The Tree - 2011

Growing up, my family tree was always decorated with tons of colourful sparkling lights and ornaments collected and saved for ages. Even today, my parents still trim their tree with those vintage lights and ornaments, and I love being there every year to help adorn the branches of the real tree my father, brother, B and myself venture out to cut down. However, growing up with this sentimental mish mash of ornaments and lights has always had me craving a beautifully planned out tree, and since I was about 18, I've been collecting my own ornaments in blues, whites and silvers - that now make up the tree that stands in our living room.

I love me a real tree, and I'm glad I can still get my fill when we visit my parents. (We also have plans to incorporate a real tree into our Christmas traditions starting next year). For now, we're happy with our Home Depot purchased artificial tree... and a Yankee candle that smells of balsam. 

Some of my favourite ornaments? The tin Victorian tinsel that we purchased at the One of A Kind Show a few years back. It adds that extra sparkle to our tree every year...

Our tin snowflakes. We actually bought these at RONA on boxing day a few years back. They were ridiculously inexpensive, with it being the day after Christmas, and we got them for less than a dollar each!

These white porcelain ornaments I grabbed at The Bay last December, the week before Christmas. They were already marked down and I knew they would be the perfect addition to our tree... so I grabbed four.

The one ornament that makes it onto our tree each year, without being white, blue or silver - is the Jameson bauble that we bought on our trip to Dublin in 2009. It was our first trip overseas together, so it's a special memory for us. 

And new to our tree this year - this sweet baby's first Christmas ornament gifted to us by my parents! I've put them front and center, and they look so sweet. 

Even our tree skirt matches well. This blue suede skirt, with white fur trim came home with us from Massachusetts after our Thanksgiving trip there in 2009... and I still adore it!

I'm linking up our sparkly blue tree today with Megan over at Honey We're Home for the Holiday Blog Link party.

How do you decorate your tree? Do you keep it the same year after year like we do - or do you like to switch it up and try something new?

Demo Days Are Behind Us!

Today I'm getting off the topic of Christmas, to bring you more bathroom renovation updates. As you can imagine, things are moving quite slow with B working full time during the day and having a four month old at home, but he's doing his best to get things done. Thankfully on Sunday while Halle and I were out at the cookie exchange, B and my Dad had the whole day to get things done... which included the last of our demolition. When I got home on Sunday the bathroom looked like this...

{Looking up at the bathroom from the stairs}

I was thrilled to see our new pocket door frame in place! It was no easy task for them to get it in, since it involved trying to make everything square again. 


The one big surprise was that we will have to change our original floor plans. We originally planned on having the tub on the wall with our new window, but B and my Dad explained that, with the state that the floor is in (even with them repairing those floor joists), it wasn't safe. So now the tub will go along the back wall, our vanity on the right (where it originally was) and toilet on the right (again, it's original location... just shifted slightly.


So this is how the bathroom currently looks. Tonight is just a quick dinner, and then Halle and I are going to head out to try and accomplish some Christmas shopping, and give B and evening to get more done on the bathroom. We'd really like to have it done by the time Christmas arrives, and with only 17 days until Christmas Eve... it doesn't look too promising at this point. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

Sending Good Tidings

We're getting close people! Only 19 more days to the big day, and still a lot to be done. My goals for this week are getting some wrapping done (maybe even a bit more shopping), and to get our Christmas cards in the mail, since they'll be sent all over Canada and the United States (and one goes to Scotland). Have you got your cards ready to go? If you're running behind and don't have time to order cards, here's what we did to save some time and money.


I used my version of My Memories, to create two different cards for this season...

It was so easy to do, by just using some backgrounds and cute little images that come with the program. Once I was done designing them, we had them printed on heavy card stock and used the back for writing a message. I loved creating our own cards, and if you'd like to do the same, you can buy your very own version of MyMemories to do the same.

Just visit MyMemories.com and use the code STMMMS43778 to get $10 off your purchase of MyMemories v3, plus a $10 credit to use at the MyMemories online store. Once you

purchase it, you can download it right away and get those cards started right away!

Have you got your cards out yet? Do you send photo cards or just regular Christmas cards?

A Festive Little Weekend

Happy Monday! I hope everyone had a great weekend! We packed ours with as many festive activities as we could. Here's what we got up to...


1. On Friday night, I had to do some prep for my baking that needed to be done on Saturday. In particular - I had to crush up whole Oreos, and doing it by hand seemed to work best. Halle wanted to help...

2. Then, up went the tree. We were able to get as far as getting it set up and the lights on, and just a few ornaments, before a certain baby needed to get to bed. She must've been exhausted from crushing all of those Oreo's, and helping Daddy with the lights for the tree...

3. On Saturday morning, I made some delicious baked french toast for breakfast, and we got a few more ornaments on the tree before bundling up and heading out to the Etobicoke Lakeshore Santa Clause Parade. We ended up leaving before Santa arrived since it was pretty cold and someone was ready for a nap...

4. When we got home, we finished decorating our tree! I love it! (I will share pictures on Thursday...promise!)


5. The afternoon was dedicated to whipping up some delicious Peppermint Cream Bites. It was kind of frustrating, and I suggest that if you plan to tackle this recipe - follow your instincts. You'll definitely need more than 2 tbps of butter to make the cookie crust stick!


6. Sunday, Halle and I headed out to my hometown and to a cookie exchange hosted by my cousin. So many yummy cookies to eat and bring home - what's better than that?

7. While we were off sampling cookies with family and friends, B and my Dad were back on the home front working away on our bathroom! I can't wait to share more updates with you soon.


8. And I saved this till last since it wasn't actually over the weekend. On Tuesday evening (after Halle's appointment for the first of her four month shots), we took her to see Santa, and this was the result...

BIG SMILES - and we love it! I think she could just understand what the photographer was saying... who was raving about what a beautiful baby she was. Yup - we're totally in trouble.

Did you get up to any fun and festive things this weekend?

Fancy Friday Love

Happy first Friday of December! We're sneaking up on Christmas, so I hope you're all getting ready and into the festive season. Here's some pretties, both festive and not, to help you get into the mood...


Did you catch Shannon's big announcement last Friday? I'm so excited for her, so make sure to go check out her new website!

Loved this gorgeous Sydney home featured on desire to inspire. The whole home was just perfect, but this room has to be my favourite...

Sweet crochet-covered lampshades from ohdeedoh. These are so sweet for a nursery or kids room, and easy to DIY. My favourite has to be those scallop edged ones!

Pretty packaging and gift wrapping ideas from 79 ideas...

Why can't our kitchen look like this beauty, from Period Living, featured on House of Turquoise earlier this week...

Looking for some fun Christmas inspiration ideas? How about these cute ideas, using Washi Tape, from The Sweetest Occasion...

This weekend, we'll be taking Halle to her very first Santa Clause parade in our neighbourhood, and on Sunday I have a cookie exchange to go to! It's been a VERY busy week around here preparing for the holiday season, but I'm so excited to get to start new traditions with our little munchkin. 

Do you have any fun and festive plans for this December weekend?

Stepping Out...

I wait for this day all year... seriously. This morning, Halle and I are headed out to the One of a Kind Show with a few of our friends from our Mommy Connections class, and also to see Jen speak. 

I always love picking up special little Christmas gifts here, finding new vendors and of course visiting some of my old favourites. A few other bloggers were lucky enough to attend the media preview breakfast last Thursday (wish I could've joined you ladies) - and if you can't make it, you can read their reviews of the show, which I've linked to below. Of course, I'll be back next week with my very own look back at my favourite bits of the show.

One of a Kind Show Reviews from Blogland:

Lisa from Wicked and Weird

Jen from Rambling Renovators

Vanessa from Decor Happy

A Holiday DIY

Happy Wednesday! I originally planned this post for yesterday, but it turned out to be more of a catch-up kind of day around the house - so here it is!


The other week before we left for Massachusetts I realized a few things...


1. This is Halle's first Christmas, and we only have two stockings (that are not even that nice)


2. Stockings can be EXPENSIVE... especially if you want matching ones. It's also not always easy to find nice ones that you like and match your Christmas decor.


3. I had a TON of extra fabric not being used for anything that could surely make some pretty stockings... that MATCH!


So, when we were packing up, I grabbed a bunch of fabric to bring with us, in hopes that B's Mom and I could put our heads together to make some pretty stockings. The night before Thanksgiving, while the men folk and Halle were taking in the Bruins game - we got to work. Here's what we did...


1. I drew the shape I wanted onto a large piece of heavy paper that B's Mom gave me. It wasn't perfect the first time, so I kept going back, erasing and re-drawing until I got the exact shape and size that I wanted.

2. Once we had it right, I cut it out and traced it onto our fabric. I made sure to trace it a bit wider to allow for the seams of the stocking.


3. Before cutting out the stocking shapes, we folded the fabric four times. The fabric I picked was thin, so we needed to double up the fabric for each side of the stocking. Thankfully I had a ton of fabric so we knew that we would be able to get four stockings no problem (me, B, Halle and then guests OR a future baby... Halle will want a sibling one day, right?).

4. Once we had the pieces cut out, B's Mom sewed the tops of two of the stocking shapes together, then sewed our seams flat so we would get a clean edge at the top of the stocking.

5. With our tops sewed clean, B's Mom then took the two doubled up stocking sides and sewed them together. I gave them a quick iron and then we flipped them right-side out - boy did they look great!....


But we weren't done yet! I'd also brought two different styles of blue fabric with me - paisley printed napkins that I'd grabbed on clearance at HomeSense before Halle was born, and some plain blue denim that I'd bought in Spring of 2010 for one of my final school projects. They match well, and would give us great coordinating stockings.


6. Lucky for me, the fold lines in the napkins gave us the perfect width for our stocking cuffs. So I cut the napkin a little wider than we needed and then ironed it flat.

7. Then it was time for B's Mom and I to really put our heads together to decide how to get the cuff on right. We could've sewed it on BEFORE we sewed the stocking together, but we were flying by the seats of our pants, so we needed to come up with a plan. B's Mom sewed my cut napkin into a loop - lining up the edging of the napkin, and then tried pinning it onto the stocking to see how it would look.

8. It worked out PERFECTLY, so B's Mom folded over the cut edge inside of the stocking to get us a finished edge inside as well, then sewed it up nicely. Our first finished stocking looked fantastic.


It took a few more days, and B's Mom was nice enough to finish up this project for us while we were out visiting a friend on Sunday afternoon, so by the time we left to head home the next morning, we had four beautiful stockings to bring home. I cannot wait to hang them by our fireplace... once we get it all cleaned up and our new mantle on there from my father.

Have you ever made your own Christmas stockings, or started any other Christmas crafts/DIY's to deck your halls this holidays season?