Merry Christmas

Christmas in the City

Christkindl Market

 

Michigan Avenue

 

 

Fourth Presbyterian Church

State Street

 

Corner Christmas Tree Lot

It may be dark by 4:30 these days. But when you have views like this, it makes it a bit more tolerable!

Coming Soon

to an Etsy Shop near to you!

Here are some new items I've been working on lately. As usual, I saw an idea on the web & decided to put my own twist on it.
What do you think, are any of these worthy of appearing in my shop?

Felt Flower Note Cards

Thank You Notes

Bright Pink Ruffle Flower Pin

White Ruffle Flower Pin


Cream Ruffle Flower Pin

Red & Turquoise Pin

Deck the Halls

Kelly's Korner Blog is doing a Show Us Your Life - Christmas Tour of Homes

I live in a small (as in 600 square feet small) apartment. So decorating for Christmas can sometimes be a challenge. But I love the challenge, so here's how I decorated this year!

My Tree. It's a 6-foot tree, but pretty skinny, so it fits well in a corner without having to move furniture too much.

I created this Christmas print from another one I saw on Pinterest

Red berries & gold ornaments in a vase

Floating striped candles with holly & cranberries

Kissing Ball on my chandelier

Grapevine wreath wrapped in ribbon, branches with mini ornaments, and bay leaf garland

A "Merry" banner I made

The Gifts are Wrapped

I love wrapping gifts. Maybe even more than shopping for them!

And it's a running joke in my family that as soon as the gift is unwrapped, the ribbon is handed back to me. Because, yes, it's usable again. And before you think I'm some sort of hoarder, I don't keep the generic gift wrap ribbon. I'm talking about keeping ribbon like this:

I love getting new ideas on how to present a gift to someone. And Pinterest has been a great source for ideas. In fact, I created a board dedicated entirely to gift wrap.

Let me share with you this year's wrapped gifts. I call these the poor girl's gift wrapping options. It didn't cost me a penny because everything I used - paper, ribbon & tags - I already had on hand.


A while back, I purchased a bunch of picture frames. To protect the frames, the store wrapped them in thick white paper. I used that paper to wrap most of my gifts this year.

And because white paper is a little boring, I brought out all my colorful ribbon to dress them up. Here I used green, red & tan ribbon to create a unique bow.



I love yarn pom poms. So I made 2 little ones in dark red & attached them to the top of this gift.


I found this idea on Pinterest: reusing grocery bags to make a fun gift topper. This one is a Target bag. It looks better in person than it does in the photo.


I love Trader Joe's! Their brown bags make a great wrapping paper. I had to use 2 bags to cover this gift. The seam of the 2 papers is covered with the Christmas tree ribbon. I added coordinating yarn to finish it off.


Speaking of Trader Joe's bags, at Christmas time, their bags come with holiday prints on them. This year, they have cut out gift tags & decorated strips you can use. I used two of the strips here & topped it with foil candy cups.

Another way I used the candy wrappers.


And finally, these are wrapped in white paper & topped with simple gold & green ribbons.


So there you have it, ways to wrap your gifts without spending much!