One week until Christmas!

Christmas is fast approaching, and I have to admit that I'm really looking forward to my first Christmas as a wife.  Here are a few photos of our tree this year.

We got this ornament on our honeymoon in Maui and we couldn't wait to hang it on the tree.  It is going to bring back great memories every year when we put it on the tree.

And here is our "Our First Christmas" ornament that we chose.  I looked FOREVER and finally ended up deciding on this cute snowflake from the Hallmark store. I wanted something that was classic and would still be cute 20 years from now.

And here is something that I just had to share :) My husband and I exchanged 1 present early this year.  He gave me these adorable Coach ear muffs! I am in love with them. He is so good to me :)

Christmas Wreath

Finally found a magnetic wreath holder for my door so that I could hang my wreath.  Here is a close up of the finished product:

I got all of my supplies from Hobby Lobby. I used ribbon, ornaments, bells, and painted a wooden letter to match.  I used a hot glue gun to attach all of the decor.  It was pretty difficult to attach the flat letter to the round wreath, but with enough glue sticks you can do anything :)

Here is a shot of the entire door and another close up:

This was such a fun project and I'm happy with how it turned out.  It was so easy to do! I hope I inspired you to make your own :)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Christmas is my FAVORITE holiday, so I tend to completely bypass Thanksgiving.  This is my first Christmas in my own home (previously I've lived in apartments) so I have been looking forward to decorating. 

I've only put a few touches around the house, but I'm excited about what I have so far. 

My first creation was glittered pinecones.

This was so easy to do and I think the result is gorgeous. All you need is pinecones, your choice of glitter, spray adhesive, and paper sacks.  Fill a paper sack with a generous amount of glitter, spray a pinecone with the adhesive (make sure to get underneath too), drop in the paper sack, and shake for a few seconds.  I found that it helped to wear gloves, otherwise you end up covered in glue and glitter. 

This vase filled with sticks was my next project.  I found sticks in my backyard and spray painted them silver.  To make it really festive, I added small red ornaments and a big red bow on the front of the vase.

While shopping a few weeks ago, I came across these gorgeous red feather trees.  I really, really wanted to get one, but I couldn't find a red one in the 12" size I wanted... so I decided to try to make it myself.  It only took me about 30 seconds to find a tutorial online (Here is the Martha Stewart Tutorial that I used).  All you need is a styrofoam cone, feathers, a skewer, and hot glue.  I found that it took 3 bags of feathers to complete my 12" tree.  I was picky about which ones I wanted to use.  My only complaint was that my feathers didn't curve out as much as the ones Martha Stewart used.  Overall I liked the end result though. :) 

So here is my finished Christmas shelf.  I lined it was garland and added a cute silver reindeer that I picked up the other day.  I like how it turned out, but I'm sure I can think of something else to add to make it even better. 

I'm almost done with my wreath, so I'll be posting a picture of that in the near future!