Happy Thanksgiving 2016

Happy Thanksgiving to your Family from ours.  A special shout out to our Troops who can't be home with their families on this day.  Be safe and enjoy the day.

Happy Halloween Driveway Decorations

Wishing everyone a safe and Happy Halloween.  Normally I don't put up a big display of Halloween decorations, but this year we are in a contest.  The contest is through North Reading Parks and Recreation in our town.  You can buy the starter kit for $25, which is just a face painted burlap head with 1 x 4 in the shape of a cross for the body. Since it's through the parks and recreation dept. in our town, I thought our display would be fun for kids to see. I made the minions with Gru who looking to go to the pumpkin patch in our town.

Happy Holidays Bring on 2016

Hello... I hope you had a super fun filled Christmas. We certainly did considering we were not feeling 100 % as the flu swept through our house affecting us over a 3 week period.  We made the most of a happy holiday.

joss & Main Inspirational Painted Picture

I'd like to share with you a picture I saw on joss & Main that I gave me inspiration for a special Christmas gift.  I was browsing on their website and came across this picture of a Shih Tzu dog.  It looked almost exactly like my Mom's dog.  Since it was only a few days until Christmas, I didn't have time to purchase it so I decided I'd try to paint one just like it.

Valentine's Day gifts for nursery school kids

Happy Valentine's Day everyone.  I made some quick and easy gifts for our son to hand out in school to his classmates. I figured I would do something not pertaining to food or candy since some kids have food allergies. I saw this on Pinterest but I put my own twist to it.
It probably took me an hour or so to do.

DIY Chalkboard

Hello Everyone, I thought I would show you how to make a chalkboard really simple. No paint required.
Our son has been learning to write his name in school this year. I thought  the chalkboard would be a great gift to his teachers to say  thank you  and sign his name for  Valentines' Day . I made three of them for his two teachers and one for myself.

Scrap wood Heart

The other day when I finished making chalkboard gifts for my son's teachers for Valentine's day ,  I had a small pile of scrap 1 by 2's leftover.  The way  they were piled on the floor kind of looked like a heart so I went with it.  I only had to make a few cuts since most of the pieces were already at 45 degree angles.

Merry Christmas to All

Merry Christmas to All from our family to yours. I hope your day is filled with love, laughter, tradition and lots of memories. I want to thank all of you who visit here and the kind emails that you send.  I will be busy up until Sunday as we have had a unexpected death of a grandparent who was very  near and dear to us. I hope you and your family have a very happy and safe holiday.

Decorated Christmas Tree 2013

We finally got our tree last week and finished decorating it a few days ago. Our tree is put up every year in our Master bedroom.  The room is about 20 x 30 and it seems the best place for our tree.  It has the large doors that go out to the balcony and a great focal point when you come down the driveway.  I use smaller trees throughout the rest of the house.
This year I added some porcelain and ceramic decorations and a lace bow/ribbon for a vintage look.

Holiday Gifts for the Teachers

Hello Everyone.   Today is the start of  Christmas vacation for our son.  They had a small Christmas party at the school with a Santa , snacks and small gifts.  As a way to say  '  Thank you  ' to the teachers , I made them a gift.  Although you can never say thank you enough to the teachers for all the hard work they do, a small gift as a sign of appreciation during the Holidays is always nice.

Decorated Kitchen Window for Christmas

I am so unbelievably late with decorating this year.  It has been so busy the past few weeks.  All my ' junk ' from that demo house is still loaded in the trailer at the shop , going to the Patriots games , and now all this snow.  He has to get all the trucks ready for plowing and it just snowballs from there.
I actually had a moment to get the kitchen window decorated today.  We went shopping for our Christmas tree this evening.  If  we didn't go tonight then  who knows when we would be able to go with more snow coming tomorrow.  Very hectic ...

Painted Wooden Sign and Post

I finished painting the post I made the other day. I made a sign for the Holidays . Paint the post white first and let it set for about 10 - 15 minutes.

Wooden Sign Post for the Holidays

If you have no porch at your house to decorate for the holidays , don't worry , you're not alone.  Since I don't have much space to decorate when you come to my front door , I decided to make a post to hang a holiday sign and some decorations.  I had a bunch of scrap wood in the garage and out in the yard.  I grabbed the pieces that were the closest to the size I needed to make the post.

Pine Cone Christmas Tree for Den

We headed out early this morning to go to the Patriots game. We got home this evening and had some time to take some decorations out.  I started with this pine cone tree that I made a few years ago.

How to make a Pine Cone Wreath - DIY

I told you about a couple of wreaths that I made last week for Kim. Here is one of the wreaths and the way that I like to make pine cone wreaths.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING from East Coast Styler

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. The wonderful smell of food cooking all day. The gathering of Family and friends.

Wishing you all a HAPPY THANKSGIVING.  I will be taking a few days off so I can spend time with my family - just eat and watch football. See you soon, Lisa

Holiday Wreaths as a way to say ' thanks '

A month ago I met this wonderful woman named Kim. She collect these beautiful pinecones , thistle , and eucalyptus pods a few years back in California and Colorado and was saving them in her garage. She wanted to make ' something ' with them someday. Well she never got around to it and passed them onto me. There were bags and boxes of them.  I was thrilled because the pinecones were so different from the pinecones here in Massachusetts. I made a promise to her that I would make her a gift with the pinecones, etc.  I wondered for a couple of weeks what could I create for Kim that would be a wonderful gift as way to say ' thanks '.  I had come up with so many ideas that I could do with the pinecones , but not knowing her style or what her house looked like on the inside it came down to making a wreath for her front door for her home.

I wanted to make something that she could have for the years to come.  She can easily change the bow to give a it a fresh look year after year.
I'm on my way to deliver it to her, along with a second wreath of ribbon and door knob bells.

 

I will take pictures of it on Kim's door and show them when I get back home.  I'm a little sluggish today because last night we went to NFL patriots game and boy,  it was colder than cold.  It was around 6 degress with the windchill.  The wind was just going thru me.  We definitely dressed properly but it didn't matter.

This is what we do for fun. We have one more game to go to for this season.  I just hope it's not as cold as last night.  There's something about the air at 1 am that just makes it feel colder when you're already freezing. My camera was freezing up so that's all I took for pictures.  Needless to say, it was a great night despite freezing out feet off. I will show a tutorial of how I made the wreaths in another post when I get back home from Kim's.

Holiday Solar Lanterns - DIY

I have these lanterns outside for the summer with candles in them for tabletop lighting on the deck. I was going to put them away for the winter but decided to try to use them for the holidays instead.

As you can see the lanterns are old and rusty which I love, not to mention all dented.  I went by the dollar tree store and picked up 2 holiday solar lights. I then masked and painted the lanterns with black spray paint.

I took the solar lights apart to use the tops of them only for this.  I tried to goop the light inside the lantern , but it didn't hold.  There is probably too much candle wax on the bottoms in the lantern.  I had to think of something else to hold the lights in place. Yup, I borrowed some of my son's good ol' play-doh and I he had some black on hand.  I made a couple of play-doh balls and stuck the light into it inside the lantern. I molded the edges over the sides.  I tested the lights to see if they would light up outside at night and they did.

Once the play-doh dried and hardened , I added some pinecones cut in half around the base of the lights. I also added some holiday greenery at the tops of the lantern.  When the spring comes , I will easily be able to take the holiday lights out and re-use the lanterns again for the spring. I think I can get another year out of them.

                                                  I just need to hang them outside.