Christmas Countdown Day 11... The Kitchen

Welcome to my kitchen... taken last Sunday before the gingerbread party began(don't forget to Vote, today is the last day).

The island...

 View from the mudroom...

 On the island I have a small tree...

 And a jar of stuffed gingies...

The sink window...

 The soldier was a new addition this year.... $4 at an antique store.

 The stove...brought back the stove board for winter(gave me more display space, but it's a pain for cooking).

 Another view...

 The hutch by the table...

 My Putz house collection

 On top the hutch...

 My vintage tree...

 The baking center...

 Doors to the deck...

 View from the family room...

My kitchen Christmas decor has brightened up over the years, I really like the vintage cheerful stuff of the 50's and 60's (but still my farmhouse style) and it works well in this room(the tree was my starting point). I need to be on the look out for more Christmas blow molds.

Stay tuned for another room tomorrow.

Have a lovely day,
Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 10....

As the snow fell, and the sun went down, Phoebe snuggled in next to me on my chair. She(and a quilt) kept me warm as I worked on a small stitchery... we may have even taken a nap together ;)

Don't forget to vote on yesterday's post to be entered into the surprise giveaway!

Stay warm,

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 9.... Gingerbread Party, and Giveaway

Yesterday was my 2nd annual gingerbread house party :)  There were 9 of us all together...6 friends, my 2 daughters, and myself. Hubby took the boys to the movies. They ended up seeing Frozen, which even my hubby said was a good movie.

On to the pics....

All set up...

And then all decorated!!....

 Now it's your turn to participate!!   Leave a comment with the number of your favorite house and that person with the most votes will get a special gift. And this year.... everyone who votes will be put into a drawing for a surprise giveaway drawing.  So all you have to do to enter is vote(just once) and make sure you have an email in the comment so I have a way to get a hold of you(so many people have bounce back(no email connected to their comments) that I can't reply.

Now for the Gingerbread houses!!
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#1  Front

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#2 Front

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#3 Front

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#4 Front

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#5 Front

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#6 Front

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#7 Front

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#8 Front

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#9 Front

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And the whole village!  It always amazes me how we can all start out with the same thing and they all end up looking so different and wonderful!!

My friends and I.... I hope everyone had a wonderful time! and I look forward to next year.

Vote through Wednesday  December 11th, and I will draw a winner from the comments on Dec. 12th.

Have a sweet day,

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 8...

And the table was set....

Pictures of the Gingerbread party tomorrow!

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 7....

Getting ready for tomorrow!  Hubby and I did our weekend grocery shopping trip today instead of tomorrow, we are headed to the gym for a quick workout, and then home to clean the house! 

I made this apron last night for my party. It started out as a very dated 80's denim Christmas jumper. I just cut off the back of the dress, added gingham around the neck and border, and ties to the back.  I couldn't have found a more perfect apron :)

Sorry for the blurry photo, that is what happens when a 7 yr old takes a picture with your phone.

Have a wonderful weekend,

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 6....

Another gloomy day here with rain, would rather have snow!  

So yesterday's baking was an epic failure. The only positive thing about 4 hours worth of work was that I got an awesome upper ab workout from rolling the dough, my stomach is seriously sore from it. I don't know what happened, maybe my kitchen was too cold or I just can't bake anymore, but around 1 in the afternoon I knew it was time to raise the white flag.  The older I get the faster I realize that it is OK to let go and sometimes go the easier route.  I had two hours before I had to be at the bus stop, so I told Mason to get on his shoes and coat and we headed to the store.  Yes...I'm not too proud to admit that I bought boxed gingerbread houses for my party this year.  Everyone will get one large house and one small house on their platter.  I don't think anyone will mind, afterall it is about friends getting together and having fun, not about whether the gingerbread is homemade or not.  Right?  

And I will still be making the royal icing to decorate with, let's just hope I don't mess that up!

 I've also been getting a few presents wrapped everyday. I think my bunny looks cute by the tree this year...

 And last night I finished up a slouchy beret for myself...it came out pretty good for no pattern.  I also bought this magazine(haven't bought a martha stewart living in ages, but the cover looked fun), but I have yet to sit down to read it, maybe tonight.

Have a marvelous day,

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 5....

It's a gloomy cold day here, perfect for baking. And I will be baking a lot today, all my gingerbread houses need to be made:)

I thought I would share what I did with two pretty goodwill frames I had.  I painted them both white and wanted to use them in the family room, but there really was no place that they worked. Then the other day I got and idea to use them in the kitchen. And since I'm out of wall space... they went on the cupboards!

Here is the first frame, jazzed up with ornaments and bows.  My kitchen is decorated Brightly for Christmas :)

 Yes, it's off center, but it adds to the quirkyness of it.

 And here is the other one.  I added a vintage green chalkboard to it and then hung the Christmas countdown board to it. After Christmas I will use this one as our menu board.  Oh, and did you notice the red gingham in the cupboards?  I used it throughout my kitchen this year, brightened everything up and it's fun and festive.

And here it what Mason has been up to... give the boy a pan of flour and add his farm, he will play for hours!  I finally got smart and put a vinyl piece of tablecloth underneath it to contain the mess.  I really need to get one of those giant drip pans for this.

 While he is playing, I will be using my pattern to make my houses....using circle platters this year for the houses.

Have a great day,

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 4.... and an Invitation

Happy Wednesday everyone!  I'll start with the invitation part of my post.... a few of the people I invited to my gingerbread party weren't able to make it, so I thought I would put out 2 invitations to my blog readers. If you live near me(southern Maine, Portland area) and would like to come to my gingerbread party this Sunday from 1-5pm, send me an email(on side bar).

Now on to the project I did last night while watching a recorded Hallmark Christmas movie :)

I took a felted cashmere blanket that I found at goodwill ages ago, put it into a giant hoop I had, and then used red yarn to stitch the words.  Totally free project because I already had everything. In fact I actually have two, one is still blank and I will make it tonight.

 I had planned on hanging it over the fireplace, but it was too big for the area, so the other one(which is an oval hoop) will go above the fireplace.  This one looks cute in the kitchen hanging on the basement door.

 Here was my Pinterest inspiration... from The Lillypad Cottage.  She used a lot more stitches for each letter, but I don't think she was going through felted cashmere and her yarn was thinner.  I may try to do the one tonight with thinner yarn to see a different effect.

Have a lovely day,

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 3....

                                                  We lit up the dollhouse :)

Have a wonderful day,

Tiff

Christmas Countdown Day 2....

Ok, so I didn't say I was doing a Christmas countdown with yesterday's post, but since we have two posts in a row and it is December 2nd, why not go for 25 days of Christmas!

Remember the bulletin board items that took me hours to draw and paint? , well I put them up this morning and I think it came out pretty darn cute.

 These were all drawn free hand(no projector or tracing involved) and then painted with many many coats of paint.   Eeyore is my favorite :)

 I wasn't planning on doing Pooh, he is hard to get to look right, but when I made tigger, I knew that Pooh had to go with him.  It's not easy drawing on a very large scale, but I think I'm getting better at it.

 The characters are as big as Mason :)

And in case you are wondering... the little dog in the box is kind of the school mascot now. I have been using him since last year and the kids look forward to seeing what he will be up to each month.

Have a fantastic day,

Tiff

Town Tree Lighting....

I really wasn't planning on leaving the house at all today.... hubby and I have head colds, it was snowing out, and I had hours worth of bulletin board work to do. We were even bad and slept in and missed church(we both really needed the sleep though).  

Anyway,  I got up, drew, painted, and stressed over what to do for the December bulletin board that I have to put up TOMORROW at school.  I started several ideas, but none of them panned out... I was in a creative slump.  Then I finally got an idea, which expanded to more things needed to be painted.... making for hours of work.    I drudged on with.  But at 3 oclock my 15 yr old daughter had to be at the town tree lighting because her dance academy  was doing a flash mob there.  We had no intentions of going to the tree lighting... to cold and crowded, and by noon the snow had turned to rain.  Around 1:30 I decided I needed a break from painting and we still had grocery shopping to do. So I told everyone to get dressed and we would drop Becca off at 3 and get the shopping done to be back at the tree lighting by 4 to see her dance.  And we did just that. Hubby and I took the 4 boys to the grocery store(it's usually just him and I who do the shopping and I realize why now!), got it all done in 40 minutes and then went to the park for the parade, flash mob, and tree lighting.

Because of the weather it wasn't too crowded(yay!), it had stopped raining, but it was freezing!  The boys enjoyed free hot coco, popcorn, and donuts while hubby and I chatted with our neighbors.

I forgot my phone and my camera, so pictures our courtesy of my 13yr old's tablet.

My 4 little snowmen....

Mason loved this and kept showing everyone how to pose in it :)

  I don't have pictures of the parade, but it was really nice and they lighted up the fire trucks with thousands of lights, much better than I have seen in the past. The flash mob dance was cute and my daughter did a great job.

It's hard to take pictures of Christmas lights, but my boy tried :)   The park lit up with small trees and the big Christmas tree in the middle.

Oh, and the BEST part,  two of my boys won sleds!!!! How awesome is that??!??!  I think for not wanting to leave the house today, things turned out pretty well.  And I'm almost done with the bulletin board stuff.

Happy 1st day of December!

Tiff