Christmas with the Erskines: A Sneak Peek into Our Home for the Holidays

 

 

Here's a look into the Erskine household for the Christmas season...enjoy!

 

 One of my favorite things about Christmas is gift giving and this year I participated in Emmy's Christmas Gift Exchange over Instagram.

 

 My partner made me this amazing gift as a way to record memories throughout the years.

 

 With a ceramic fruit basket from Anthro and index cards, I have it propped up in our kitchen to record so many memories.

 Brittany got me the tree topper of my dreams!! Isn't it gorgeous?

 

The ornaments Ryan got from St. Nicholas.

 

 My 24th birthday present from the folks!

 Our first Christmas village! It's from the Dollar Tree and had some "handwritten" storefront signs (womp womp) but it's really cute.  I also have an African American Santa which I'm sure Megyn Kelly would love.  Have no idea what I'm talking about?  Don't stress over it.  The Fox newscaster is convinced that Santa and Jesus could only be white men.  Therefore this Santa is my little play at irony in my house.

Blu will rock antlers and Holly hates them with a passion.  Ryan had to stand with them for every picture otherwise Holly looked terrified and Blu would run away.

 

If you love this wreath, check out The Paper Mama's blog for the tutorial! 

Looking to make one of these bomb.com sweaters?  I'll be posting my tutorial on the 23rd! :)

 Blisterz's Christmas Tree Lot- super simple and incredibly cute!
All you need are bottle brush trees, which are actually really hard to find leading into Christmas so I always stock up.  Put them next to a sign (mine is made from cardstock) and you have a Christmas Tree Lot.

I've had my eye on these foxes at Target for so long! I was thrilled when one of my besties and battle buddies, Brittany surprised me with them on my birthday!

I was determined to get a nativity this year and bought this from Walmart.

It took me four baby Jesuses to find one without crazy eyes but alas, I was successful.

 I wanted to snag the camel but I only had $10 on me and had to get Hershey kisses for cookies so I went with the donkey.

 

I painted these reindeer last year and they turned out to be a perfect solution as a centerpiece.

 

The snowmen placemats I got on sale at Kohl's last year (we don't have a Kohl's here unfortunately) and the nutcracker placemats I found at Goodwill, along with a table runner.

 

Santa hat chair covers were found at the Dollar Tree for only $1 each.

 

I made this shadowbox last year when we I was stationed at Vandenberg.  It's a wooden shadowbox from Michael's.  I then used two pieces of scrapbook paper, a metallic blue and then a diecut snowflake piece.  I then took mini ornaments, that I believe I got at Walmart, and hot glued them together.

 

My mini mitten garland was made with mitten ornaments from Target last year.  A pair of mittens was $3 and then I used mini clothepins from Michael's and ribbon.  Super simple and easy to make.

 

We have a ton of cards from so many wonderful friends!

 

I used command strip style squares and thick wire edged ribbon.  You can always find ribbon sales at Michael's, especially leading into December.  I love this reindeer ribbon so much!  I picked up clothespins from the Dollar Tree.  Last year I used mini ones and it was difficult to keep the cards in place.  You can always decorate the pins with mod podge and glitter :)

With that, I hope you enjoyed our home and we wish you a very Merry Christmas!  

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The 2013 Erskine Pumpkin

 

2013 pumpkin carving has commenced!

      

 Our friend Cory invited a bunch of us over one night that we miraculously all had off 

and we brought over a ton of pumpkins.

      

 With at least five pumpkins up for carving, we had a ton of seeds and while Ryan was busy carving part I of our Erskine pumpkin, I was busy collecting seeds in a glass bowl for roasting.

      

 We decide to go with a haunted house scene, complete with a spooky tree and graveyard!

We had the biggest pumpkin there but I always grew up picking out huge pumpkins.

There's just more canvas :)

    

When I wasn't busy pulling together seeds for roasting, I was enjoying some mulled wine provided by our friend Rhi.  It was pretty darn delicious and maybe I can get her to share the recipe on a future blog post.

   

Our friend Cory has never carved a pumpkin before, so of course, we made him carve one.

Hannah and Anthony rocking their state pumpkin.

The final results from the Erskine 2013 pumpkin. What do you think?
After pumpkin carving wrapped up, we ended up watching the latest edition of the Chucky series.
I was absolutely terrified of him as a child and remember one incident where a cousin of mine tried to get me to watch Child's Play.  Yup, she definitely didn't trick me and I was out of that room faster than you could say unnecessary gore.  It was actually pretty hilarious and weirdly funny but gory.

What are some of your favorite Halloween traditions?

GIT-R-DONE: The Fast, Easy & Cost-Effective Approach to Holiday Decor

Source

HOLY SANTA CLAUS'S BEARD, 
IT'S NOVEMBER 23RD!

That really shouldn't make a difference to anyone who knows me because, to be honest, I decorate starting November 1st.  However, for the rest of the holiday-sane community, most people try to decorate the day after Thanksgiving.  This is something I never quite understood coming from Wisconsin, because as I sit in the balmy weather of Central California, my Midwestern kinfolk are huddled inside as Wisconsin is a whopping 23 degrees outside.

 Can anyone say,  

Baby it's cold outside?

I know you've already heard me complain about how un-Christmasey it feels here in Central Cali due to the lack of snow and the irony of having snowflake/snowmen decor, but I have made a few adjustments to my decor and thought I would share them with my bliggety blog community.

I've combed the pages on Pinterest for inspiration and came up with a few concepts that may help you out this holiday season and go a little easy on a college graduate budget.

The children hung their stockings by the fire with care

I love the little details when it comes to designing.  Attention to detail can turn any space into something fabulous.  After seeing advent calendars of mini-stockings, I went on Etsy to see if I could find something similar and only found expensive options.  Target came to the rescue with $3 mitten ornaments that came in a pair.  I took red ribbon with a stream of white dots and hung that along the fireplace.  I then separated each mitten and hung them up with mini clothespins.  It turned out really cute and is one of my favorite decor pieces in the house.  The mini clothespins also came in handy for another idea that's farther along the page.

I ended up buying 5 pairs, so this cost me a little over $15, which definitely  beat the $100+ cost of similar items that I found on Etsy.

 

 

 

 

Mini-Ornament Christmas Tree

Shadow box, scrapbook papers and ornaments cost under $20

I had a few ideas in my head for this concept before creating it and I kind of just went with what I found at our local Michael's.  Instead of purchasing a frame or shadow box like many Pinterest instructions say, I found a wooden shadow box in the unfinished wood items aisle at Michael's for around/under $7.  I then bought blue metallic scrapbook paper as well as a specialty snowflake paper and all of this was for the background.  To actually create the tree, I bought a package of mini ball ornaments that come with about 27 ornaments.  I hot glued the mini ornaments, while layering them on top of each other and it created this beautiful stacking effect.  That was basically it.  A really easy craft piece that is perfect as display piece. 

Shades of Gold

Cost under $10 to recreate these deer

Normally you find decorative deer pieces ranging from $30-$50.  I spotted a few paper-mache deer at a local craft store called Beverly's and here's the kicker...the only cost me $2 each!  I picked three different shades of metallic golds and one is more like a copper but all I needed to do was paint them.  They look incredibly sharp in front of any mantle, coffee table or just an entrance-way piece.  Right now they've made their home on the mantle as I figure out how I want our decor to go.

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree

I'm sure you've seen these tutorials all over Pinterest, but these trees are so easy to make!  The trees themselves can range from $2-$6, depending on the size.  The best part is wandering the aisles of your local craft store or that craft tub at home and figuring out how you want to decorate them.  The imagination can run wild with these.  I used textured yarns, glitter, feathers, etc. on the ones that I created.  I plan on making more and turning my mantle into a forest that any winter wonderland would be proud of.

An Alternative to Christmas Canvases

Cost me under $10 for this lovely canvas-want-to-be

I have been swooning over the adorable prints featured on Pinterest and Etsy.  As a person who has done quite a bit of graphic design, I've been itching to make some prints.  However, frames can get expensive.  You can, of course, make prints to fit your already existing frames and then swap out those family portraits for some holiday cheer or you can try out this tip.

I wanted to have Christmas canvases but paying for large canvases is not for the faint of heart.  Well I'm always determined to have my cake and eat it too, so I went to home depot and bought pieces of wood planking.  Essentially they're really thin shelves.  They're a little long, but that's easily fixed at home if you have a saw/those kind of materials and I also think that Home Depot (and similar stores) can adjust them for you as well.  It cost me under $7 and looks amazing on my mantle. I painted it with black acrylic paint and let it dry, then free-handed the lyrics, "O Holy Night, the Stars are Brightly Shining" in white acrylic paint.  It brings the entire room together and I love it!

Oh There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays

Does anyone love getting mail as much as I do?  Christmas amps up that excitement as I receive cards from friends and loved ones who are now all over the world!  I wanted to decorate our kitchen a little more but wasn't entirely sure how, apart from adding kitchen towels embroidered with holiday cheer.  This is so easy to do, you'll just love it.  I bought wide ribbon from Michael's, around $3 and cut appropriate lengths out to match the length of the cabinets and 

secured them to the back of the doors.  The mini clothespins I used from a previous project, mentioned above, were perfect for attaching Christmas cards and photos.  It definitely adds a little extra warmth to the kitchen.

Schooled by a Chalkboard

If you don't have a chalkboard and have your own living space, you really need one.  Why has this turned into a need, instead of simply a want?  Well it's because a chalkboard is so versatile.  From daily reminders to becoming a decor piece, it has a ton of uses that expand from just being a old school staple.  Chalkboard font has become an art and it's also just a lot of fun.

You can check out my experience making a chalkboard here.

That basically wraps up what I've done so far in terms of decorating.  We have our tree up and my husband has put on our new tree topper, a star!  It's our first Christmas tree together and we're so excited.  It's decorated with both our ornaments and my roommate's, so it's filled with a lot of memories for being a new tree.

Today in the mail, I received this from one of best-friend's, Courtney:

You all knew that I was going to try it. I know a good present when I see one ;)

xoxo,