Christmas Villages

1. Village de Noël 2008, 2. Village de Noël 2008, 3. Village de Noël 2008, 4. christmas village 2, 5. christmas village, 6. christmas village, 7. christmas village, 8. christmas village decor 2008, 9. Crowded Christmas Village

I adore Christmas villages. From the time I was a kid I have been fascinated by them. I would always want to make myself teeny tiny and jump into one for a bit - have a truly Dickens Christmas and sing carols. Of course, I think I would be mighty lonely with all those ceramic figurines! One year, my father brought me to our local department store (Caldor's for those that may remember!) and bought me all of the village pieces they had. I had a great time setting up this village each year and I even named it Kringleton. I still have all of these pieces and they have been merged with Jeff's Christmas in the City set. We have QUITE a few pieces but not that much display space so for now we pick a handful each year and display them on our mantel. As Chelsea gets older it will be fun to set up the village with her and perhaps let it take over a room in our house for the season.

I also wanted to share this great post on creating some new family traditions. Love most of these and I think we will be putting some in place this year.

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The Local Harvest

Sharing some photos from one of our local apple orchards. I love they way they come to life in the fall. Such beautiful displays.

Love the greens and oranges together. Hope you are all well!

Easy Halloween Ideas Courtesy of Martha

I was perusing Martha's site for some holiday decor inspiration. Mainly I was looking for some super easy ideas as I don't have the crafting time I used to (presently I have NO crafting time - [insert my tearful face here]).

I love Martha's ideas but often find they require time I don't have. I was happy to find these simple and inspirational project photos. Above is a faux rose wreath made black by simple spray paint. The dollar store has a wide variety of faux flowers and foam wreath forms - this little diddy can be whipped up in no time and for under $10.

Loved this one too. What a great idea for Halloween night - my only concern would be that the pumpkin would be naked after the first few trick or treaters - some major sweet teeth in my neighborhood! This would be fun for a party or as an everyday candy display. I love to have seasonal candy on hand around the house - though I may have to change this as Chelsea gets older. Don't want to give her bad habits - definitely don't want her to take after her mom who considers candy a food group!

Fall Wishes

Chelsea wishes you a Happy Fall!

Flashcards for Baby

Country Living

I've been wanting to get some flashcards for Chelsea, simple things like numbers, the letters of the alphabet, colors, and some simple words. I searched but did not find anything that fit what I was looking for and that also had a low price tag. I decided to create my own flashcards and I wanted to share them with you. Now mind you, I am not graphics or design oriented (in a technical way at least) and do not have PS so I created these as Word documents. They are not the beautiful flashcards I envisioned in my head but they will do. I also figured a 6 month old needs simplicity and not a lot of extra design and do-dads.



I cannot figure out an appropriate way to attach a Word document or get a screen grab - I feel like I should be a bit more up on technology for a 31 year-old but it is what it is! I used Google Docs to create these links and some of the font sizing and formatting was lost (for example, the font size doesn't go above 36 in Google Docs). If you know of a better way, please leave me a comment. For now I am linking to the documents below.



Alphabet and Words Flashcards



Update: I only linked to the Alphabet Flashcards. The formatting is very off for the numbers and colors flashcards docs. If you are interested in these documents, I can e-mail them to you directly.



I also found this free download for numbers 1 - 4. Much nicer than mine!

Farewell Summer

Some last beautiful blues of summer. Time to bring on the fall oranges, browns, and yellows.

P.S. I have no idea why Blogger is putting in white space around these photos!