Valentine's Day Wreath

This wreath may look familiar. It is the same one that I made for Christmas but easily re-purposed! All I did was take off the snowflakes and add cute styrofoam hearts and decorations. Perfect example of all the things you can do with these wreaths. I bought some orange polydeco mesh on clearance after the Holidays and plan to do a UT one in the fall!

Happy Valentine's Day!

I got a new car!!!

It is a little bitter-sweet but I am so excited to say the least! I've loved my Explorer and had it since I was 16! Most of your probably know that I love to drive and pretty much lived out of the back of my car!

But now that I have a new, beautiful, clean car and plan to keep it that way! No more hauling junk around! Here she is...

My Nissan Murano!

The dash with so many buttons! I have yet to discover what they all are for!

This cute little box is just the first step to keeping my car nice and neat! I love driving it so far. I'm thinking road trip soon?!?

Chocolate Covered Strawberries

All signs this week have been pointing to chocolate this week for some reason. Seth and I started talking about chocolate covered strawberries one night and I couldn't stop thinking of them. So I figured we'd have a little Valentine's Day treat a few weeks early. Now I know it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out how to make chocolate covered strawberries but thought I would feature it anyway. All you need is strawberries and chocolate (I used candy melt).

First wash and dry your strawberries. Heat your chocolate in a bowl for 2 minutes, then stirring and repeating until melted. While holding the stem, dip each side in the chocolate, forming a sweetheart shape near the top. Set to dry on wax paper.

Now if that doesn't make your mouth water I don't know what will! This was on of my favorites, a tuxedo strawberry. You can also drizzle it with alternating colors. I did this using a piping bag but you can also use a ziplock bag with the tip cut out!

YUMMM! I made about 20 strawberries for $6. Around Valentine's Day you could pay up to $40 for a dozen. Plus it's something fun to do together, or maybe even fondue! Enjoy!

Make your own wedding centerpiece

I apologize in advance for the length of this post. If you are looking for super quick instructions on how to do your wedding flowers, you won't find it here. But it is informative if you really want to go through with this.

I had quotes upwards of $3000 for all our flowers. That was a LOT more than I was willing to spend. So I hired Jan Giordano to do all the bouquets and ceremony flowers and decided to the reception flowers myself! Or more like with the help of my wonderful bridesmaids and Mother-in-law! The flowers made me most nervous throughout planning. This couldn't be done weeks ahead like almost every other DIY project. It had to be done in the most stressful 48 hours leading up the wedding! I definitely had my doubts.

Enter Geny's Wholesale, my life saver. Located in Nashville, this place is amazing! You can order flowers, take flower classes, or use a consultant for help. I went into this without a clue but they were so helpful. I had planned for a combination of (19) small and (7) large arrangements. I bought the small vases at Dollar Tree and the larger ones at TJ Maxx, which required lots of trips.

In order to figure out how many flowers I needed, I attempted a test run with flowers from the grocery! Here I am going to focus on my larger centerpieces. My smaller ones were much simpler and don't require much instruction. I originally planned on using roses, hydrangeas, hypercium (green berries), white stock and greenery filler. I didn't quite stick to this in the end. I'll explain later. Other than the flowers, here's what you need:

• large vase, any height with 5-7 inch diameter
• floral tape, waterproof works best
• flower shears
  
• fresh floral foam, a good sized piece but must fit on the plate
  
• a clear plastic plate, I used 7.5"

Wet your floral foam. Place onto the plastic plate. Tape the floral foam tightly to the plate by wrapping the tape all the way around. Set on the vase.

Begin adding the greenery filler all over. You will add more later but you want to get a base on it so it won't cover up the flowers you add later. Be sure to stick the stem as far towards the center/bottom as possible so it stays.

Here I am testing the look. This is where I decided not to use hydrangeas. The cost had something to do with it, too. Beware: while hydrangeas are beautiful, they wilt quickly and require lots of water. They do not sit very well in the floral foam and can be tricky if you don't have experience working with them. Everything else turned out to work pretty good. I ended up adding some green buttons, carnations instead of hydrangeas, and gypsophila (baby's breathe), and bells of ireland (inside the vases).

I found it was best to seperate the different flowers in different levels. Start at the top. Our venue had high ceiling so I used the Stock (5 stems) to create height. Then I added the roses (5) at a 45 degree angle. Then the carnations (8) parallel with the table. I used more greenery, the gyp and buttons to fill in any wholes. I filled the vases with water and (2) Bells of Ireland and put the plate on top.

All in all, I spent almost $350 on the reception flowers, about $12.50 on each centerpiece. It may seem like a lot to some of you, but my quote was $45 for each centerpiece. So I ended up saving a lot. Our prep the day before took about an hour. On the day of the wedding, my MIL and I worked on these from 6am-9am. Not recommended but well worth it!

Here's a closeup!

Here is what they looked like complete and on the table. Love them even more that I did them myself! So proud! These also work great for wedding and baby showers, really any type of party!

Happy Birthday to me!!

What a wonderful birthday already! I want to do this to the yummy red velvet cake from my sweet Aunt Lea! I am so blessed to have such wonderful friends and family! Off to dinner with my amazing husband! Birhdays are the best!

Made with Love

Some of my absolute favorite gifts, to give and receive, are handmade things. Unfortunately, I opted for mostly buying instead of making this year for Christmas. But I wanted to share some of the things I made last year.

Aprons
I made these for my cousins and Seth's cousins last year for Christmas! There are so many possibilities with prints and patterns. You can really customize them to any hobby or personality. I didn't actually use a pattern at all. I just traced an apron I already had on the reverse side of the fabric. I cut it about 2 inches outside that tracing. Then ironed and pinned the hems and started sewing. For simple ties around the waist and neck you can use ribbon.

Cookbooks
My Aunt Lea wanted to make cookbooks for all of her nieces, including me. Since I was living with her at the time, she enlisted my help. This was a very time consuming project. We had my mom, grandmother and other aunts send us favorite and family recipes. Then we typed them up and put them in a cute decorated binder! So easy to add to for years to come!

Spirited Art - Come see me!

I got a new job!!! Just one on the side, something fun to do two nights a week and make a little extra money. I'll be working at Spirited Art, the place in my post a while back. I am going to be an Assistant Teacher on busy class nights, usually Thursday and Sunday nights. It is going to be so much fun! Come see me at work to paint, drink some wine, and have a great time!!!

2011 Calendar and Flower Magnets

We're 11 days into the year and I still can't believe it's 2011! I'm in the process of organizing, which includes our schedules. Growing up my mom always kept a calendar on our fridge with everyone's schedule. It's a great location because you look at it everyday and always know what's going on. I discovered the most adorable printable monthly calendar on SWITCHEROOm. I just had to share! I wish I could post it here but you'll have to visit Elle's site and comment on her blog post to get it! Really simple and worth it, I promise!

Here are all the months layed out... Perfect!

Now that I found the perfect calendar, I just needed some cute magnets to display with it. So, of course, I decided to make them. I pulled out some fabric scraps, magnet tape and my glue gun for this craft. Let's go to work!

I cut the scraps into 14-18 inch strips, all about 2 inches wide. Then I folded one end in half lengthwise. I started to roll them up while twisting the fabric and hot glueing along the way. This was a lot of trial and error. I really thought it was going to look terrible at first but I loved the finished product!

Closeup! Love this little guy, and the rose magnet too!

January calendar with fabric flower magnets on our fridge. Fabulous, functional and free - doesn't get any better than that!

Make your own garter

I have yet to recap any of the DIY projects from our wedding. But I have had some requests on how I made my garter – Tennessee, of course. First I headed to Hobby Lobby to pick up the goods. Here’s what you need:

• 1 yard of semi-thick lace

• A package of thin elastic

• Ribbon of your choice (Note: the ribbon has to be wider than the elastic)

• Any embellishments (I recommend buttons for this because they are cute and really easy to attach)

• Needle and thread

I’ve seen garters similar to mine that go for $30. My cost was around $4 but could vary depending on what fabrics and embellishments you choose. I purchased a cheap throw garter that I used for a reference, very helpful if you are unsure.

First, I stretched out the throw garter to get a better idea of the length I needed, it’s a lot more than you think! Then I cut the lace and the ribbon to the approximate length. Better too long than too short here! Pin the ribbon to the lace and sew them together along the very edges of the ribbon (both sides), do not sew together the ends.

Then attach a small safety pin to the end of the elastic and thread it in between the lace and ribbon.

This next step involves some trial and error and a few safety pins, at least for me. Once you have it all the way through, pin one end of the elastic to the lace. Then scrunch up the lace along the elastic.

Pin the end of the scrunched lace to the elastic. Put the piece around your leg, face down to your skin. Pin the ends together leaving some excess fabric on both ends. Now everything fits according to your liking, sew the elastic to the ribbon and the ends and sew the two ends together. That’s it for the basics.

Then you can add a bow, which I sewed on, and any embellishments. All done! Now you just have to remember to use a throw garter!

Language Art

As you know from previous posts, I am a big fan of memorable, yet creative art in a home. I love things that are both visually beautiful and memorable. Here is another example of a copycat of mine. You may have seen this somewhere or another. Michaels Crafts even carries these in the custom framing department now. I think they make great gifts, especially for wedding or baby showers. Not bad on the wallet either, when you do them yourself! In stores, I've seen them go upwards of $10 a photo for custom words.

I started taking pictures of numbers and letters last summer after I discovered this at a store in Knoxville. Once again, I decided it was much more economical to do myself! And, it is actually pretty fun to see where all you can find letters in nature and architecture. Here are some of the projects I did.

My fave! Pictures from memorable places for Seth and I: From a favorite restaurant, old apartments, Neyland Stadium, Sunsphere, etc...

A little blurry - E&P for Erica & Phil!

Our wedding date, which I have yet to get printed! Not sure where it will go, maybe when we get more space!

Well, you get the idea! Now I have every letter (except q) and still find myself looking for them sometimes. If anyone wants some letters to get printed for their place, just let me know. I don't have as many numbers but I'd be more than happy to share whatever I do!

Happy New Year!!!

Love,

Knoxybear, aka Party Animal