Christmas Home Tour: The Crutchfields

I am so pleased to bring you the first Christmas home tour on Cultivate Create this year. This home is truly one of the more unique ones that I've seen and it belongs to my sweet friend, Lindsey and her husband, Justin. They have a precious little one and what a wonderful place for him to grow up! There are so many unique touches, attention to detail, and the marrying of old and new in this home. Let's get started!

Justin and Lindsey Crutchfield

Originally, this structure was to be a barn/guest house, but Lindsey and Justin later decided to make it their home by adding on to the front and it became what you see today! It's nestled back off of the road in a secluded little slice of heaven. 

I love Lindsey's ladder Christmas tree on the front porch. I can't imagine the time it took her to hang all of those pretty, perfectly spaced ornaments, but the effect is well worth it.

The Entryway:

The Living Room:

When you walk through the entryway, down a wide hallway that is flanked by bedrooms on each side, you end up in the main living space. There is major "wow factor" when you enter. The ceilings are very high, and are adorned with beautiful tin. And the beams are just gorgeous!

Just look at those gorgeous, rustic high ceilings!

Check out this awesome staircase that goes up to the loft. I love that Lindsey put old license plates to decorate it. So unique! I'll show you more details about the staircase and loft in a moment. But first....

Lindsey and Justin have lots of old metal signs, including this antique Studebaker sign that was found at her grandfather's home.

The kitchen runs down the entire length of the room, with beautiful white cabinets and black granite counters. I wish this photo did justice to the height of the ceilings. 

At the back of the great room, there is an eating area with an industrial metal table flanked by metal tabouret chairs. The rustic wood walls pair so well with the metal.

Also at the back of the great room, is the guest bathroom. It's planked cedar walls and rustic touches are right at home in this barn turned house. 

I love the bucket and water spouts as sink and faucets!

See that adorable screen door?

It's a pocket door entry for the walk-in pantry. And as Lindsey says,"What goes better together than screen doors and pickle jars?" Love it!


The Loft:

Here is a closer shot of some of those awesome license plates on the staircase going up to the loft. They found lots of these at antique stores around the area.

Lindsey used antique suitcases as shelves flanking the wall of the staircase. So unique and adorable.

View from the top of the staircase.

Just look at this view from the top! So, so pretty!

And this rustic cedar railing? Oh my goodness! 

Lindsey and Justin have currently been using the loft as a guest room, but are working on converting it into an office.

Outdoor Spaces:

The outdoor spaces have just as much charm and character as the rest of the home. 

I know a lot of people who would die to find an antique metal glider set in this condition! Lindsey painted it to give it a fresh feel without losing the integrity of the pieces. 

I love that they used an antique corn shucker as a coffee table. 

There is so much attention to detail in this home. Like this old door with a Colonial Bread metal push bar on it....

...or this antique light that they rewired. (There's also a matching on in the great room above the dining table.)

I hope you enjoyed touring this home as much as I did. I absolutely love when people know what they love and just go for it! Lindsey and Justin's unique style is so endearing and I'm so glad they let us take a peek inside their home. If you have any questions about the home, some of the items or antiques, or where items were bought, feel free to ask by leaving a comment or messaging me on Facebook or email me at cultivatecreate@yahoo.com. 

Advent Calendar with Printable Plaid Tags

We've carried on the tradition of the Advent calendar at our home this year. I love to give my girls little surprises or treats each day leading up to Christmas....Jesus' birthday! For last year's Advent, I made some printable scripture and activities to include each day. (I'll leave the link to last year's at the bottom of the post so you can download that free printable if you want.) I used the same printable this year, but only included the scripture and not all of the activities. I found that I over extended myself a bit and getting in some of those activities was difficult. We'll still take things to our neighbors and to some civil servants (two of the activities on the printable), but otherwise will keep it simple with the scripture. 

I used an antique wooden ladder that I found at an antique store in Dothan, Alabama a couple years ago to hang our Advent calendar. I draped red pom pom trim and attached with a small clothespin. 

I made printable tags with buffalo check and traditional plaid to go along with my theme this year. I've made this available for you to print, too! Just download at the bottom of this post. 

I'm a couple of days late in getting this post up, but there you go! If you've already done an Advent calendar, pin this post and save for next year!

To download the free printable, right click on each picture and save. Copyright Cultivate Create 2015. For personal use only. 

Click HERE to see last year's Advent calendar with free activity printable. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Dare to DIY: Flocked Christmas Tree

An Honest Review and Tutorial. DIY if you dare.
I've been eyeing pretty flocked trees for a while. I'm so drawn to the snowy branches. It seems to bring some softness to the tree and I guess you always want what you can't have.... and for us, that's a white Christmas. It just doesn't happen in South Alabama. (My Iowa family members are probably thinking I should be careful what I wish for.) Anyway, I have perfectly good trees and didn't want to go buy another one, so I decided to DIY it. 

Now, I'm not one to shy away from a good do-it-yourself project. But, when I started researching how to flock a Christmas tree, I almost decided to forego the whole project. But I really, really, really wanted a flocked tree and I had a vision in my head of how I wanted my tree to look this year and when I get a vision in my head, it's virtually impossible for me to veer from that direction. (Was that enough of a run-on sentence for you?) So, I decided on the most cost-effective way to flock a tree. Apparently this method was the way many people flocked trees decades ago. It involves soap flakes. 

I should let that sink in for a minute for you. Soap flakes. I should've known right then and there that this project may not go the way I envisioned it, but I forged ahead anyway. In case you're like me and desperately want to DIY your own tree, here's the recipe I used for my flocking.

Tree Flocking:
*1 large box soap flakes (all I could find was Zote soap flakes at Wal-Mart. It comes in a 17.6 oz. box for $2.64)
*4 tablespoons of corn starch
*3 cups of cold water
*1 cup of hot water
*vanilla and cinnamon (if you want to add for scent)

My tree before flocking (unfluffed)

How-to:
Add your box of soap flakes to a large bowl, then mix in the three cups of water. Add your cornstarch to the cup of warm water and stir. Then add that to your bowl and mix with a mixer until fluffy. (You may have to microwave your soap mixture to soften and melt the soap flakes. I ended up having to do that a couple of times.) You want to mix until your consistency is like fluffy shaving cream like the picture above. You can add the vanilla and cinnamon if you want to for scent. This has a very strong soapy scent, obviously, and I read somewhere that adding this helps cut down that scent. In my experience with it, it really didn't make much of a difference.  

Then, all you have to do is apply directly to your tree. I put my tree in my garage on top of a drop cloth. I didn't use gloves, but if you have sensitive skin, you might want to wear some. 

I applied the thickest amount on the very tips of the branches and a little lighter further in the tree. Once you are finished, let the tree sit for at least twenty-four hours to cure. It will dry hard.

I really liked the look of my tree when I was finished. It was flocked, but not overly so. I was so happy with and I couldn't wait to get it inside. 

After it cured overnight, I enlisted my husband to help me carry it inside still fully put together to keep from messing up the flocking. Here's where the Griswold moment comes in. I could tell by touching the flocking that it would break off easily, so I thought the best way to keep it mostly in tact was to just carry the whole thing inside fully put together. This involved us opening up both French doors at our side entry to fit it inside. Instead of taking an immediate left to get the tree to its home, we had to walk through the kitchen, through the dining room, then to the foyer, and finally the living room to get it to the office where it was going. Everywhere we walked through had a trail that looked like this:

Sorry about the blurry cell phone photo, but that was all I snapped of this mess. Ya'll, it was everywhere! I swept at least three times and vacuumed to get it all up. We probably lost 35-40% of the flocking just getting it inside and I probably lost another 10% when I decorated it.  That's about half of that pretty flocking that I spent so much time hand applying just gone!

So the moral of the story is sometimes you win at DIY and sometimes you lose. As it pertains to this particular project, I was definitely on the losing end. I'm not sure how it went for all of the many other bloggers whose posts I read about how to flock a Christmas tree, but the most anyone mentioned was that it was "messy." That may be a bit of an understatement. It is VERY messy, a good bit of your flocking will probably break off, and it smells overwhelmingly of soap. That has faded as the days have passed, but the first few days it had a very strong soap odor. 

On the up side, I still have some pretty, soapy flocking still in tact on my tree that I can enjoy for now. But, we'll see how long it takes for that to break off as well. Oh well. All's fair in love and DIY flocked Christmas trees.