DIY Jar Lid Ornaments

I hope you had a wonderful weekend!  Ours was filled with birthday parties, Christmas celebrations, and decorating for the holidays (still getting the finishing touches up).

I have just a couple more crafts/DIYs for you this week before I start my virtual home tour series. I will be featuring my Christmas home tour, as well as homes of friends. I love to see the different styles and ways of decorating of each person! So, stay tuned this week and next week for beautiful Christmas home tours.

DIY Jar Lid Ornaments

These jar lid ornaments are so versatile in the potential they posses. There are limitless possibilities, your imagination being the fuel to make them happen!  I opted for snowmen and snowflakes.  But, you could easily make punched "tin" ornaments, monograms, santa faces.....so many options! Also, this craft is wonderful for children! A great way to let them use their imagination!

I had jar lids on hand from when I used to own a bath and body store, but if you can't find lids with rims, you could just as easily use mason jar flats. All I needed was some white paint and glitter, buttons, fabric scraps, and hot glue to make the snowman face. I used a small stamp to make the snowflakes, and lined the rim with white ric rac. 

I think my theme for crafts this year has been "easy," and this craft is no exception. And they really show up well on the tree! So pretty!

Coffee Filter Snowballs

I absolutely love these big white poofs! I stayed very neutral in my Christmas decor in my dining room/kitchen area, using golds, silvers, and whites. (Partly because of my very loud green walls.)  When I was decorating these shelves, I originally want to make a coffee filter snowball garland. But as I started making the snowballs, I saw that they were a lot larger than I had intended, so I decided to sit them directly on the shelves. (And, in case you missed it, you can see how to make the ornament wreath here.) This is, once again, a very simple craft that doesn't take a lot of time. 

Gather your supplies:
Small styrofoam balls
Small coffee filters 
Hot glue gun and glue
Ribbon if you want to add a loop to be able to hang them

Start by folding your filter in half.

Then, fold in half again. You might want to put a small dot of hot glue in this fold to hold in place. 

Next, begin gluing to the styrofoam ball in a row, overlapping as you go. 

Once you get a whole row hot glued, then begin filling in around the rest of the ball. Add a loop of ribbon at this stage if you want to be able to hang the snowballs. And there you have it! Another easy Christmas craft! I really love how they look!

DIY Tissue Paper Trees

I'm just popping in quickly today to share this simple craft.  Tissue Paper Trees are so easy and simple to make, anyone can do it. You'll need cone shaped styrofoam forms, copy paper, tissue paper (I used scalloped edge paper), and hot glue. You can also add glitter if you want. 

Start by adding white copy paper to the form to cover the green. I also added a small cone to the top to make it look for like a Christmas tree and to cove the flat top. I did both my trees differently. The one on the left, I cut small sections of the scalloped paper and glued them to the form.  The one on the right, I cut my paper in long strips and wrapped around the form. While they both look good, I think I prefer the one on the right. It seems to have a little more movement. You can play around with your method to get the look you want. I just continued adding tissue paper until it covered the whole tree. Lastly, I sprayed with spray adhesive and dusted with fine glitter. 

This is such an easy craft and it didn't take all that long. It would a great one to get the  kiddos involved in!

DIY Snowglobe Jars

This year, when decorating for Christmas, I have used a lot of bottle brush trees, especially in my living room.  I really wanted a vintage vibe, and I feel that using the mini trees accomplishes just that. To display on shelves in my living room and foyer, I made lots of mini snowglobe jars using salt and bottle brush trees. All of the apothecary jars were some I found at thrift stores. (I love finding that kind of stuff on the cheap!)

The red house was a score from TJ Maxx. It even lights up. I nestled it into a large lidded jar that I found at Wal-Mart years ago. (They still sell them.) In the rest of my jars, I added salt for snow and placed trees of the appropriate size into each jar. 

I think that this Christmas tree shaped jar is my favorite. I found it at a local flea market for $0.78. Yes. You read that right. It was only $0.78 and it was filled with vintage glass ornaments. You can't beat that. I snatched it up immediately. STEAL!

I'm also displaying this guy on shelves in my dining room. (You can see this post on how I made it last year.) It held up well from last year.  (Can you believe I found this jar at a thrift store last year for $0.25?)

These DIY waterless snowglobe jars are super easy to make AND they are inexpensive as well. Make a few of them for a display with big impact!

Red Velvet Truffles

If there's one thing I absolutely love during the holidays, it's my Granny's Red Velvet Cake.  It is by far the best recipe I've ever had, however partial I may be, and it screams Christmas to me. (You can read an article I wrote about it in Southern Holiday Life Magazine here. Pages 81-82.)

When I make this cake, I always have to even out the cake so that it will be level. When I'm finished making the delectable treat, I always have extra cake sitting around from where I shaved down the layers. So I decided to put that extra cake to good use. Making truffles with it seemed like a good idea.  (Recipe at the bottom of this post.)

My Granny's recipe makes three layers. Sometimes, I like to make a four layer cake so that it looks a little more appealing.  So, I double the recipe, make a four layer cake, and use the rest of the cake layers and the parts I shaved off to make the truffles. 

These truffles are just as mouth-watering as their layered counterpart.  You'll notice in the recipe that I add a pinch of sea salt to the top of the truffle. That's to cut the sweetness just a bit. These treats are very rich!  They also make great hostess or neighbor gifts!  Package in a treat box and tie with ribbon and you have a gift anyone would love. 

Granny's Red Velvet Cake
1 box Duncan Hines Butter Recipe cake mix
1 Tbsp cocoa
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup buttermilk
1 bottle of red food coloring
1 stick of butter
3 eggs
1 tsp baking soda
1 Tbsp vinegar

Mix cake mix and cocoa together. Then, add vanilla, buttermilk, food coloring, butter, and eggs. Blend well until moist. Add baking soda and vinegar. Beat the mixture for four minutes.

Bake in a 375 degree oven for 25-30 minutes. Makes three layers.

Cream Cheese Pecan Frosting
1 stick of butter
1 8oz. cream cheese
1 box of powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup chopped pecans

Soften butter and cream cheese. Cream well. Add sugar, vanilla, and nuts.

Red Velvet Truffles
Red Velvet cake and Cream Cheese Pecan Frosting
Almond Bark
Sea Salt
Chopped pecans

Crumble cake in a large bowl. Mix in the cream cheese pecan frosting. Roll into balls and place on cookie sheet lined with wax paper. Place in freezer for twenty minutes for balls to set. Once set, dip balls into Almond Bark and top with a pinch of salt and garnish with chopped pecans.

Linking up to:
Thistlewood Farms Holiday Recipe Link Party

DIY Ornament Wreath

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving! We enjoyed spending time with our family and I had a blast shopping on Black Friday. Now it's December and I say let the Christmas festivities begin!  (I have two Christmas parties this week alone. Already.) 

To celebrate the Most Wonderful Time of the Year, I'm sharing Christmas crafts and DIYs again this week, starting with one of my favorites......an ornament wreath. 

DIY Ornament Wreath

Gather your supplies:
*ornaments (lots and lots of them!) Check thrift and dollar stores. You want a variation in size for this wreath in order to be able to fill in the gaps. I used three sizes, the smallest being balls for mini trees. 
*Wreath form. I used a straw one I already had on hand.
*Hot glue gun and glue.

1. Start by hot gluing your larger ornaments around the outside and inside of the wreath to get your base. 
2. Once you have the outside and inside perimeter of the wreath lined with ornaments, begin to fill in the top ( or front once you hang it) of the wreath. Be sure to vary the color and sizes in order to get better coverage. 
3. Continue to hot glue the ornaments around the wreath until you get good coverage. 

This is a very simple wreath to make, it is just a bit time consuming.  Also, just a little tip. I made one of these last year, then stored in our storage building that is not climate controlled. It got really hot in the summer and most of the ornaments fell off and I had to completely start over this year. You may want to store this inside your home where there won't be a huge variation in temperature to compromise the integrity of the hot glue. 

And one more thing. This wreath takes a lot of ornaments to make. Buy more than you think you need. Because you will probably need them. Last year when making one, I kept having to go back and get more ornaments.  This year, I was prepared. 

Have you ever made an ornament wreath?  I'd love to see it. Leave a comment with a link to a blog post featuring ornament wreaths. Don't blog? Share your ornament wreath photo on Cultivate Create Facebook page. I can't wait to see them!

Paper Fan Ornaments

I haven't used red and green in my Christmas decorating for the past two years, favoring gold and silver. This year, I just couldn't stand it anymore. I HAD to bring red and green back, but I opted to add in some blues as well. In my mind, I envisioned a tree with a vintage flair.....and adding the blue gave me the look I was going for. But the real stars of this tree are the paper fan ornaments that with just a little modification, made all the difference. 

Gather your supplies:

*Paper fans (I found mine at Wal-Mart in the party supply section.)
*Stickers or embellishments
*Paper
*Glue
*Glitter

In order to specialize these generic paper fans for my tree, I cut circles out of white paper. Then I added glitter to the edges of the circle and embellished with a sticker in the center. Lastly, I affixed it to the center of the fan. Easy peasy.   

I realize paper fans are a little unconventional for a tree ornament, but I really love the bold impact they give! 

I truly hope you have an amazing Thanksgiving! I'm signing off until next Monday, taking time to spend with family and friends, and perhaps to shop a bit. Monday, there's more Christmas DIY and crafts that I can't wait to show you. See you then!

Linking up to:
Creative Spark Link Party