Christmas decorations...finally

I've taken forever to post my Christmas decorations, time flies in December and I can't believe Christmas is in 2 days!! I hope most of you are more ready than I am!

Anyway here we go!

As I mentioned in my previous post I went for a Scandinavian/shabby chic theme this year. On our tree I used silver glass ornaments and a lot of zinc ornaments as well that I picked up at Ikea this year:) I also love to add real candles but we never light them.

 I made these Christmas count down blocks last year and I'm glad they still fit in with my theme this year:) Of course I love adding vintage items in my decorations!

 My advent candles were very easily and quickly displayed this year. I didn't make a wreath because once it gets dry it gets so messy when you have to move it on and off the table so I went for this zinc planter and put the greens directly inside that way when I move it around nothing falls onto the table:)

 I made a fresh green wreath for the living room and added some fresh red apples for a little pop of color.

 I made this plaque and used distress inks to make the plaque look vintage, very easy and mess free (except for the ink on your hands..).

 To display the greeting cards we receive this year I went to the woods and picked up some dead branches. I put them in a vase and wrapped some jute around it that I secured with some white satin ribbon.

 When I get a card I simply punch a small hole on the top and add some white satin ribbon and then I hang it on a branch.

 And here is my mantel for this Christmas. I made a fresh wreath to hang on my fake window. I set up our willow tree nativity on the mantel along with an Ikea lantern and some vintage touches.

Every year I've said I'd make stockings for our family and every year I was never able to find the time. This year I finally made a set of stockings for us! I wanted them to be very simple and neutral. I used jute and lined them with a thin cream colored fabric. I made stencils with my silhouette so I could add our names with acrylic paint. If you're wondering what font I used it is called 'Zelda' :)

 I am in love with chalkboards at the moment, so I put one in a chicken wire basket filled with branches and pine cones.

 Last but not least, I made these little wooden signs for my kids to hold for our Christmas pictures. I didn't use chalkboard paint, just regular black acrylic paint and white acrylic paint. I retraced the swirls with a silver paint marker and used a sponge and some white paint marker dabbed on it to sponge the surface of the plaques making sure to take the excess paint marker off on some scratch paper before applying it to the plaque. And if I added too much white here and there then I just grabbed some sandpaper and sanded it down as much as I needed to.

Thank you for all the nice comments and remarks this year! I wish you all a very happy Christmas with your loved ones!!

Scandinavian/shabby chic inspired Christmas

For the past year I've been eyeing Scandinavian decor. In June a friend of mine gave me some of her old Jeanne d'arc living magazines and I fell in love with their Christmas edition, I have the one for 2011. 

This is the picture that most inspired my Christmas decorating this year:)

Today I'm just going to share with you how I decorated our front door. This year I mostly used white and silver for my colors and a lot of fresh pine branches.

  I made  a few fresh wreaths for inside and outside but left them plain with just a big white fabric bow. I love zinc, so I tried to add some zinc decorations everywhere I could. I fond a whole bunch at Ikea that I used for our Christmas tree but I'll show you those in a separate post.

 I found these used ice skates on ebay for 5 euros! I dont think they are very old but I mainly wanted them to look used:)

 I also love this old Davos sled that I got on an auction site in Switzerland for 15 dollars. The silver lantern is from Ikea;) I'll be back soon with more pictures of our Christmas decorations!

Christmas count-down plaque

Happy second Advent everyone! Today I thought I'd share a little plaque I designed for Our relief society activity in November. I love count down blocks but I wanted something less time consuming for our activity night so I came up with this plaque. 

 The plaque measures 25cmX8cm, I covered it with scrapbook paper and cut out the ornament shape using a nestability ornament die and chalkboard vinyl.

 Since our ward is french I put 'Days until Christmas' in french. I used my silhouette SD to cut out the vinyl. Pretty simple and fast project. Hope you're all having a nice Sunday!

Princesstarta

A few weeks ago I saw this pin on pinterest, that cake looks so gorgeous! I really wanted to find a good recipe for it so I asked a Swedish friend since this is a Scandinavian cake to send me a recipe. Yesterday with my sister in law and I got to work in the kitchen and made our princess cake! Click here to see the recipe we used. The link also gives interesting history about the cake and why it is called princess cake. 

 It is very yummy! Our custard didn't turn out as creamy as it should have so I would probably look for a different custard recipe next time I make this. Oh and I didn't have a cake pan the right size for this cake so we used a stainless steel cooking pan (I removed the plastic handles of course!).

car themed birthday invitations tutorial!

So this is not an original idea of mine, I saw this treat holder here. I didn't use stampin ups top note die like on the other website, instead I used Spellinders labels 8 (the biggest die in the set).

When I want a stamped image from a disney movie I usually buy these cheap rubber stamps for kids, they cost about 5 euros and work well enough:)

 these are the other stamp sets that I used, the background set is from waltzingmouse and the party invite set is from Inkadinkado. My favourite inks for stamping are memento inks, I used black and red for this project.

 I love using Copic markers to color images, the colors are very vibrant and they blend very well together.

 I used my die cutting machine to cut out two labels 8 dies per invitation in dark blue plus one that had a background stamped on it.

 Used a little banner die from spellbinders for the sentiment.

 Cut your stamped labels 8 die in two and glue onto the dark blue labels 8 as shown in the picture below (for the stamped one I cut off the embossed edge you get with spellbinders dies so I would get a layered look)

 create the top flap by scoring, folding down and gluing a section of your labels 8 die.

 use a STRONG glue to adhere the front and back together, let dry completely before you add your treat.

 Now you can decorate the front!

 Oh and on the back I added all the information for the party

Thanks for stopping by!

Cars themed birthday party

My now three year old son is REALLY into cars (not just the movie), so for his birthday last week I went for a lightning Mcqueen/Cars theme. The colors I decided to work with were red, yellow, black and white.

 This year instead of spending 3 hours decorating the birthday cake I thought I'd spend a little extra time making a really yummy cake:) I used this recipe and it was delicious, in between the two cake layers I added some raspberry jam and home made whipped cream.

 I made these little party favors using kraft envelops from the supermarket (carrefour).

 I had to color at least 30 of those Mcqueen stamped images, it took forever!

 My favorite part of birthday parties is making the buntings, I usually make fabric ones so they are more durable and once the party is over I can hang it up in my son's room:)

 The drinks table (the guests were bringing more drinks)

 Lemon meringue pie (because of the yellow color:) and backed potato dip for the chips.

 Chocolate caramel brownies

 These are the invitations I made for the party, I'll be posting a tutorial on how I put these together!

Faux DIY fireplace

I've been wanting to make a faux fireplace for over a year now and I finally did it!! It took about 3 days to make with all the painting.

 I payed about 60 euros for all the wood, I already had the paint on hand and in the end I had extra molding left over (which will not go to waste!). It was hard to find a nice thick beam so I had to settle for something a lot thinner than what I had in mind but I quickly got over that:) We put the base together in three parts.

 And added molding until I liked the look of it.

 I used a nice dark varnish for my undercoat (the color is called Palisander in Switzerland or Germany).

 Then I added two coats of my favorite antic white.

 To finish it off I distressed all the edges with sand paper...I must confess I haven't yet covered the whole fireplace with a clear varnish to protect it...I was to excited to put it up on the wall:)

 The next day I was back in the wood store to buy the supplies to make the two big panels on either side of the fireplace.

 I love how it turned out. I would love to add a brick wall inside the fireplace but that will have to wait...

 A selection of pumpkins for fall, I'll be able to switch out the decorations in the basket depending on the season, so I'm happy about that too:)

 A closer look at the two wooden panels: