And the winner is....

Last night I wrote out all the names of the wonderful bloggers who entered my ornament giveaway.  All the names went into a hat-not just any hat but a Santa hat.  

My little elf assistant (dear son) came to help.  Isn't he cute!!

Of course, we homeschool and by night time the couch, along with the rest of this room, is in a shambles.  Excuse the mess and look at those cute dimples.  He dares not peek as he pulls out a name.

And the winner is...

Alessandra from Just Be Happy!!!

Congratulations Alessandra!!!!  Thank you all for visiting and entering the giveaway.  I wish all of you could have won.  I am so bad at this because then I want to send some to everyone who entered. LOL~ It's been fun "meeting" new people and visiting your blogs. 

Christmas Tour of My Home

Welcome to our home!!

~Ornament wreath~

The Nester is hosting the Christmas Tour of Homes 2009.  The link list is almost endless there and I may need to sit here until Christmas to visit all the sites but I thought it would be fun to join in.

 The angel that sits on top our tree

Our tree

Joy blocks just completed yesterday

Our Creche and other Christmas things

Snowman building fun

The church I love from Jamie at Forest Frolic

Merry Christmas

Snowglobes

Our son's Nutcracker collection~they are not my favorites but he loves them and has been collecting them for quite a few years.  He will have quite a collection for his home someday.

More...

My favorite of all his nutcrackers

My favorite bell

Fireplace with sentry nutcracker guards

My mini tree with vintage ornaments

A Little Sale

Five pack Snowflake Ornaments

~round ornaments~

$24 plus $7 s/h

Four Pack Snowflake Ornaments

~teardrop shape~

$24 plus $7 s/h

Please request the color ribbon you would like and the 5 pack of round ornaments or the 4 pack of teardrop ornaments.  Also would you prefer the ornaments tied with ribbon bows at the top or the ribbon confetti ties (pictured in the teardrop sample).

'Tis the Season Giveaway

I love to spend time creating.  Crochet is one of my favorite things.  There are so many possibilities when you pick up that thread and hook.  

I wanted to share with you some of the fun things I have been creating and host a giveaway for all the wonderfully creative and fun ladies in blog land.  Your blogs inspire me daily.  I can get lost perusing the pages of all the wonderful blogs.    

The ornaments below are made by little ole me.  Each ornament is filled with faux snow and a mini-snowflake ornament that I hand crocheted.  

I would like to give away this set of five ornaments.

To enter just leave me a comment below for one entry.  For a second chance to win blog about this on your blog.  Send your friends over.  The more the merrier.

This is a close-up of one of the ornaments in the giveaway set. 

This is another set I made.  I love the ribbon confetti on top and the gorgeous shape. (Don't know why blog insists on flipping my pictures.)

It looks so beautiful on the tree.  

These ornaments are also available for purchase.  The round ornaments come in a set of five.  The cost is $24 plus $7 s&h.  If you are interested you can email me through my profile.  You can specify if you would like bows on your ornaments or the ribbon confetti ties.  You can also choose what color ribbons you would like added to the ornaments.  I can have them completed and shipped in 3 days.  

The giveaway will end on Wednesday, December 16.  I will choose a winner and have them in the mail by Friday the 18th so you can receive them in time to enjoy them for Christmas.

Don't forget to pass the word along!!

~Thanks~

Great Finds

Sunday we visited a small town nearby.  It is filled with antique shops, country stores and our favorite: Brown & Hopkins Country Store.  It has been in business for over 200 years and you can still buy penny candy.  It is a filled to the rafters with so many great things.  Once the kids had their bags loaded with penny candy we headed to do some shopping about town.  It is the quintessential town with a fabulous Main Street that seems like it's been fixed in a bygone time.

I found these cute little ornaments in my favorite colors.

I also picked up these little caroling books.

I saw these ornaments in many of the antique stores but my treasure is far better.  I found them at a thrift store and the price was right.  They were only $1.99 and the antique stores had them in the same boxes for $10-$20.

I have been working on the centerpiece for our table.  This is what I tried first but really didn't like how it came out or how it seemed to clashed in the room.  I quickly took it apart and started to think.

I decided to use the berry garland I had left over from my swags with some greenery.  This is the final product.  I like it much better and it seems to blend with the room.

This weekend I am hoping we can visit a Winter Wonderland they are hosting at a local park.  It is supposed to rain/snow mix so I don't know if we'll make it but I am hoping.  It looks and sounds spectacular.

Enjoy your weekend!!

Out With the Old~In With the New

My Christmas swags were made a few years  back and were starting to show their age.  They weren't the style that I enjoyed any longer.  At that time I had filled them with floral picks and a gold edged ribbon.  I like them then but have outgrown them.  I went shopping to find new swags for the archways in our living and dining room.  The ones that I loved were completely out of my price range.  So I came home empty handed and thinking about what I should do.  I decided to redo them.  I set to work on dismantling the swags.

Here is the before (please disregard the very ugly basement floor).  

Before close up.

I got together some things I would need.  These wire cutters come in very handy.

I used this ribbon that I purchased last year after Christmas on clearance.

These little beads were being thrown out by someone I know and I rescued them.

This berry garland also saved from being thrown out.

I purchased this beaded garland at Michaels.  It was on clearance. 

I laid everything out on my kitchen floor and set to work on the swags.  I laid the beaded garland over the greenery.  Wrapped the ribbon around and under.  I filled in some spots with the beads and berry garland and here is the completed garlands.

This is the living room garland.  Click on the picture for a better look.

This is the dining room garland.  (Disregard ugly kitchen wallpaper and tile-the kitchen needs a makeover)

I am thrilled with my new garlands.  They look much better than the pictures I have taken.  This is my favorite Christmas redo.

Turn the Page Tuesday

Adrienne at Some of a Kind hosts Turn the Page Tuesday.  This month I am posting about some Homecrafting mysteries that I found by accident.  I saw the title, Lye in Wait, in a forum about soap making and I thought it would be a book on soap-making.  I quickly looked it up at the library and found the whole set.  I was quickly immersed in the story and the characters lives.   I have enjoyed reading through all three books in this series.  They are quick reads and I find that I relate to the main characters in the story.  These three titles are just the beginning of the series.  A new book is expected out in the spring of 2010 and I am looking forward to it.  

Lye in Wait is the first book in the series.  We are introduced to the lives of the main character Sophie Mae Reynolds, her best friend-whom she lives with, and the detective.  Sophie Mae finds her handyman, Walter, dead in her basement workroom.  She becomes entangled in the details of what is believed to be his suicide.  In the end it all works out and there are a few twists and turns along the way.

Heaven Preserve Us is the next book in the series.  Sophie Mae volunteers to answer a crisis hotline and immediately things begin to take a strange turn when she receives a strange phone call from someone who wants to do more than ask for help and the director of the center dies mysteriously.  Was it just an accident?  Will anyone investigate what really happened?  You will be surprised by the peculiar events surrounding this mystery.

The last book in the series thus far is Spin a Wicked Web.  Sophie Mae becomes a part of a crafters co-op.  The new love in her life is spinning.  Things are all well until Sophie Mae finds her fellow co-op member strangled to death with her very first skein of yarn.  Sophie Mae's presence at the scene of yet another dead body raises questions.  The co-op members seem to all have a secret, it takes a little unraveling of clues to find the murderer.  Sophie Mae is once again in the middle of this case.  The usual twists and turns are present in this mystery.  This was my favorite of the three books.  I enjoyed the many details included in each of the books, but especially the domestic details.  Spinning yarn, raising chickens, making soap, living more sustainably are all things that resonate with me.

I hope you have a chance to enjoy this great series.

There are more books out there that I would love to read and haven't had the chance.  I love to share the books I have read and enjoyed.  Looking through everyones' reading lists is so much fun.