Holiday Happenings~holiday decorating, gifting, baking, & crafting galore.

Hello Hello,
I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and is enjoying getting into the holiday spirit. I’ve been so busy working around the house and organizing things I haven’t had time to post anything in a few weeks. Maybe it’s because last year I was working so much that I’m really trying to be festive this year. Last year I worked everyday except Christmas day and didn’t even put up a tree. This year I bought my first live tree just for me. My to-do list isn’t seeming to get any shorter but I’ve gotten so much other stuff done, it’s been a busy holiday season already. What about ya’ll? Have you gotten your decorations up? Shopping done? Wrapping completed? I love getting things checked off my list and my gift closet cleaned out! 

 

Holiday baking has commenced! I made some yummy apple pie and got cracking on my holiday cookie baking. I love cookie cutters:)

 

 

 

 

Some of my annual pepparkakor cookies. I’ve decided to indulge my Swedish side and make Swedish gingerbread every Christmas from now on. So yummy and such great presents!

 

 

Ready to decorate the bird tree with these vintage flashcards I snagged at Country Living Fair 2012.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Country Kitchen Tree

 

 

Redecorated the hutch for Christmas! Santa collection.

 

 

I pulled out all the holiday china we’ve been collecting over the years and put it out to use everyday and for the holidays. This has become a holiday dessert/coffee bar.

 

 

 

 

Pulled out all the Christmas and found our collection of Santa pictures. Poor Santa!

 

 

 

 

I bought these vintage flashcards at the Country Living fair also. Just too cute to pass up…

 

 

..and it’s so true. Instead of a kid friendly room mine has to be kitty friendly. Pumpkin snooped out the Christmas presents early. He knows it’s for him and doesn’t feel much like waiting until Christmas morning.

 

 

 

 

Uh oh. Baby has caught on too.

 

 

Stella has discovered she loves gift wrapping. Or rather finding a nice hiding spot from whence to pounce upon you.

 

 

I love my glitter chapels! These white and blue trees are perfect for my room too. Wish I could find more of them.

 

 

 

Ornaments I bought in Venice while studying abroad a few years ago. So pretty! Felt birds from Star Provisions & Marie Antoinette paper emellishments from Pink Girl.

 

 

    

 

Getting crafty! I found this adorable and easy peasy felt mouse ornament/gift topper from Between Naps on the Porch. I added bubble paint for eyes on mine later on. They are so adorable!

 

Below: Work in progress. I’ve been working all year with the kiddos at the office to make calendar artwork for end of the year presents. They have turned out so cute, I can’t wait for their parents to see them! I’ll post later the full project and images. Be sure to check out my Pinterest page for more ideas like this!

 

 

 

 

Presents for my kiddos have arrived! Can’t wait for them to play with their toys;)

 

 

I spent all day Thanksgiving cleaning out the attic, literally emptied it, half of it was Christmas anyways and needed to be cleaned/sorted/tossed and in the process I discovered stink bugs invaded and were in everything. So naturally I emptied every box into the back yard, shop vacuumed the attic out, and reorganized all the shelving and craft items. Finally finished putting things back into the attic yesterday. I was very glad I got to sit down to this tasty turkey dinner. Thanks mom!

 

 

So I convinced my mom to go Christmas shopping with me on Black Friday this year. She was reluctant but I did it for the first time last year and it really is not that bad if you know what you’re looking for and aren’t one of the crazies hanging out at Target at midnight the night before or camping out for the one TV that’s half priced. Sorry, not my thing. We actually had a fun day, got lots of things checked off our list, and we beat all the crowds everywhere we went. By the time we finished up and headed home we had been up and shopping for 12 hours and I started crashing and burning. By the time we got home I was so sick, I caught a cold! Booo! But we did have fun, here’s some of the highlights.

 

 

Headed to Anthropologie first, we were basically alone the entire time we were there. Sweet!

 

 

 

 

Snagged some super cute gifts and an adorable sweater for a steal.

Image via Pinterest

 

 

I love this Souvenir vase! The blue and white delft version is my favorite, maybe I’ll save up enough to get one. Or maybe they’ll go on sale!? Fingers crossed!

 

 

Miniature winter wonderland:)

 

 

 

 

Very pretty stemware!

 

We headed off to Lenox afterwards and did more damage. C Wonder has so many cute things! Love those bikes!

 

 

Finally got myself a tree. A live tree! It’s so pretty and smells so good. I wish I could have gotten that giant tree but I settled for a more reasonable 6 footer.

 

    

 

 

Time to pull out the Barbie extravaganza of ornaments. Barbie tree 2012 is ready to commence!

 

 

Aww. I forgot I made these. Cookie Dough, Willow Snow, & Thackery Binx. This was pre Pumpkin & Stella. Maybe someday I’ll make them one.

 

 

 

 

{Let them eat cake!}

Well after all this decorating, cleaning, organizing, baking, crafting, and so on…we’re pooped.

What have you been doing to prepare for the holidays? Any fun plans for the upcoming weekends?

Have a bright day!
Chelsea aka Bright Girl

Black Friday Report

Hello Everyone!
Okay so as I mentioned in my last post I was planning on braving the wee morning drive to Atlanta, traffic, zero parking options, and truly crazed crowds to  not only WORK on Black Friday but also partake in the shopping craze for the very first time. Here is my report.
So Thanksgiving day I did some early online shopping to get a few gifts taken care of. I don’t know if I just never paid attention before or retailers were really trying to boost sales but there were a lot of online deals starting Wednesday and Thursday of last week before Black Friday. I also got some great deals at Talbots! I can’t wait for my stuff to come. Shirts regularly priced at over $40 for $15. Yes please! I’ll have to share my purchases for some fashion inspiration as soon as they come! Mini fashion show? I think yes!
Whilst shopping online Thursday I thought about it and there were a few things I knew I for sure wanted at a couple stores and the deals on Friday morning were going to be great{30-50% off items before 11am}. Thus I decided to get up early and be there right at opening to get what I wanted for myself and for gifts. I had to be at work amongst the madness anyway in the morning. Why not partake?

Jane and I are ready to hit the road

I got up before 5am to get ready for work, my clothes and work bag were set and ready for me to hit the door. I stopped for some Starbucks sustenance, chai latte and granola yogurt. A little caffeine to wake me up! Anthropologie opened at 7am, I got there at 6am. No one was there. I felt like a creeper sitting in my car. Where are the shoppers with that slightly crazed and sleep deprived look in their eyes? And then the cars started coming. I was first in line and out in 10 minutes. Honestly there were probably only 15 people there at opening. However, the lady standing next to me had just left another store and told me the tales of her true Black Friday experience there. People were going insane grabbing up things, trying on clothes in the middle of the store, and being overall rude people. This made me feel a little scared since the job I was heading to in a few hours was at that mall.


One of the items I was lusting for a deal on. Anthropologie’s Bake by Numbers pie platter. Sooo cute! As a former art student and overall lover of baking, art, and unique and crafty things I HAD to have this. On sale for $9.99!!! Get outta my way BF shoppers.
Mission Accomplished!

After leaving store #1 I headed to Talbots to check out the sale. Same story here. They opened at 7am for Black Friday, 30% off one full priced item. But the items I was looking at were sale items already 65% off. They had tons of clothes on sale…and I was the only one there. At first when I got there I second guessed that they were opening early. I got a lot of great items at over 65% off, a few things were only $5 if you can believe it!
Here is where things got a little interesting. I headed to the mall. I really lucked out and found a parking spot right next to the entrance I needed to be at. I had almost 2 hours to kill so I wandered the mall. It wasn’t as bad as I expected. There were a lot of people there but not quite what I expected. I kind of enjoyed myself. There were a few stores that were so crowded I just left. I don’t need anything bad enough to wait over 30 minutes to check out. Plus I’m basically done with Christmas shopping now. I must say doing some recon work the day before really helped. I made a list of the places I wanted to go and what I wanted to look at buying, which wasn’t much.
The rest of the weekend was sort of ho hum. Work wasn’t that busy, Sunday was surprisingly busy compared to Friday and Saturday which we were expecting to be super crazy.
Leaving the mall on BF, however, was another experience all together.

Umm. Can I please just get out of here and go home!?!

Get me outta here!

Overall it wasn’t a horrible experience. Plus I got a few fun pictures.

A view of the Atlanta skyline. Sunrise. Black Friday 2011.

Can anyone guess what that reflection is? The first thing I saw when I was finally reunited with my car after work.

It’s the Macy’s Christmas Tree!!

Look at all those sparkling lights!

Definitely made me feel cheery after a very long day.

How did you spend YOUR Black Friday? Did you go shopping early and snag some awesome deals? Please do share I would love to hear stories of your Black Friday experience and what you nabbed.
Have a bright day!
Bright Girl