Free Christmas Poster Printables

Have you decorated for the holidays yet? I like having Thanksgiving so early in the month - I feel like I'm much more ahead of schedule than usual!

One new thing I did this year was to add some Christmas printables to this series of three frames I already had on the wall behind our kitchen table. These 'chalkboard' printables are from Nest of Posies - I love them!

Here are links to a number of Christmas printables if you'd like to add some to your frames! Check out each of the links - sometimes there are more options than shown here.

Nest of Posies - Chalkboard Printables

The Blue Eyed Owl - Joy to the World

A Night Owl  & Just Us Three Designs - Joy to the World

Smile Like You Mean It - Chalkboard Subway Art

Sweet Rose Studio - Reindeer & Jingle

Tattered and Inked - Reindeer Names

Design Dazzle - Chevron Merry Christmas

Less Cake More Frosting - Believing

Printable Decor - Cheer & Trees

Over the Big Moon - Cold Outside

Antsi-Pants - Christmas subway art

The Jacobs Clan - Variety of Christmas printables

Polkadots on Parade: Tree & Ho Ho Ho

Agape Love - Merry Christmas

Two Twenty One - Chevron

Tattered and Inked - Most Wonderful

Creationz - Ho Ho Ho

Simple as That - Christmas Word Tree

Capital B - O Holy Night 

Sugar Tot Designs - 12 Days

aka Design - Joy & Adore

The 36th Avenue - Advent Tree

Today's Creative Blog - Holiday Cheer

Lemon Squeezy - Tree

Aren't they great?! Do you know of any others I should add??

Featured:

Foreign Coin Magnets

What do you do with your foreign coins? We never really figured out what to do with them - they just sort of turn up randomly around the house, although whenever I see them, it makes me happy. When I saw a pin on this post from Tattered Style, I knew I finally had a foreign coin solution!

These were the coins I was able to find after a quick search, since like I said, we don't really have a spot where we keep them. I used round magnets and a hot glue gun. My magnets didn't seem very powerful and some of the coins were fairly heavy, so I was afraid they might not stick well, but they work perfectly fine. This project literally just takes a few minutes, looks great (they're classy looking magnets, aren't they??), and brings back happy memories whenever I go to the fridge. I love them!

Cranberry {Orange, Pineapple, Walnut} Sauce

Happy Thanksgiving!! How were your holidays? We had a nice relaxing day with my family at my aunt & uncle's house, where the only thing I was asked to bring was 'my' cranberry sauce.

This has become 'my' cranberry sauce because I've made it for the past several holiday meals, but (shh, don't tell!) I just use this recipe. And I follow it exactly. Check the link for the full recipe, but here are some thoughts from my experience...

• If you've never had homemade cranberry sauce and always use the cans (which was me until a few years ago) - there's seriously no comparison. I don't have any desire to eat the canned stuff again!
• I have even less desire to eat the canned kind since this is so easy - chopping the orange is by far the worst & slowest part (although I am admittedly a terrible chopper). It's very quick and very simple (and also fun - I love when the cranberries start popping!)
• The combination of flavors in this recipe is really nice - the orange and pineapple give it a different spin, and I love the crunch of the walnuts.
• I'm not a big fan of it plain, as it's a little on the bitter side, but I think it's absolutely perfect paired with turkey so I haven't adjusted the recipe. If you'd prefer to cut down the bitterness, you could reduce the orange.
• The recipe yields a massive amount. We usually have a gang of 12 or so, and there is always some leftover. If you have a smaller bunch, you may want to reduce the recipe.  Orrrr... you can use the leftovers in other tasty ways. I had some mixed in with my oatmeal for breakfast this morning, and I want to try these cranberry sauce muffins.

If you don't already make homemade cranberry sauce, or if you'd like to try something a little different, I highly recommend this one!

After dinner, we spent a little time in the backyard. Yes, this is my aunt & uncle's backyard - isn't it amazing?!

Rub a dub dub: Enjoying your tub

I've always been a big fan of baths in all their hot, steamy, relaxing, wonderfulness. But lately, I haven't been able to take one - we've had a clog. A BAD one that turned our tub into utter grossness. I don't know about you, but I can't seem to avoid this issue. In my renting days, this was easily the most common problem we needed to get fixed. Once we bought out own place, it took us a while to figure out how to handle it. We tried the chemical stuff over and over with little to no success. We called a plumber once who totally gouged us. Finally, we discovered the zip-it. I'm convinced this is the best possible way to unclog a drain. This puny little piece of plastic doesn't look very convincing but it seriously works wonders. Although it's not exactly an enticing topic, I just thought I'd share in case anyone else out there with similar issues hasn't discovered it yet!

Since we got the new ones we ordered in today, I'm looking forward to a nice, hot bath tonight - even if our tub doesn't look quite as nice as these. Oh, beautiful bathtubs! Maybe one day I'll have one on par with these - for now, I'll enjoy my clean, well-draining tub tonight!

Modern Bathroom design by Nashville Interior Designer Beckwith Interiors

Contemporary Bathroom design by Miami Kitchen And Bath Fixtures PSCBATH

Contemporary Bathroom design by Toronto Photographer Peter A. Sellar - Architectural Photographer

Contemporary Bathroom design

Contemporary Bathroom design by Miami Interior Designer Pepe Calderin

Modern Bathroom design by Seattle Architect Coates Design Architects Seattle

Modern Bathroom design by Boston Architect Stern McCafferty

Contemporary Bathroom design by Seattle Architect Garret Cord Werner

DIY Bina Wrap/Cardigan/Blouse/Scarf {or Dracula Cape}

Why hello, hello, and happy Monday to you! How was your weekend? Ours was pretty busy - we had an event with Bryan's company Friday night, a wedding in Annapolis on Saturday (don't you love the photo booth trend?), and then I ran the Vienna Turkey Trot on Sunday (Smokey & Bryan were there to support and even ran across the finish line with me). Fun times!

Anyway, I'm finally getting around to posting about the wrap I made last week. I recently came across this pin from the Fine Craft Guild to make your own Bina Brianca wrap. I hadn't heard of the wrap before, but since it sounded like pretty much the easiest project ever, I decided to give it a try.

64" fabric =Dracula cape

I got my fabric from the clearance section at Joann for $4.50 a yard, and overall, I followed their instructions, so there's no need for me to repost them here.... except that initially I didn't read the tutorial very carefully. I saw that it said 64" wide fabric, so I went with that, without paying attention to the further detail below about determining the length. Result? Dracula cape. If you want to make a nice cape, use 64" fabric. Otherwise, you may need to do some cutting. After this initial fail, I ended up going about 38" tall, 64" across, and using 12" arm slits (the 14" recommended seemed a little large to me).

Once I de-capeified it, here's what it looks like in a few more of the different styles. For more (with directions), see the Bina Brianca website. I doubt I'll ever wear a lot of the options, but even as a plain old cardigan it's really cozy - plus it's basically wrinkle-proof so it's great for traveling (and I always love traveling in big drapy sweaters that can double as a blanket).

And here's what it looks like laying flat:

Featured in Tutorials & Tips Link Party {86} at Home Stories A to Z!

Here's to the beginning of the end of my 20s...

I turned 29 last week on the 8th. Yikes! Time goes by way too fast now. Wasn't I just 25, like, last year?? The best part about my birthday was this awesome video Bryan put together for me. Isn't he the best?? :) The video starts with general photos from our life, then has a travel section, then a wedding section. It is pretty long, so if you're only going to watch a bit, I'd recommend checking out 4:50 and 6:25 (and watching each of those for a few seconds with the volume on). I love it!!



Here are a few birthday related Instagrams - Bryan took me out for dinner at a tasty Peruvian restaurant, my parents sent me these lovely flowers, and my nieces made me this awesome card (although my older niece is 10 years and the younger is 10 months, so I think one of them was a little more involved than the other!).