Welcome to my blog ~ where aesthetics are a passion, details are a priority, and pleasure in simple things is celebrated!
I invite you to share my inspirations for a creative life and a lifetime of adventures.
Thanks so much for visiting, Jackie
Thanksgiving is a time to give thanks..for me, also a time of reflection. And, here in the U.S., Thanksgiving is the official kickoff to the holiday season.
What better time to count blessings…and, to express gratitude.
For Friday field trip today, I am sharing some words that inspire me at this special time of year.
Have a wonderful weekend. Thank you so much for stopping by – you are certainly one of my many blessings! :)
Love & thanks, Jackie
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I love to read.
So, I guess it won’t come as a surprise to you when I tell you that books have always had a place as part of my holiday celebration.
In my home, reading holiday books is as much a part of preparing for Christmas as leaving cookies for Santa or trimming the tree. Every November, the stack of holiday picture books packed away with the rest of the holiday trimmings, makes its way downstairs.
A great tradition I am sharing with you today is to create a more formal celebration of holiday books by making them into an Advent calendar. Wrap up 25 holiday books to stack by the fireplace or a cozy couch and have the children open one to read each evening during Advent.
The books don’t need to be about the holidays in the literal sense. You can choose stories of love, family, friendship, travel…or, even cooking –all appropriate themes relating to the holiday season. There are so many great books – you don’t need to limit yourself to How the Grinch Stole Christmas or ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas. If you need some suggestions, here are a few titles we have enjoyed to get you started:
Santa Calls by William Joyce
Christmas in New York City by Roxie Munroe
The Finest Tree by John and Anne Hassett
Penquin and Pinecone: A Friendship Story by Salina Yoon
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein
The Tree that Came to Stay by Anna Quindlen
Love You Forever by Robert Munsch
Be sure to include some titles with beautiful illustrations:
Old Turtle by Douglas Wood
Santa’s Favorite Story by Hisako Aoki and Ivan Gantscher
Simon and the Snowflakes by Gilles Tibo
The Snowman by Raymond Briggs
Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
Also, it is fun to include titles that promote activities:
I Spy Christmas by Walter Wick and Jean Marzollo
Snowmen by Peter Cole, Frankie Frankeny, Leslie Jonath
Recipe for Adventure Series by Giada deLaurentiis and Francesca Gambatesa
Kids in the Holiday Kitchen: Making, Baking, Giving by Jessica Strand
When wrapping the books, you can choose a color theme to match your décor, holiday theme, or favorite color of the child(ren). I used kraft paper this year to wrap the books and added stickers I personalized with ‘book a day advent’ at Tiny Prints (click here for the website). Their stickers are great – so many cute designs to choose from, they can be personalized as you wish, and a set is very inexpensive. I added numbers to my personalized stickers using rubber stamps and added one to each wrapped book.
When adding the numbers, be conscious that you can be strategic by coordinating number placement with book selection. Number an activity book for the weekend, time a relative’s visit with an appropriate theme/title, or read ‘Twas The Night Before Christmas on the appropriate evening.
You can use books you already own and/or library books for this activity…no need for it to be an expensive project! Your local children’s librarian can help with your title selection if you need it. And, if you own the books, when opening your gifts this year, use the discarded wrapping paper to wrap up the books for next year’s book calendar!
I hope you are inspired to create a book Advent calendar this year! Have fun with it! I would love to hear your favorite titles! The children will love this activity – and, what better tradition than one that promotes a love for reading? :)
Thanks for stopping by. Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
Sharing with Finding Silver Pennies, House of Hipsters, Thoughts from Alice, Crafts a la Mode, and Sand & Sisal.
Today we are taking a peek at a weekend in design featuring an Opening Night Gala; vignettes of interior design; a marketplace; a holiday fashion show and luncheon; and dinner with event chairman, Thom Filicia. (You know I love Thom…click here for our first meeting!)
Now in its 20th year, Rooms With a View has helped Southport Congregational Church help others by raising well over a million dollars for charitable causes.
The room vignettes are always inspiring…
My favorite room this year was designed by Forehand + Lake – a bright and styling cabin…
Every year I find different takeaways from the event. A couple of the lighting choices were really interesting this year…How cool is the lighting in this “Starry Night” themed room designed by NYSID students and alumni?
And, I found this light fixture, used by Jenny Wolf Interiors, as a unique choice…
Rooms With a View provides a great opportunity to get a jump on holiday shopping by offering a marketplace of vendors. You can see these items fit right in with my holiday theme!
Much like Susan Leggitt’s artwork inspired by the Maine Coast, I found these hand painted stars really awesome!
The meal and fashion show is always the most fun for me. The clothes from Millie Rae’s in Westport were my favorites and it is great the way the event people mix some thrift store finds in with the new fashions from local stores. This year, I loved that Borrowed (a rental company that specializes in bringing unique, mismatched, and whimsical touches to an event) provided an eclectic mix of plates to the luncheon service.
The meal provided by Festivities was delicious…
But, for me, the plates stole the show! How many more plate photos can I add? I just loved them!
The other wonderful design touch to the tables were the wallpaper runners provided by Farrow & Ball (no, those wallpaper scraps aren’t just for book covers)…
Rooms With a View is a great way for friends in Fairfield County, Connecticut to get together and be inspired. I hope some of the photos of the event on today’s Friday field trip have inspired you!
Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a wonderful weekend, Jackie
Sharing with Liz Marie Blog, Crafts a la Mode, and Shabby Nest.
I love Advent calendars! Every year I end up making a least a couple! I’m not one to make a hanging calendar…I much prefer the 3D variety. The first one I am sharing with you this year uses a collection of simple paper houses. (Last year I shared one made from baby food jars, remember? Click here to see.)
I used white card stock to cut out a two piece house. I had planned on using gray card stock for the roofs, to create a nice contrast against the white ‘snow,’ but since the copy center was out of gray, I ended up painting the white card stock gray for my roofs. I used rubber stamps to add the numbers to the front of each house (and added a little glitter). I then added glass glitter ‘snow’ to the roofs…
You don’t need a mantel to display an Advent village…here is the village on a birch bark lined tray…
Or – you can use any shelf, table, or little corner in your home to add these tiny houses. To make them really magical, they need some snow and lights…don’t you think?
I am keeping mine pretty simple…just the houses with some snow – and, to go with my woodland theme, I added a white birch log…
So easy and so pretty! This is a wonderful project to create with children. I have another Advent calendar in the works to share soon!
Thanks so much for stopping by!
Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
Sharing at Craftberry Bush, Sand & Sisal, Thoughts From Alice, and Finding Silver Pennies.
A balmy day in November certainly warrants a trip to the beach – no matter how brief. There are signs of the season here – the fall colors in the marsh…
an occasionally leaf under the docks…
but even with an odd sixty degree afternoon in November, winter is on its way.
For Friday field trip today, I am sharing a few photos from my trip to the beach this balmy day…
I’m here to collect some items for holiday crafts…
It is so much fun to repurpose collected materials from nature!
Today was the perfect day to do some scavenging!
Snow is predicted this week in Connecticut, so soon this fall scene will make way for the white stuff!
Thanks so much for stopping by!
And, remember to take pleasure in simple things…some of the very best things are the simple things!
Have a great weekend, Jackie
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Yes, I have admitted I am going through a little bit of a bottle obsession phase of late…creating holiday décor with little bottles has been really fun! Today, I am sharing a really easy DIY ‘tree in bottle’ Christmas ornament.
Like these Thanksgiving place card holders I shared, I used miniature bottles to create these tree ornaments. I have added a little ‘snow,’ and a miniature tree inside the corked bottle to create the cutest ornament!
The little bottles and trees are easy to find in a craft or dollar store. I chose a natural colored bottle brush tree for my creation since I have a passion for neutrals. For the ‘snow,’ use your favorite glitter, salt, or artificial snow.
To be able to hang the ornament, I screwed a tiny screw eye into the cork and added a length of brown and white baker’s twine. (The screw eyes are easy to find in the hardware section of your local Home Depot – you can buy a package and will have enough to make several ornaments.)
That, my friends, is it! Easy, right? And, so cute!
I hope you enjoyed today’s easy Christmas ornament DIY.
Thanks so much for stopping by and remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
Sharing with The Shabby Nest, Sand & Sisal, and Thoughts from Alice.
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When I was a kid, one of the best parts of Thanksgiving at my grandmother’s house was cracking and eating nuts! My grandmother would serve a basket of mixed nuts in the shell, providing a metal nutcracker so that we could open them ourselves. It took so much longer to open the nuts than to actually eat them, but then I guess that was what contributed to the fun – all that hard work!
My first exposure to hazelnuts was when they were in the Thanksgiving nut basket…of course, I had no idea they were called hazelnuts at the time. ..the same was true of pretty much all the nuts (including the silly looking Brazil nuts) in the assortment – except for the more familiar walnuts.
As I got older, and was able to identify the individual nuts and their flavors, hazelnuts were one of my favorites! So, it is no wonder that I had an instant love for Nutella …chocolate and hazelnuts? With these two flavors, how can you go wrong?!
This year, I thought about trying to make my own hazelnut spread. Of course it would be much easier to buy it prepared, but I wanted to taste a fresh batch of homemade! When I realized there was a hazelnut spread recipe in the Mast Brothers cookbook, I knew I had to try it! So, come into my kitchen for today’s Friday field trip to make some spread!
Roasting hazelnuts to use in homemade chocolate hazelnut spread.
I have included the recipe adapted from the Mast Brothers in this post and I will be giving away a copy of the Mast Brother’s cookbook as November’s giveaway selection. (If you leave a comment on this post, you are automatically entered to win!) Since I will be making several of the recipes in this wonderful chocolate cookbook to give as gifts this holiday season, I thought some of my friends may want to do the same! The Mast Brothers are chocolate masters, and I am hoping to use some of their expertise to create some of my own chocolate edibles this holiday.
When I buy nuts in bulk for recipes – like pistachio, pine, or hazelnuts – I usually purchase them at Trader Joe’s since I have always found they carry a good quality product that is reasonably priced. So, when I needed recipe ingredients for my hazelnut spread, guess where I shopped?
I had fun making the spread and I am eager to test out some recipes using hazelnut spread. I packaged up my spread in jars and plan on giving them as Thanksgiving gifts. Maybe I will make copies of some of the recipes I find to include with the spread and add a tie-on tag.
Thanks for stopping by! I hope you will try making your own hazelnut spread…it has such a great, fresh flavor! If you should have any great recipes using hazelnut spread, I would love to hear about them!
Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
(If you’d like to see my Friday field trip to Mast Brothers Chocolate, click here.)
So many things look so much cuter in miniature, don’t they? Today, I am showing you how to use a miniature bottle to create an easy DIY place card holder for your Thanksgiving table. Reminiscent of a fairy garden, these mushroom place card holders are refreshingly different than the standard turkey motif! A small piece of moss, a tiny faux mushroom, and some bendable wire are the only other supplies needed to create a little mushroom in a bottle…so small, and so adorable!
Small corked bottles are easy to find at a craft or dollar store. I found a great selection in the jewelry supply section of my local craft store. (They are also great for displaying small pieces of sea glass and hanging from a chain!)
Any little piece of moss will do inside the bottle…you may be able to find some outdoors. You won’t need much! Then, add your mushroom. If you have any trouble manipulating the mushroom into the bottle, try using a pair of tweezers.
Use a small length of bendable wire – these come in many different finishes in the craft store – and shape a couple circles to use to position the place cards. Leave a little piece of the wire at the bottom to push into the cork stopper.
Now, just repeat the process for the number of place card holders you wish to make! They don’t all need to be the same exact size or shape.
Aren’t they adorable?
I hope you enjoyed this easy DIY for Thanksgiving place card holders. I can’t wait to share my Christmas version! I’ve been busy making holiday items using bottles and jar/containers…so much fun!
Thanks for stopping by! Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
P.S. If you can’t give up on the turkey motif, you may also enjoy this cutie for your Thanksgiving table!
Sharing with Sand & Sisal, Elizabeth & Co., Coastal Charm, Finding Silver Pennies, Craftberry Bush, City Farmhouse, and Thoughts from Alice.
