Happy Easter!

Wishing you the very best Easter full of fluffy bunnies like this one:

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I hope you have a great day full of egg hunts, binge eating chocolate, and enjoying the delights of spring! Happy Easter! 

Chickie Gardland

With Easter just around the corner - I am convinced to make one of these awesome chickie garlands from Miss Vicky Viola (link)! It is was too cute to resist:

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Eee!  Those little fluff ball chicks are so adorable and although I do find the image of the needle going through one of them a little disturbing, this DIY is right up my alley! I mean pom poms and cute animals? I'm sold. I even bought a bunch of those little chicks from the craft store and although they are currently hanging out all over my house (I got a little excited with my decorating), I feel I have the skills to pull this one off. We will see how it goes. Do you ever decorate for holidays? What do you do for Easter?

Oh no you didn't!

Since Fraser has been trying extra hard to cut out all refined sugar in his diet I attempt to be supportive. Sure I love myself a little sugar binge once in a while but find if I can resist the temptation in the store it's easy to live without it. That is...until they bring candy corn out for Valentine's Day:

Oh dear! You know I can't say no to the delicious wonders of candy corn! How sneaky of your candy makers to conveniently change the colours to be more Valentines-y! What a delicious surprise! And since this time of year also means the arrival of one of my other seasonal favourites (cinnamon hearts) I think February 14th may just be a little extra exciting this year! Hooray! What are your favourite candies? Any seasonal faves like me? 

Happy Xmas!

Happy Christmas everyone! Fraser and I are having a nice quiet day at home getting ready for our big trip to Vegas!! Woo woo! I promised I'd share some finished pictures of our wee little tree in all it's glory so today is the perfect day for it! Check it out:

And now for some close ups - can you tell I like woodland themed ornaments?

Oh, and robots...

Here's one last one pulling it all together once the sun goes down:

How are you spending this Christmas? 

Snowflake Card Clothesline!

I figure I had better put up all my festive decorating pictures quickly before xmas has come and gone (boy time flies!) so today I'm sharing my snowflake and holiday card clothesline! Take a peek:

Isn't it fun? In past years I've set up my cards on top of the tv but since they always end up falling off or piling so I can't see them I bought a card clothesline from Lee Valley at the  begging of the month. I'm sure you could make your own version (since it's just nylon cord and mini clothes pegs) but it was reasonable and came in a cute tin! Yay!

Next I decided to whip out the perler beads and designed and ironed up loads of different white snowflakes! Then it was just a matter of stringing them up with some butchers twine and using more mini pegs to hang them up! I had such a great time making up the snowflake patterns and am really pleased with how it all came together. Here are a few more images of some of my snowflakes:

Hooray! What do you think? What do you do with cards when you get them? 

Festive Date Night

As part of our advent calendar activities Fraser and I had a fun festive date night downtown! We went out for a quiet dinner and then checked out all the decorated trees at the Empress! I loved the fancy gold ornaments on this tree:

and couldn't resist taking a picture of the giant tree in the lobby!:

Heck, even the tour busses were dolled up:

Then it was a quaint little stroll checking out the lights in the inner harbour and at the Parliament buildings: 

Hoho! Aren't those fun? Not quite as adorable as this horse in a wee little santa hat though - he is just darling!

Yay! We finished off the night with hot chocolates and a cider and a lovely car ride home listening to Charlie Brown Christmas! Oh how lovely! Have you been doing any festive sight seeing this year? 

Stockings for Advent

So I was a little late on posting this project - since the month is almost over - but I am so proud of my crafty productivity this December I figured better late than never! I've been drooling over all the cute advent calendar ideas out there and decided to make Fraser his very own using little felt stockings!  Take a peek:

Although I'm sure I could have make my own stockings, I picked these mini ones up from Michaels and wrote the days on them glitter paint pens! Then it was just a matter of hanging them with some stripy butcher twine and fill them up with goodies! I opted for little notes suggesting festive activities to do together, as well as some traditional chocolates, and a few scratch and wins! So far Fraser seems to be enjoying it and I love how they look hanging in our living room! Here's a detail shot so you can see some of the different stocking patterns:

Hooray! I can't wait to reuse this baby year after year - so here's to hoping it holds up! What do you think? 

Holly Jolly Crochet Holly

At the beginning of the month I did a post showing a fun crochet holly gift topper pattern (link) and was extra excited to try it out for myself! I modified it a bit (as I seem to do with all my crafts) and decided to go with three little holly berry poms instead of one! The result? One awesome crochet holly:

I wanted a little more versatility than just wrapping for gifts so I sewed a bar pin on the back and voila! Instant awesome handmade festive brooch:

Yay! I experimented a bit with the pattern and holly designs and ended up making two of the three leaf hollys and two with two leaves crossing over a bit:

I think the two leaf holly pieces would look extra cute pinned to a xmas stocking and love how the three leaf pin looks on a cardigan! What a festive look! I even sewed a hair clip to one of them and am wearing it to work today! Hooray! I'm so happy with how they turned out and love actually completing craft projects once in a while! What do you think? Are you going to attempt your own crochet jolly holly? 

my new favourite ornaments!

A wonderful parcel arrived yesterday and just look at what was inside!

Oh my! Fraser's parents (most likely his Mom I'm guessing) are the best! One of the wonderfully wrapped gifts inside said "open right now" and once we did I was squealing with excitement! Who doesn't want a nice pair of festive sparkly amanita toadstool ornaments? That's right - there's two of them! Take another peek:

Aren't they fun? It's been extra challenging to get good picture taking lighting this time of year (with the very short/non existant natural sunlight and loads of rain) so once conditions are suitable I'll be sure to snap some pictures of how amazing they look on the tree! Yay! What are your favourite holiday ornaments? 

fun with sparkly pipe cleaners!

The other day after work I took a peek into the dollar store to see what fun holiday themed goodies I could find. I ended up being drawn to a very sparkly bag of xmas pipe cleaners and (of course) picked it up! Who could pass up a big ol' bag of red, green, silver, and gold goodness just waiting to be crafted with! So I brought the sparkly joy back home and decided that these particular pipe cleaners were destine to become xmas candy canes! Yay!

This craft probably qualifies as kid friendly since it is incredibly easy, minor motor skills are required, and all you need is pipe cleaners and snips. It also lands in the "my favourite kind of craft" project because it takes all of one minute to complete. Ready? Let's go:

Step 1: Pick out a nice combination of candy cane pipe cleaners and line them up

Step 2: Twist away!

Step 3: Grab the kitchen scissors and snip your twisted sparkly stick into smaller pieces. I decided to go with three canes per cleaner, but you could easily make them as big or small as you'd like

Step 4: Bend the top of your piece into a festive candy cane shape and you're set!

Step 5 (optional): Go crazy and make yourself an army of canes!!!

Now wasn't that fun? What do you with your masses of festive candy canes you ask? Well those options are endless!  I decided to hang some of the candy canes on my little tree as tinsel and they really add some extra sparkle when the twinkle lights are on. I taped some to some holiday parcels as a little gift topper and ended up decorating a stocking with them too! Finally I sent the remaining canes along with a few xmas cards to some pals who will hopefully have their own imaginative new homes.  If I had a cat I would have happily taken pictures of nameless cat (probably) going wild over how fun they are to play with! Hooray!  What do you think? Any pipe cleaner candy cane uses I haven't thought of? 

secret santa

Guess what? I'm back! I'm still on the mend from this stomach virus I can't seem to kick but I've been busy crafting up a storm so I wanted to pop back in and share some with you! Hooray! 

So what's new with me? Well, this year I landed an easy secret santa partner for our exchange at work!  Since I know she happens to be a fan of my homemade earrings, all I needed to do was whip a few pairs up and put them together nicely on a card. Bring out the crafting supplies and this is what I ended up with:

Take a closer peek at my traditional recycled cardstock with a hint of rubber stamp and some washi tape and bam! There it is

I even got to use my new lovely lowercase letter stamps to personalize the whole things with my secret santa's name (Emily) on the bottom:

Now to wrap it up in an inconspicuous box so she will have no idea what she's receiving (well...until the opens it...):

Yaayyy! What do you think? Do you partake in secret santas? 

It's beginning to look a lot like xmas!

Victoria is wonderful.  It's a great city filled with nice people, fun things to do and see, and a nice mild winter climate.  The downfall of that rainy mildness? No xmas snow! Okay...so snow in Victoria is actually sort of terrible since no one knows how to deal with it and the whole city shuts down...but it isn't very festive without it! To counteract the non-winter wonderland I've been pulling out all the decorating stops! Hooray! Jim already jumpstarted the fun by putting up some nice white xmas lights and once Fraser came home and whipped out the xmas box - things were in full swing! Including:

1) Xmas tree/holiday scents:

2) Holiday dvds (including this yule log gem with optional smooth jazz piano xmas classics):

3) The cutest yeti topped table top tree!

4) and apparently holiday themed decorations on a doily:

Okay, so the playmobil is a new addition to the decor this year, but it was in the box so out it comes! Now all I need to do is finish up the end bits of my holiday shopping and wrapping and getting those parcels out in the mail! Then a few more weeks of Fraser filled December bliss and it will be the big day! Yay! How is your holiday decorating going? Are you ready for xmas this year? 

Advent-ures in Paper!

 I have always been a huge fan of the advent calendar. Nothing like a chocolate filled countdown to the big day to perk up the holidays! This year I bought mine extra early and snagged a sbux one when they came out in November but once December starts up I always wish I had made one. I am especially in love with this neat printable advent village from Mr. Printables (link):

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Isn't it fun? Well apparently it was so tempting that my wonderfully paper crafty pal Lindsay whipped one up for her own handmade piano decorating:

Perhaps the quick cell phone picture isn't the best to show it off but I LOVE it! I think next year I will definitely make one for Fraser and I and fill them with candies and little neat festive plans for each day! What a plan! Do you celebrate the season with advent calendars? 

quite possibly the BEST xmas wrapping topper EVER!

You may think that blog post title was a tad exaggerated...but wait until you see this spectacular festive yarn gift topper from One Sheepish Girl (link):

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*Gasp!* Did it just take your breath away with its amazing awesomeness? No? Well...perhaps you aren't as easily excited about these things as I am but I am in love. What a sweet way to combine some of my favourite wintery activities - gift wrapping, crafting, crocheting, and POM POMS! Eeee! You could even take this beyond the intended gift purposes and throw them all over the place! You name it - wreaths, brooches, hair accessories - I'm all over this! I figure if reindeer ears are allowed at work giant pom pom holly hair bands should be too right? Anyone else out there as mad for this project as I am? 

Umbra Stitched Fireplace

This will be the first year in my entire 28 years of existence that I won't be going home for xmas.  Unfortunately it just isn't going to work out this year so instead of Dad reading "Twas the Night Before Christmas" and hanging our stockings on the fireplace, Fraser and I will get the chance to come up with our own festive traditions and have a quiet time together instead.  Fraser and I keep talking about the nice things we can do to make the holidays special and I think this amazing cross stitch fireplace I saw on Umbra's instagram feed would be spectacular:

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Maybe we could add some little hooks at the top to hang our stockings and listen to some jazzy Charlie Brown tunes around our "fireplace" and xmas tree! Heck - Fraser even suggested making a cardboard fireplace to put around our tv and then find one of those roaring fire dvds to set the tone of things. Oh the possibilities! What sort of traditions do you enjoy during the holidays? Do your activities involve the fireplace? 

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! Looks like we've made it to the end of the month already which means it's time to celebrate one of the funnest holidays of the year! I had high hopes for lots of decorating to go on this year but just didn't seem to make it happen  - so here's a sweet little pumpkin I carved a few years back instead:

It isn't quite as impressive as the dozen or so pumpkins my mom likes to carve every year, but he does the trick and since I don't have any carving tools (or the wrist strength to do any pumpkin gutting) I will just keep milking off the carving I did three years ago until I feel motivated to carve again.  I was motivated enough to buy a little plastic pumpkin (oh I know, such hard effort involved) and put one of my succulents in him for some end of the month festiveness! Take a peek:

Hehe! Isn't he a smiley chap? It also involved zero wrist strain, no mess, and can be used from year to year! What a win! I am dressing up in my fox costume today for work and am looking forward to seeing what creative costumes other people have come up with. I tried really hard to convince one of my favourite customers to come to work dressed up since he told me he went as "Sheldon Cooper from The Big Bang Theory dressed up as The Doppler Effect" (here's a link to the episode clip if you haven't seen it)! Maybe Matt will humour me and make some nice Doppler Effect noises for me regardless of costume... What are you doing to celebrate Halloween today? Trick or treating with the wee ones? Handing out candy? Dressing up as something spooky? Details please! 

Ghostie Decor

While I was busy working away on my Halloween costume (and watching my new favourite show - Downton Abbey), I realized that I didn't get around to scheduling blog posts for the week like I usually do on Sundays. Oh dear! The good news is I did manage to get my costume done (yipee) and since I was in a very festive mood I thought I'd share this adorable ghost garland from Wild Olive (link):

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Isn't it just perfect? I love the simple shapes and (of course) wide set eye smiles! Also, much like all projects I love posting about, it is quick, simple, and I happen to have all the supplies on hand! How perfect! Now to figure out the perfect placement and whip this baby up for myself. What do you think? Do you decorate for Halloween? 

Already?

Is it just me or does the xmas stuff seem to come out earlier and earlier each year. Sure Costco had trees out in August, but when I went out grocery shopping this Thursday I discovered that Superstore had all their festiveness on! Trees, decorations, wrapping - the works. Perhaps Canada is trying to take after our neighbours to the south and roll it all out right after Thanksgiving? Isn't it pushing it a bit? There were isles upon isles of holiday cheer vomited all over the right half of the store.  Although I am certainly not prepared to start thinking about the holidays, I was pleasantly surprised by this very lovely ugly xmas sweater inspired tray I spotted:

I am a such sucker for browsing the kitchen section and I tend to have an especially soft spot for trays.  Luckily I am fully stocked on trays at home (which I use all the time for working on crafts on the couch) so this was wasn't necessary but I do enjoy the knit motif.  I've also decided that taking pictures of things I like in stores is a great alternative to buying them. It let's me share and enjoy their cuteness, is remarkably less costly, and ends with me not having a house full of things I never get to use (especially holiday stuff that only comes out for one month of the year). What a plan!

So what do you think? How do you feel about stores putting out holiday merchandise in October? Am I the only one that feels like it's ridiculous? Would you have resisted the $14 knit deer tray?

Homemade Foxy Halloween

Isn't Lindsay just the best for keeping your company while I was off sick? I think so! Now that I'm back (and still a wee bit woozy) I thought I'd start off my posting with what crafty adventures I've been dreaming up! First on the list - Halloween! It's October now and since I bombed on the costume front last year, I figure I need to pull something off for work this time around. I waffled around with a few options and after a nice process of elimination (and look in my closet) I've decided to be a fox this year! Not just any fox either - an amigurumi one! Time to get some orange yarn and my 5mm crochet hook out to make myself some handcrafted foxy ears and tail.  I'm confident with that my free styling hook skills are good enough that I don't need a pattern - but I certainly enjoyed gaining a little inspiration from some crafty foxes on etsy:

(1, 2, 3, 4, and 5)

Aren't they fun? I love different things about each of the listings I showed above so I figure I can meld them into some sort of yarn fox concoction that will suit my costume needs! I'm going to skip out on any plans for a full toque hat and figure a nice hair band with fox ears will mix into my already red/orange hair quite nicely. Then I've just got to figure out some makeshift tail that I can pin on and I'm golden! Oh, throw in some tights, and orange dress and red cardigan from my closet and voila! Halloween is taken care of! Any thoughts? 

Knit Candy Corn!

Guess what!? October is rolling along and that only means one thing: my most favourite seasonal candy is coming out! Woo candy corn! Now, if I only I could knit...

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...then I would totally make three of these! Aren't they awesome? Nothing says fall quite like some wooly yellow, orange, and white! I love all the projects over at The Purl Bee (link), but these hold an extra special spot in my heart (or at least in my sweet tooth?). They'd be extra fun with some little smiles and feets on them and would really look top notch hanging out on my shelf in the living room. Perhaps I will try a crochet cousin of these babies if I find some extra time one of these days. If not - I am certainly enjoying this image of them and maybe if one of you make them I can vicariously craft with you too! Hooray! What do you think? What's your favourite seasonal candy?