivered tomorrow, at which point I'll snap a quick pic to add to my Christmas Home Tour post and get that published quick as a flash. 

I've been waiting on that pillow since November 30th. It's so cute though, that I know it'll be worth the wait. :)

I had jury duty earlier this week. Ugh. Not my idea of fun. SO glad that's over!

I can't believe how pretty my knock out roses are right now! Everything around them is going dormant, but they're still blooming strong. :)

Oh Holly...you find the weirdest sleeping positions. :)

Last night a friend tagged me on Instagram for #widn (what I'm doing now) It's just where you're supposed to post a pic of what you're doing at that moment. Well...I just happened to be listening to the 90's channel while "Mmmbop" by Hanson was playing! So embarrassing, but it WAS what I was doing when I got the tag. :) So, I posted this pic...

And that song has been stuck in my head ever since. My hubby and I play this game where we listen to the music channels on tv (mostly the 70's, 80's, and 90's music ones) and we try to see who can name the artist/song first. He wins Every. Single. Time. I have no idea who sings anything, unless it's J.T. or Michael Jackson. ;) I still remember the day I got my "Thriller" album. Happy times. :)

Do y'all love Lofthouse cookies as much as me? Oh my goodness...they're SO good! I've never met a softer, yummier tasting cookie in my life. :) I've seen recipes for them online, but I've never made them.

Well, HOPEFULLY I'll be back tomorrow posting my Christmas Home Tour. Gosh, now that I've talked up that pillow so much, I hope y'all aren't disappointed. Ha ha!

~Lisa

A New Keurig, The Freedom Clip, and Other Ramblings

Hello! I know I said I'd be posting my Christmas Home Tour pretty soon, but I'm STILL waiting on a cute pillow cover I ordered. It's adorable and really is one of my favorite things this year, so I'm going to try and give it a few more days to arrive. If it doesn't come soon, I'll just post the tour without it and give you an updated pic when it finally arrives. It's already been lost in the mail once, and they've re-ordered it, so let's hope that doesn't happen again. :)

So, in other happenings, we finally decided to hop on the Keurig bandwagon...

(And let me just say right now that I'm not getting paid to say any of this and this is NOT a sponsored post or anything like that. I'm just sharing my research and passing on information that I found helpful) 

Okay, so I wanted one for awhile, but had been putting it off for a couple of reasons. 1. the k-cups seemed kind of expensive (especially with 4 of us using them) And 2. the k-cups weren't bio-degradable and I feel like our landfills are already bursting at the seems. :)

Then when I started researching them, I discovered that they're only selling the new Keurig 2.0 now. It came out a couple of months ago and the main difference is that it will ONLY brew "authorized Keurig k-cups" and NOT any other (cheaper) brand. The new k-cups are printed with a special ink on the lid that the machine recognizes and won't brew anything else. Well, that doesn't sound very nice of them. 

At first I thought we'd just buy on older model that would still brew the off-brand cups, but good luck finding one. There aren't any older models on the shelves. At least around here. Seriously, it's like they've been pulled from the shelves or something. I couldn't even find them online.

Then I discovered a neat little gadget called the "Freedom Clip." It's just a little clip that you install in your Keurig 2.0 that forces it to recognize ANY BRAND cups as "keurig approved." A wonderful company called the Roger's Family Company invented it and they're GIVING THEM AWAY FOR FREE to anyone who wants it! You can click HERE to order yours at absolutely NO COST. :)

While I was on their website, I discovered they also sell 97% bio-degradable "one cups" that will work in your Keurig! They'll even work in the 2.0 as long as you have the Freedom Clip installed. I LOVE that they're not plastic. I was never thrilled about using plastic cups in a coffee machine. I worry about the plastic leeching into the coffee. Yes, I'm paranoid about stuff like that. Lol! 

Click HERE to see all the 97% bio-degradable pods (or cups, or whatever you want to call them) They are San Francisco Bay Gourmet Coffee brand and they even have decaf, which is mostly what I drink. They're also very reasonably priced compared to most. For instance, their 12 pack is only $6.99. As an added bonus, I discovered my local HEB grocery store sells them at that same price!

So, all my problems were solved. I found the freedom clip that would allow me to brew ANY brand of cups. Then I found the 97% bio-degradable cups AND they were reasonably priced AND they come in decaf, AND they have a wide variety of flavors for the rest of the family. So happy when things work out like that. :)

I usually spend about $7 a week on a bag of coffee, so I figured if I spend that on one box of pods, it would come out the same. So, we went to Sam's Club and purchased the Keurig 2.0 and so far, we're really happy with it. 

So if you know anyone who recently purchased the 2.0 or if you receive one for Christmas, now you know how to bypass the system. ;)

And just because I can't seem to post without at least a couple of pics, here's my Christmas tablescape for this year...

Hopefully I'll get my pillow cover in the mail this week and post my home tour. Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

~Lisa

2014 Hot Cocoa Station

Hello! Are y'all ready for Christmas? Are all your gifts bought and wrapped? Mine aren't. :) I better get busy on that. 

My boys have been asking for the return of the hot cocoa station since September, so I thought I'd set it up again since it was such a hit last year. 

As you can tell in the pic below...the nutcrackers are back. Ugh. 

Obviously someone had just made some hot cocoa with the remnants still on the spoon. Oh well. I got that cute little fox plate at Target on clearance right after Christmas last year.

The little snowman basket in the back is holding mini candy canes. 

I used the same Dollar Tree container for the cocoa, but one of the new additions this year was crushed peppermints. (hand crushed by me) :)

Then we just have the obligatory mini marshmallows, red and green straws, and some cute reindeer spoons. Oh, and I changed up the fabric lining the tray this year. 

I picked up these little woodland creatures at Target last year for .25 cents after Christmas.

And just to make you laugh, here's a pic of Holly...

My son just got a fish eye lens for his iPhone and had to try it out. I especially like the little tail in the background. I honestly think she resembles Chester Cheetah. Maybe I should buy her some Cheetos. Bless her heart.

I'll be back in a day or two to share my Christmas Home Tour. Enjoy your day!

~Lisa

This and That

Hi there! Once again, I was looking through my phone and found some pics I haven't shared here yet.

Remember the cotton stems I bought awhile back? I finally decided to put them in this vase in my bedroom. For now. I'm sure they'll make their way around the house in the future. :)

Here's another Kohl's deal I got. (are y'all tired of hearing about how great Kohl's is yet???) Lol! I promise I'm not getting paid by them, they just happen to have fantastic deals, especially this time of year. :) 

So, I had my eye on these monogrammed mugs. They were priced at $9.99 each and I had a $10 coupon I planned on using. The coupon stated that you had to purchase at least $10 worth of stuff to use it. Well, when I got to the store, I discovered the mugs were on sale for $3.99! So, I HAD to get two, right? But the problem was that still didn't get me up to the $10 minimum purchase I needed in order to use the coupon. So, what's a girl to do but add some Godiva chocolates to her cart? ;)

Actually, the chocolates were on sale too, but it was enough to get me up to the $10 minimum. I had to get two because I plan on putting them in my boys' stockings. So, my grand total for two mugs and two Godiva chocolates was........

$3.51!!! 

Sweet, huh? :) I love those $10 coupons, but sometimes I have a hard time finding little "filler" items to bump my total up. That's where those chocolates come in handy. They're usually around $3 and just enough to get me to the $10. :) They sell them year round too!

One more quick thing. If you've been reading this blog for awhile, you might remember these, but if you're new here, I wanted to let you in on this quick and inexpensive project...

See the pretty Christmas decoration below? 

I just popped a piece of Christmas scrap book paper into a frame and added a couple of those flat, sparkly $1 ornaments from Walmart. I just taped the ornaments to the paper. Easy peasy! So cute as your own decor, or as a gift! With so many available papers and ornaments, the possibilities are endless! You could literally do any theme or color. 

 My guest bathroom is blue and brown, so that's where I have this one. After all this talk about it, now I want to make more! :)

Hope everyone has a great day and thanks for stopping by!

~Lisa

DIY Three Tiered Tray

Hello! Hope everyone is doing well! I have an easy and inexpensive diy for you today. I've been drooling over those farmhouse style galvanized three tiered trays online, but most of them were upwards of $100 and that was not going to happen. 

So, here's what I came up with...

Can you guess what it's made of? Cookie tins!!!

Here's what happened. While browsing Instagram the other day, I came across a diy tray from Courtney at Golden Boys And Me. I'm telling ya...I've gotten so much inspiration from IG lately! Anyway, she used cake pans for hers, but I didn't have any extras and I didn't want to pay for new ones. I even checked Walmart and the cheapest one there was $8 for the smallest size and the bigger ones were about $10 and $12. 

So, I went to Michael's hoping to be inspired to use something less expensive. That's when I came across the cookie tins in various sizes, along with some wooden candlesticks. They also had the sterling silver spray paint on sale!

Here's what I bought...

The cookie tins were $3, $2, and $1.50 and the candlesticks were $3.50. I think the paint was on sale for about $4. I was able to use some coupons so my total cost was about $15. 

Here's a closer look at the wooden candle sticks. 

And here's the paint I used.

I started by priming everything. I was out of primer, so I used Heirloom white spray paint. 

After a quick coat of that, I painted everything silver and glued it all together with E-6000.

Here's a pic I put on Instagram of the before and after...

Then the fun began and I got busy decorating it for the holidays. :)

Remember my Christmas mugs I got for .95 cents at Crate and Barrel? I put one in the top tray and filled it with miniature candy canes. 

In the middle tray, I put some Christmas napkins, a "Noel" door hanger, and one of my mom's gingerbread ornaments she purchased from Montgomery Ward way back in the 70's. :)

Then in the bottom tray, I just scattered some ornaments, silver jingle bells, and a cranberry stocking ornament. 

 We got out all our Christmas decor the other day and I can't wait to share it  with you! You can see a peek at my gingerbread/candy cane tree in the kitchen below. I put up 4 trees again this year. :)

I'm so happy with how this turned out! Not bad for $15, huh? I've also seen people use pie tins for this and that looks cute as well! I think I'll have fun styling it for different holidays. 

 Thanks so much for stopping by!

~Lisa