Oh What a Year

I claim that the year I was 22 was the best year of my life. Lots of great things happened that year.

 

However, I don't think I've ever had a more eventful year than this one!!

 

Starting with the birth of our second sweet baby, the births of lots of baby friends, the death of my sweet Granny, friends buying houses and moving, Hubby quitting his job and starting a new one, me quitting MY paying job...and starting a whole new adventure of staying home with my babies....

 

It has been a whirlwind of crazy around our house, but I wouldn't trade it for anything.

 

It's been a busy year around the blog too!

 

Here have been some of your favorite posts this year:

 

Mesh Wreaths are becoming soooo popular, and a lot of you have turned to THIS tutorial for guidance on making your own!

 

I've become a little obsessed with fonts this year, and have enjoyed compiling my favorites for YOU

 

 

I was actually surprised to see that This tutorial for easy microwave cleaning was so popular. I guess your microwaves were as neglected as mine.

 

 

Remember to check the Tutorials page for new tutorials all the time, or sign up to get Grits & Giggles in your inbox and never miss a post!

 

I'm so thankful for my readers sharing life with me day by day!

 

 

New Year Glitter Crafts

New Year's Eve always makes me think about glitter. Sometimes Hubby and I will go to a low-key New Years party with friends, but we're never at a glitter-showering bash at midnight. I guess all of the magic and sparkle of the ball drop, fireworks, and the hope of a wonderful new year gets me in the glitter spirit.

 

I don't decorate for the New Year...in fact, we leave our Christmas decorations out for a couple of weeks after Christmas. But in case you do, and you need some Glittery Inspiration...here are a few little crafts that you can whip up quickly and *sparkly* in time for a new years gathering.

 

Whether it's a champagne toast at midnight, or sweet tea before bed, everything will taste better in a sparkly glass! Living Locurto shows you how with.....nail polish!

 

 

 

I love candles, and often change them for new seasons to match our décor. How precious are these glitter accented candles from A Pumpin and a Princess?

 

 

Copy Craft show us how to make these sweet little napkins, perfect for finishing off your holiday table.

 

 

If you're throwing a New Year's bash and need some quick décor to throw on your mantle, doorways, or light fixtures...how about a glitter garland?

 

The Shabby Creek Cottage has a cute and easy one.

 

 

 

How cute would it be at midnight for everyone to reach into their own glitter vial for a shower of sparkles to ring in the new year? Emmalou shares a quick tutorial on making glitter vial necklaces.

(I just wouldn't want to be around for the clean up!)

 

 

Why just decorate your house? Decorate yourself in glitter too.

Sweet Verbena shows how she turned boring flats into fabulous shoes. I tried this last year... but mine was a little bit of a craft fail.

 

 

You can pretty up your walls with these sweet little frames from White House Black Shutters.

Love the ombre effect!!

 

 

Domestic Charm shows you how to create beautiful and easy glitter balloons. How cute would a balloon drop of THESE be at midnight??

 

 

 

Paper Pony shows us how to make these adorable glitter cake toppers. You could make them any shape for any occasion!

 

 

 

 I am obsessed with this tutorial from A Berry Sweet Life on making glitter letters. I will be trying it out ASAP to glitterize some things in my life!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you have a fun and sparkly new year!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Merry Christmas

Have a Very Merry Christmas

From my family to YOURS!

 

May your trees be twinkly and your hearts be full of joy during the celebration of

Jesus' birthday!

 

 

I hope Santa Claus is good to each of you! I hope he stops by here too!

 

Christmas Card Wreath

In case you are itching to do something with a hot glue gun the week before Christmas...why not make yourself a Christmas Card Wreath??

 

I have always stood our cards up on our mantle to display during the holidays, but now that more people are using photocards, there's no longer a bi-folded card to prop! Solution: the card wreath.

 

And it couldn't be easier to make!!

 

Materials:

 

Embroidery Hoop (wood or plastic)

Clothespins

Ribbon

Hot Glue

 

Two steps:

 

1) Hot glue clothespins around the embroidery hoop. Have a few pins pointing towards the center to fill the "hole". Use as many as you would like.

 

2) Tie a bow and a ribbon to hang your card wreath to the top of the hoop, covering the screw on the outside of the hoop.

 

DONE!!

 

I've been meaning to spray paint mine lime green, and add some glitter or paint to my clothespins to jazz it up a bit, but for now it works! Maybe next year.

 

*Happy Crafting*

 

The End of Football

The saddest time of year. We are done with home games and are now slaves to our TV to see college football games. Last year we managed to go to our bowl game which was AMAZING, even though it was 26 days before our son was born. (Maybe I jumped too hard when we won!)

We had an amazing time at our tailgate again spending time with the ones we love, and enjoying good food and football.

Papa spent his first football season with his grandson, teaching him the importance of Bojangles biscuits and yelling "Go Tigers"

The girls took full advantage of the "purple out" for military appreciation day. Gray thinks her purple pants are the coolest.

Our sweet family of 4. I swear baby boy knows how to smile. He's a very serious little man.

My babies have the best two grandparents that kids could ask for. Their Nana and Papa mean the world to them, and they shower the babies with more love than they know what to do with. 

 There's something about Game Day in Death Valley that makes us all very happy. The colors, the noise, and the family atmosphere make for some very fun weekends.

We pull for our tigers from our head to our toes...

Until next year....

GO TIGERS!

Christmas Comes Early

I hope you are all having a wonderful holiday season! Christmas is coming early for my readers...

especially my fellow "Crunchy Mamas".

 

I have a new pattern available...and it's FREE!

 

Download Here

 

If you've been around here a while you know that I'm obsessed with cloth diapers and how cute and soft they make the little hineys in my house.

 

I sewed a lot of newborn diapers for baby boy, and am now starting on a stash of bigger overnight fitteds for him. Fitted diapers are real workhorses, but they are expensive, so buying up a good stash can really cut into your budget.

 

 

However, sewing them is a real money saver, and you can make them unique and fun!

 

Hubby is completely obsessed with this diaper. What's not to love?

RealTree Camo and a Clemson Tiger Paw.

 

And for my techy baby.... "iPood"

It's the closest he'll get to an iPod anytime soon.

 

The beauty of fitted diapers is that they can be embroidered with no risk of hurting their absorbency. Perfect for feeding my new personalization habit.

 

The Mattie Diaper Pattern includes 4 sizes:

Newborn, Small, Medium, and Large.

 

This pattern guides you, step by step through making a fitted or All-In-One diaper from start to finish.

 

Here is an All-In-One I made for baby boy. It fits great around his skinny legs and chunky belly.

 

How much do you want to pinch those fat rolls? It's a miracle I get anything done around here with all of that cuteness crawling around.

 

 

The e-book includes ideas on making soaker pads as well, from materials to layers.

This version is a quick-dry soaker to take less drying time than other All-In-One diapers.

 

If you've thought about cloth diapering, or love to try new patterns of diapers on your baby...(always looking for the perfect fit!) then give the Mattie Diaper pattern a try!

 

What can it hurt, it's FREE!

 

Download the printable pattern HERE at Craftsy.

 

While you're there, check out the other free patterns, classes, and great tutorials they have to offer!

 

Embroidered Christmas Ornaments

I've been trying to follow kind of a "use it or lose it" philosophy in regards to my crafting supplies. Some things you just NEED to have lying around, but others just take up room.

I have a bad habit of holding on to the ends of ribbon rolls, just in case I need that last 3 inches of ribbon. This is nuts. However, I came up with a simple and fun project to use of the ends of some burlap ribbon rolls that I used to make These Wreaths.

I threw the ends on an embroidery hoop and sewed up a few of these....

 

I used my embroidery machine, but you could paint these too!! Anything to use up those scraps!

 

 

To begin:

 

I cut the ends of my ribbon rolls to fit on my embroidery hoop. I embroidered a circle outline, then a Monogram "M" and a Tiger Paw in the middle.

 

*If you are painting, just lay your ribbon out flat and use a stencil or a steady hand to add your designs.

 

Cut around the outside of the circle. I left a small border for a more rustic look.

 

Poke a small hole in the circle, and thread a ribbon, or twine through to allow it to hang on your tree.

 

They look great on the tree, and I love that one more scrap is gone from my pile!

 

I have lots more to make (lots more scrap ribbon)

 

I'll have everyone's initials on the tree by the end.

 

These would also make AMAZING gift tags if you are really into "WOW" packaging. I don't get that involved with wrapping, but it would definitely add a beautiful touch to a package.

Rustic Christmas Decor

I love natural decorating....bringing the outside, inside. It's not easy to do sometimes without looking really country, but little touches here and there can really stand out.

Here is a little round-up of some really sweet and beautiful ideas to bring a little bit of rustic charm to your Christmas decor this year!

Last year I made these little jute and wood ornaments. They still look adorable on our tree.

Jute and Wood Ornaments

These little Christmas trees look simple to make, but would make a big statement on a mantle or coffee table.
My Girlish Whims shows you how to put them together.


Ya'll know I am a sucker for anything monogrammed, so when I saw these monogrammed wood ornaments, I swooned a little bit. May Richer Fuller Be shows you how to make LOTS for your tree!



Learning Creating Living has put together this simple but stunning Christmas tree with twigs. Sometimes the most simple designs are the most beautiful.

    Create Craft Love made this lighted burlap wreath. I'm not even close to being tired of burlap yet, so throw in some Christmas lights and I need one of these! I'm sure hubby wouldn't mind.


The Thinking Closet has put together a home tour of her rustic Christmas decorations. How beautiful is this ruffled burlap tree skirt?? LOVE it. Check out all of her decor. It's beautiful.

In a season full of glitter, twinkly lights, sparkle and all things color,sometimes it's nice to enjoy some simple rustic beauty!

Some of these sweet ideas may make it into our home next year.

A Christmas Runner

Last year, I sewed my super-cheerful Christmas Quilt. I did a lot of quilting last year while I was REALLY pregnant and wanted to sit down a lot. 

 

This year, Hubby declared that we needed a runner to go under our television to match this little quilt. Somehow I managed to get a husband who LOVES holiday decorating (Yippie!)

Unfortunately I used up all of this sweet little fabric, so I couldn't make a matching one, but I dug into my fabric stash and found some coordinating Christmas colors from past projects. 

I wanted to try a new pattern to, so I took a shot at the herringbone block placement. 

I like it, but would like it more in solid, matching colors. But that's for another project.

It was a small, quick project, which I love. It was also a little bit of a scrapbuster, which is also great!
I used some vintage gingham fabric for the backing, and a decor weight chevron for the binding.

It's quilted lightly with swirls and loops. It still needs washing to get that awesome wrinkly and quilty finish. I think it will look wonderful under the TV, and give me an excuse a reason to wash the one that's already there.

I've told myself to slow down on the sewing, but with customer orders, and decorating for the holidays, it's hard not to try to whip up some fun projects.

What are you sewing this holiday season???

Cheerful Ornament Pillows

One of the quickest ways to add new personality to a piece of furniture, especially a couch or chair, is with a new pillow. But pillows can be SUPER expensive. Solution...pillow covers!! I've made lots of pillow covers in the past to give an instant facelift to our existing pillows. Then when we're ready for change, we take them off and try a new one. The covers fold neatly (and flat!) for easy storage, so no bulky pillows lying around. 

After giving new life to our front porch pillows , I wanted to make sure they didn't feel left out during the holidays. I wanted a Christmas pillow to join them. I found an old, unused pillow in a closet and decided it would be the "chosen one" to get the new pillow cover.

Continuing the obsession with my new embroidery machine, I used it to make these sweet little ornaments! The machine makes it easy to get clean and precise stitching on applique borders, but you could easily make this on your sewing machine! Cut out the ornament shapes you want, and use a zig zag stitch to attach them to your pillow cover fabric. Once the ornaments were sewn, I added some sparkly gold ric rac, and tied little red bows to finish off the look.

It's festive and sweet for this holiday season, and looks great nestled between my two new suede pillows. 

It doesn't take much time, or a lot of $$$ to make unique holiday decor.

If you have an embroidery machine and are wanting to make this exact pattern, I got the applique file from Applique Market.

Pillow Revamp

We're in the process of updating some of our "spaces" and trying to develop a new style. After lots of evaluation, we decided that our current color scheme and taste was a little "country". Not that there's anything wrong with that...it was just time for a change.

 

We have this sweet little couch that I LOVE to sit on and relax. It came with these pillows, that are kind of blah. The color is fine, the paisley is fine, but they're just not in keeping with the new color scheme.

 

Since we can't easily change the color of this couch, I thought we could do a quick pillow makeover.

 

 

MUCH BETTER

(It's amazing how the sun coming out affects the color of that couch! Yikes!)

 

 

I used my Brother PE770 Embroidery Machine to add an SC Palmetto and Moon, as well as our name to the pillows. I had lots of this buttery suede leftover from making Gray's Jacket a couple of years ago, and decided it was time to use some of it up.

 

These pillows are so much more personal and aren't as much of an eye-sore as the paisley pillows.

I love a quick and easy facelift!