Happy Halloween!!

I am majorly suppressing the desire to take down my Halloween stuff today! We celebrated last night, with the trick or treating and everything. I really just want to put up my dang cute wreath for Thanksgiving, don't remember it? Check it out here.

So until I can I thought I would share some of my latest creations....

Thanksgiving quilt top...this is for my mom...all thought I really want to steal it and add it my Holiday Quilts...but she did pay for it...so I guess I have to give it to her!

Over on my favorite swapping site, Two Peas I am hosting a 12 days of Christmas quilt squares. There are 6 people participating and each person choose two numbers to represent in a 12x12 quilt square....I had 11 pipers piping

9 Ladies dancing.

I also made some Christmas tags for swap I am in, the themes were

red, white and silver

Nativity

and penguins, which I did cause Gunner LOVES penguins!

Well hope you all have a Happy Halloween, I am off to play in the craft room!

Last minute Turkey day ideas...

Just a couple of quick last minute Thanksgiving ideas for you. These are both pretty simple.

This is out Give Thanks journal. I made it two years ago. It is a covered composition note book. Each year, were ever we eat our Thanksgiving meal, we ask those who are with us to write...


or draw...

in the journal.
This year the blank pages

will be filled with Mr Toadly Craft's family, as we will be hosting the family at our house.

This


is a hair barrette that I saw on Etsy and had to have for Missy MayMay. But once again, a shortage of funds got in the way. So I figured out how to do it myself. It turned out so cute, I made one for three of my nieces.


I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving Wreath

I loved all the leaf filled wreaths out there, both in blogger world and around my neighborhood. But I wanted something different. I was inspired by a pine cone wreath photo that was sent to me by one of my fellow craft group members. But being on a very tight budget lately with Christmas coming, I decided to improvise.

First the kids and I did a "service project" and picked up a huge bag of pine cones out of the yard of a neighbor (we got permission first)


Jr G said something along the lines of "Are you making us do this for a craft?" and Big G said something like "Yea, and she can't spend more money cause dad will get made at her!" Luckily, MayMay was there to back me up! Then I used my 40% off coupon at my LCS and bought a big, beautiful grapevine wreath only $8!
I used some bright orange, sheer ribbon I had on hand an made a bow. I wired the bow to the wreath.

Then I used my well loved glue gun and began gluing the pinecones on to the wreath. This tool some patience, as the pine cones have to be held in place until the hot glue sets a bit. At first they were all glued flat. But I wanted some depth to it, so I would add a pinecone first,

and use that pine cone as a support to lean other ones against it. It gives the wreath a more layered look.


Once I glued pinecones all the way around the wreath (which it was hard to cover up that beautiful grapevine!)I tucked in a few pieces of wheat. Remember this

garage sale find? I never could fall in love with it. So cut the wheat off of there.

Then Sunday when we went and had big family pictures taken at Mr Toadly Craft's family barn.


Mr Toadly Crafty ran into a buddy who was pheasant hunting. When I saw the beautiful feathers on the pheasant, I made Mr Toadly Crafty ask him for them. He said something about as long as they aren't for some stupid craft.....to which the MR rolled his eyes. He wouldn't give up the tail feathers, I guess those are some big prize for a hunter or something.

I tucked in some silk fall leaves and added a little brown ribbon and

TaDa, it is done!





And Guess what? I still have half a bag of pine cones!!

Thanksgiving Decor

I must say there really is not much to show. I don't do much decor for Thanksgiving because it is sandwiched in between my two biggest decor holidays, Halloween outside and Christmas inside. But I am slowly building it up. I need to add a wreath to the front door and hope to get to it this weekend.

The silver pumpkins are just cheap pumpkins I bought at the evil W store and then used some silver metallic spray paint on them. The pilgrim people are one of the first things I ever crafted. My SIL and I made a set. I still love them, even if they are a little out dated!

On the front table


are my give thanks blocks from a couple of posts ago. Then a candy dish I got on clearance last year with some M&Ms and silk fall leaves in it. Another pilgrim couple

and a basket with some silk flowers in gold and orange

To give it some height to help fill some of the negative space, I placed the basket on a candlestick holder.

Coming up....Fall Wreath (Hopefully!) and Thanksgiving journal....

Novemeber is here!

I LOVE Halloween! It is one of my favorite holidays, okay maybe they are all "my favorites" but still it is fun. I must say I am a little grateful this one is over. Yesterday was a really long day!

My ds turned 8, which for us is a big birthday. He was baptized and so we had a big luncheon afterwards.

We also do Halloween really big! A cemetery, fog machine, witch...it is quite the production! But so much fun.


So between the two, I am kind of wiped out.

But as much as I love Halloween...I get excited when it is over because I get to start planning for the holidays. I host a big cookie exchange each year, this year I think I may end up hosting two or three. Stay tuned, I will give you all my plans and ideas on how to host one of these fun parties! And also what has worked in the past and what hasn't. This will be my seventh year doing this. Also I have some fun Christmas countdowns, decor and recipes to share. I also think this year, I am going to let my kids host their first annual Polar Express Party. On top of all that I make my kids and hubby a scrapbook highlighting all the years events. I have given it to them on Christmas in the past, but this year I am going to give it to them on New Years Eve, you know out with the old in with the new. I also make the kids a gift that is just from me, hand made, to them...I have a few ideas tossing around the noggin for that!

But first Thanksgiving. Such a peaceful holiday! Here is a little craft I made with my craft group. It made taking down the Halloween decorations a little easier, because I knew I had this cutie waiting to go up.



The inspiration for this one came from Lindsey at Inspiring Creations .

The rest of the front table is not set up yet. DH has not dragged the Thanksgiving box out of storage yet for me. So hopefully he will and I can get that all set up for you to peek at.

I hope you all had a fun Halloween! Happy crafting!