Snowy Red & White Christmas Decorations

Hi there! I thought I would share some the Christmas decorations I have been working on for the last couple of weeks.  Two of my boys had adenoid surgery back to back so I have been distracted from posting.  They are now healing and will be soon be breathing free! This year I was going for the snowy Christmas look with pops of red.  I found the flocked wreath at Craft Warehouse, half off, and added a gingham bow.  My black door tends to hide most of my wreaths, so the snowy wreath is perfect.

I picked up a couple of trees at Home Goods and Michaels and added ribbon.   

Gingerbread, both real and fake, are some of my favorites during the Christmas season. 

For the Christmas tree, I added red birds mixed with silver icicles and glittery snowflakes. My boys are not thrilled with "pretty" trees, so I made sure to use a smaller tree to hang all of our fun ornaments. We love pulling out the homemade school ornaments each year, along with a couple of Star Wars and Sponge Bob ornaments. Yeah, Sponge Bob and the Star Wars M&M guys go on the back of the tree.

I filled different sizes of glass balls with powder snow.  Really messy to fill, but I love the look with a few added berries, pine cones, and greens.

To help fill the globes, my son and I made a paper funnel.  Two sets of hands help make this job go fast!

I have never bought a tree skirt, but I broke down after I saw this cute ruffled burlap skirt at Cost Plus.  I love it!

I added more of the powder snow (found at Craft Warehouse) to a candle display.  White candles, cut greens, and berries make it so pretty!

 Every year I can't resist the live wreaths from Costco. They are fairly inexpensive, and it is always fun to be creative with them.

This year I added small red ornaments in varying sizes. I wired some ornaments and used hot glue on the rest.

I added several cut sprigs of glittery greens found at Michaels and a few mini birds.

And that's pretty much it! Hopefully Nicole and I will finish the projects we started. Where did the last month go? Two weeks until Christmas and so much to do.  See you soon!

Finding Christmas Spirit

I wasn't quite sure what to call this post~it's a hodge podge of emotion and my favorite things
about the true Christmas Spirit that I found this weekend.

First I got out my two cruddy wreaths I picked up from the thrift store 2 years ago that have been sitting in my garage. I had gotten them for $2 each and they had great "guts" on them, I figured I could rip them apart and put them together.  I picked up a pretty fake cedar that was all crystal iced at Michael's~they just knocked everything down to 60% off on Friday!  I wasn't sure if it was going to work so of course I didn't take any before pictures~you're just going to have to imagine tons of those yucky red silky threaded balls and tacky ribbons hanging off, I mean threads all over the place yucky.  She's pretty right?:)  I only spent just under $12 on her too!

I just got home from our Church Choir Concert that~yes I participated in~like I didn't have enough on my overloaded plate, I got crazy and joined the church choir.  Hearing that Christmas music sung by such beautiful voices~O Holy Night gets me in complete tears every time!  Our hope is that amidst all the chaos the season seems to bring that you'll enjoy the little things like the music and making sugar cookies with your kids even though half the sprinkles end up on your floor.:)

First up we wanted to share our Mom's famous sugar recipe.  It's a keeper for sure!  Our Mom became famous with these when they were missionary parents in Korea for 150+ young missionaries, our Mom would make them a plate of pink frosted sugar cookies for each of their birthdays.  Yes, we ate a lot of sugar cookies growing up when they were made that often!

I had to bring 4 dozen of these bad boys to our Church Christmas party Friday night and they disappeared fast!  I have to admit that when I got up to get treats for me I started to freak out because I couldn't see any of mine.  I was so worried that they were left in the kitchen and I would be taking home 4 dozen cookies~not good for a gal on a diet~I raced to the kitchen to only be relieved at the empty boxes I brought them in.  Phewwww!

Granny Annie's Famous Sugar Cookies
3/4 cup butter (part shortening)
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. vanilla (or lemon or both)
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt

Mix wet ingredients together well-till light and fluffy.  Sift together the dry ingredients and then add to the wet ingredients.  Chill 1 hour, cut 1/4" thick.  Cook 6-8 minutes @ 400 degrees.  Should make about 2 dozen cookies or so.  I always triple the batch...hmmmm....wonder why I'm on a diet!  Here is something I do a little different, I actually use real squeezed lemon juice in my cookies and my frosting along with the vanilla.  It's so yummy!
                                 
 Also I won't cook cookies on anything but a Pampered Chef's stoneware pan.  If you don't have one of those pans then you need to get one.  They make good cookies perfect!

I use Betty Crocker's frosting recipe~
Cream Cheese Frosting
2 3-ounce packages cream cheese
1/2 cup softened margarine or butter
2 tsp. vanilla
4 1/2 to 4 3/4 sifted powdered sugar

Beat together cream cheese, butter and vanilla till light and fluffy.  Gradually beat in powdered sugar, beating well until desired consistency.

December is flying by~Candace has had 2 boys with adenoid surgery in the last couple weeks and has her hands full.  Hopefully we'll get those poor Santa's we've been working on done soon~until then I've got 2 kid parties to do this week plus somehow I'm gonna break out the Gingerbread house mold that came in the mail~Thank you Ebay!  Happy Monday Friends!

Oh My!

I have a good friend in my neighborhood that loved the ornament wreath I made last year. (The one that broke)  My friend decided last year to start building her wreath and oh how it puts mine to shame!  Everything she makes is big and beautiful, and her home is gorgeous! Her husband knows some car upholstery guys that cut her out a huge wood wreath form and batted it with car upholstery felt.  That's pretty smart!

My friend hit the after Christmas sales and picked up most of the balls for 90% off.  My wreath had at least 220 balls, we're thinking this must have at least 1000? She said that it measures 48" by 48"! Crazy!

I am so amazed with her skills!

Wow!