Country Living shared easy holiday snowflake craft projects that triggered the idea to deck your guest room. I never deck a bedroom but since your guest room is the private living quarter of your guests during their stay, why not add a winter touch to their decor?  The snowflake pillows are cute. Do not forget to add some shiny touches. The silver lampshade is a superb idea to achieve it.

Since your guests may be hungry when they arrive, leave on their room a coconut frosted cupcakes with its beaded snowflake topper. You simply need long and short clear beads and some wire to make your own topper.

+ photos: Country Living

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If you are handy working with wood, here is something that you may consider doing for your kids. I feel it would be a wonderful Christmas gift. If you do, make sure to adapt the project to your child favorite games and activities. You could cut a window to suit the needs of a puppet theater.

I suggest to you a DIY project because Tschutschu by Dominik Lutz seems to be only available in Germany for the moment. This is kind of the ultimate multipurpose kid furniture as it integrated a bench, a train table, and a chalkboard. By standing on a different side, it serves a different purpose. You could fix a wooden train track on the train table. This way, there will be less mess across the home and no arguments with your kid to store the train set.

+ Tschutschu at Magazin 179 €
+ via ohdeedoh

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The countdown to Christmas is a fun activity when you live with young kids. You have all November to craft your own. In fact, if you wish to get the advent house or the bucket advent calendar you have no other choice than making your own since they are out of stock at John Lewis. They may get more since you can leave your email but I would not count of that.

For the house, you could start with a paper or a wood house model. Get a good supply of card boards and foam core to add details to the house. Use paint, gift wrapping paper,and small ornaments to decorate every window. It could be a fun weekend project for the family.

The bucket pennants is easier to reproduce than the advent house. Sadly, I am not sure that you will save money by making your own. To make your own, shop for 25 small decorative buckets, look at scrapbooking items to craft the date tags, and find a festive large ribbon.

Feel free to send me pictures of your advent calenders. Do you follow the advent calendar custom? If you follow it, do you put a toy, a treat or an act/goal to your kids?

SOURCING:
+ Christmas Advent House £30
+ East of India Bucket Advent Calendar £25

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If you give home baked goods this Holiday or if you host a Thanksgiving dinner party, why not share your recipes with your friends and family? To help you write your recipes down, you can print these etsy-orange recipe cards designed by Julie Green of Up Up Creative. Keep the comment empty for your friends to fill out once they tried out your recipe.

+ photo by Up Up Creative

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This is one of the best Ikea hack I have seen. It was an idea of Andy from Show and Tell. His project involved laser cut performed on the acacia wood caps to write the words salty and sweet. I like that typographic style.

+ Celeber Spice Jars $7.99 USD for pack of 2
+ via Show and Tell

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You recalled the fabulous mobile birds created by Spool Sewing that I showcased last March. I just realized that they would look awesome next to the Season Surface Graphics by notNeutral. Made of removable and reusable vinyl, the Season wall decals can stay with your kid up to the preschool years.

Wall Decals

Build you own tree or small forest with the tree trunk parts, leaves, flowers, birds and butterflies of the Season Surface Graphics set. If you wish to create a complete natural backdrop, you could save some money by getting the Seasons & Elements package from notNeutral. That package joins the tree, air and land wall decal sets.

Stretched Art

You could also match the mobile birds with art pieces. The San Diego studio Oopsy daisy specializes in fine art for kids. They print on canvas adorable and modern illustrations by many artists from around the world. “Birds in a tree” is a common theme. Let the color and pattern of the wall art piece influence the fabrics you will use to create your mobile birds.

The bird mobile is a fairly easy hand-sewing project. Making these birdies takes is 2 pieces of fabric, a needle and thread. Think of a modern quilt and mix fabrics. You will find the instructions on the blog of Spool Sewing.

SOURCING:
+ Misty Blue Bird pattern by Spool Sewing
+ Seasons & Elements Complete Set $120 USD
+ Birds in a Tree Canvas Reproduction by Rachel Taylor $138 USD
+ Green Bird Postage Stamp Wall Art by Paula Prass
+ Petite Fruit Tree Canvas Reproduction $108 USD

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Fall officially arrived. In a few weeks, the cottage on the lake season will close for many of us that live North. Wood slice trays are nothing new but I still like them. Plus, using handcrafted organic elements to contrast modern pieces is one of the 4 trends for Christmas 2009 (more on that later).

Wood slices are beloved because they are versatile. Tree slices fit in from a shack style to the modern rustic. You can use them to serve savory pies, or as a natural cheese board.  They can also support your floral centerpieces as you can see on this charming table by the crafty Anna of Rifle Design. Anna took that picture as part of her DIY menu wheel craft project.

Rustic Tree Cake Stands

What I like the most is how you can transform a tree slice and a short thick branch into your own cake stands. Make a least three stands. Ideally, you wish to vary their heights and surface size. They are not complicated to make. See the instructions of Laurie Cinotto. Remember to put a paper between the food and the tree slice, unless you applied a food-safe wood sealer.

If crafting is not your thing, go to Hens in Daisies’ Etsy shop to find large and extra large cake stands. They are ready to use. Simply wipe clean with damp cloth these food-safe sealed cake plates.

MORE:
+ DIY Tree Pedestal Cake Stand by Laurie Cinotto on Once Wed
+ DIY Wedding Menu Wheel on Design*Sponge
+ Large Rustic Cake Stand by Hens in Daisies $45 USD on Etsy
+ Extra Large Rustic Cake Stand by Hens in Daisies $75 USD on Etsy

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When everything has its place, you do not lose time looking for it. There is a therapeutic effect of living and working in an uncluttered space. We also need a few storage solutions and organizers to be on display to be practical. For that, you need items that feel more unique than the utilitarian objects.

It does not have to cost a fortune. You transform an everyday item or repurpose flea market finds. A quick solution is to stencil numbers or letters on Mason jars. The numbered Mason jars available at Pottery Barn have a charming distressed look. Mason jars are great to store anything, not just food.

No one wants to bring home the corporate office look. Opt for cool desk accessories, like this giant sharpener pencil holder, to infuse a sense of casual style. Old drawers and wood boxes easy replace the desktop sorter.

Old-fashioned front-desk organizers used in hotels inspired the Cubby Organizer. This distressed solid mahogany display unit would complement a modern country interior. Each of the 25 cubbies is detailed with a hand-painted number. The design will nicely highlight a few collections of small items built around an overall theme.

GET THE LOOK:
+ Numbered Mason Jars at Pottery Barn $39 USD for set of 3
+ Cubby Organizer at Pottery Barn$129 USD
+ Giant sharpener desk tidy at WhippetGrey £14.50
+ Hardware Store Drawers – No.2 at Three Potato Four $18 USD
+ Foundry Mold – Type B at Three Potato Four $65 USD

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Dressing up a soft drink table for a party deserves as much attention than setting a regular bar. Both have to be pretty and inviting. This week provides delightful examples of what you can do to make it grand.

That quest started by this Old fashioned soda bar featured on Project Wedding. The concept was to find several old-style soda bottles. They collected 14 soda drinks. They made it beautiful by lining the sodas by color. This is a merchandising trick that you often see at fine stationery stores. They also suggest to not put them on ice. Instead, keep them on the fridge until the last minute.

Like they say, the hardest thing is to find the old-fashioned bottles. If you have relatives who live in several parts of the country, ask their help to expand your collection.

Print Your Own Soda Labels

Inspired by that project, Amy of Eat Drink Chic made templates to print your own soda labels. They are available in two font styles. It may be simpler than looking for the old style brands. You could buy bottles from different brands for a more realistic effect.

Homemade Lemonade Stand

Finally, the appeal of the old-fashioned homemade lemonade stand does not die. Here they used big jars with tags and ladles to serve the lemonade. Anyone with some carpentering experience can build a cute lemonade stand.

Fabric pennant banners hanged on the stand mimics the vintage look. You can follow the instructions on Mommy Diaries to learn how to sew your own banner or head to etsy to find one that you like. You can refer to some of my favorite flag pennant banners.

MORE:
+ Project Wedding
+ Eat Drink Chic
+ One Love Photo

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When I saw this store window yesterday decorated with corrugated cardboard rolls, I grabbed my iPhone to take pictures. This is something that you can reproduce at home.

I immediately imagined a twist for the hat making activity that is so popular in Alice in Wonderland theme party. After all, why not set the theme in a different environment? Your guests can paint, draw and glue decorations. You will set up a wall to exhibit their creations.

It can also form the backdrop of a tasting of Asian tea service. It is a creative decor that is simple to do.

Corrugated cardboard rolls are easy to find at packaging supply stores. You can use A, B or C flute sizes but look for 6-inch thick rolls.

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Montreal, like the rest of the North East region, is in a heat wave right now. We welcome the chance to eat outside at night. I started a search for cool ideas to enjoy the summertime. I found on design*sponge a few ideas to make your party a success.

+ To hang out outside all night, you can make your own lantern. Erik Anderson taught us how to turn a wine bottle into a modern backyard tiki torch.

+ Brooklyn-based photographer Tara Donne made a Rhubarb and Strawberry Compote that she served with Aged Balsamic and Ricotta. It looks delicious.

+ From Buenos Aires, Eliza Jane Curtis prepared fresh appetizers by replacing the typical bread or biscuits by a cucumber. Get her recipes of Boursin filling, hummus and more tasty combinations. Eliza created height on her buffet simply by raising a plate with a cafe au lait bowl.

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I am writing this post in response to a reader’s question. Jessica B. wanted to know where to get this type of cupcake stand.

I usually ask my cupcake baker to make it. This way, I am sure that the colors are coordinated with the cupcakes. But if you do it yourself, you could start from your party decor and provide a sample of your stand paper and ribbons to the cupcake baker.

These are not hard to do if you have some crafting experience. Cakejournal published a step-by-step tutorial on how to make your own cupcake stand. You can be as imaginative as you want. Look at the bold stands produced by Mandotts on Flickr. She is a talented woman with a flair for cupcake and cake decorations.

These stands are for one use only.

PHOTO CREDITS:
+ Cupcake Stand Tutorial by Cakejournal
+ Custom Cupcake Stands by Mandotts

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