Twas the night before...

And so the day has come, my favourite day of the year. All the build up, the preperation, weeks of being surrounded by decorations and the sweet excitment in the air..I can't believe it'll soon be over for another year.

I want to wish you all a wonderful Christmas wherever you are. Thank you for reading my sporadic posts and for sticking with me this year.

Lots of festive love from my family's home to yours.

Lexie

x

The Festive Home

Ahhh Christmas. Is there any other month more wonderful than December?..every day takes you closer to the best days of the year and while we wait we get to decorate our homes and enjoy the festive sights and smells.

I truly love this time of year.

My house is looking suitably festive, I trust yours is too by now. This year I am particularly happy with my festive home.

I have contrasting tastes when it comes to Christmas decor. I love a rustic, country Christmas style decor with natural garlands, greenery and scandi style red and white combinations. But I also adore a faded, frosty look that screams vintage oppulance. The two don't exactly mix so this year I have tried to keep them seperate and only mixed where I feel it looks right...mostly on the tree. I think I've managed to get it right for once...

The living room is rustic, with berry and ivy garlands on the mantle piece, candles and frosted twigs in a vase.

The tree is an ecclectic mix of scandi patterns, reds and whites as well as pinks, ivories and florals (of course).

The hallway is full of frosty white, ivories and golds. Lots of faded glitter, lace and vintage gold ornaments and some frosted pinecones to keep the rustic theme going.

My bedroom continues the theme with whites, creams and fairy lights. 

And when all is decorated, I love to sit back and enjoy the sights by evening candle light..

And those glorious Christmas smells..cinamon, cloves, clemantines..

There definitely is no better time of year.

Happy decorating and thank you for reading.

Lexie

x

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A sparkling 2012

Hello all, January is upon us...can I just be the first to say that I miss Christmas, can we do it all again please??

I am not too excited for the coming year, the last few have been hard and full of more bad than good unfortunately so I will wait and see what this year holds..although having had some terrible news late last year I have a feeling it's going to be a hard few months, sigh!

Nevertheless, before I go into my winter slump and battle the January blues or the "Januaries" as my dad would call them I would like to wish my readers a very very HAPPY NEW YEAR and a wonderful, craft and beauty filled 2012! Look I even found a pretty picture and everything...

Image source

I look forward to spending my year in your delightful company!

With love,

Lexie

The inbetween

Ahh, it's that time of year again, that weird time of year when Christmas is over but new year is yet to come, there is still turkey in the fridge but most people are back to work. The fairy lights are still twinkling, but they're a little less bright, less pretty. This time of year makes me a little sad, although I am very happy to not be back at work. But, Christmas is over...and January is looming, oh how I hate January!!

The important thing is, I had a wonderful Christmas full of family and laughter, too much food and chocolate, presents and my sisters teeny tiny kitten who I had the (unexpected) pleasure of looking after all Christmas day and boxing day (I had never seen anything so tiny). Isn't Christmas just such a lovely time? But so sad when it's gone.

I thought I would take the time to share some of my Christmas 2011 highlights with you, firstly, the present hoard!

Everyone loved the gifts I had for them and I in turn loved everything I received, I am very very lucky!

Books, there were a few:

The laduree book is exquisite!

 My family have singlehandedly managed to keep Cath K in business this Christmas..I don't often buy Cath K stuff so it's nice to be treated!

I got supplies to keep me crafting as well as a lovely blue mini sewing machine to get me into the habit of sewing!

And then there were the lovely things to make pretty with..these are now proudly hanging around my flat!

I also got some Cath K gift vouchers which I spent some of today, got to love the Cath Kidston sale when you have gift vouchers to spend!

However, I am most grateful for my lovely memories of the last few days..

That is one tiny kitten sleeping on my post Christmas dinner food baby!

My gorgeous niece and nephew on Christmas eve!

Reading my nephew's letter from santa..he was thrilled with it!

Opening presents with my sister, brother and nana and parents for the first time in my whole life..
it felt good :)

I have had a hectic, fun filled few days filled with hugs and my wonderful family, I suppose that will be enough to get me through the in-between, the January mist and right through the spring 2012 :)

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and I wish you all a happy new year!

Lexie x x x

Twas the night before...

Well here we are, Christmas Eve is upon us!

I hope all your festive plans are coming together, your family have arrived safely and the festive cheer is bubbling over!

I fully intended to post my Christmas baking inspirations but it all went a little bit wrong...needless to say I won't be sharing my baking endeavours with you today!

So it just remains for me to wish you all a wonderful Christmas and New Year...I will be enjoying mine at my dads with a house full of family! Bliss.

Much love and merriment to you all dear readers!

Lexie x x x

My printable gift to you

Hello all,

Christmas is but a blissfully short seven days away. Unfortunately I have been horrifically ill since last we spoke and I am very slowly getting better...hopefully in time for Christmas!

I stumbled across some rather adorable printable gift tags for those of you who love everything cute and vintage and have yet to wrap your gifts..infact, they are so lovely that I re tagged some of my presents.

So here they are..

You can download them here for yourself and bring some extra festive loveliness to your no doubt sublimely wrapped gifts. I printed mine on some peach coloured card and they look wonderful!

On another note, I am amused and surprised by the amount of Christmas blog posts I have read titled "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas"...Is this a blog rule that I was not aware of?

Have a lovely Sunday,

Love,

Lexie (Cough, cough, sneeze, sniff)

Tis the season part 5: Creating the Christmas look

Hello again.

The time has finally arrived for me to share my festive decorations and I am more than a little excited because I am so happy with my Christmas home! I've been spying and drooling over all the pictures from my favourite bloggers showing their lovely Christmas decor and now it is my turn.

This year I decided it was time for a change, I wanted a Christmas decor that was classy and sophisticated, that reflected my taste and my age and finally, after many years of failing to get the mix quite right- always over doing on something or just mixing too many things that just didn't work together- finally, this year I have a house to be proud of..it's very me but more refined, very traditional and very classy.

I went looking for an image on Pinterest that encapsulated everything that I was trying to create- this is where Pinterest really comes into its own- finding a picture that matched the one in my mind was tricky, in fact I ended up with a lot of different pictures that sort of, maybe, kind of got the right idea...I ended up with these:

Source

Source

I wanted green foliage, frosty hues and delicate creams. I also wanted splashes of red, whitewashed wicker and rustic decorations that would look perfect in any country cottage.

The result? I sort of achieved it, I certainly got my creams and my foliage, I got the wicker and the reds and overall I am thrilled. However, budget was an issue (isn't it always) and I had to make a few compromises along the way when I just couldn't find what I was looking for.

So, without further a do, I give you my Christmas home:

My huge tree is lovely and carries my many ornaments very well.
I have been tweaking the decorations all the time and I'm
not sure I will ever be happy with them!

My fire place is decorated with artificial ivy, berries and pine cones as well as candles and
berry fairy lights. Wicker ornaments hang from the mantel and jars and candles line the base.

I printed some wonderful sheet music for some Christmas
carols and framed them. They create a vintage, traditional feel.
You can get these for your own home here

One of my favourite baubles.

Emma Bridgewater Christmas bunting from ebay. 

This is one of the baubles that I my friend purchased for me
from Aubrey Garner's stall at the Osterley Craft fair. I have three of them hanging in
a row above a window!

So there you have it! I also have a real wreath scattered with cinnamon and berries hanging in my kitchen along with my mum's old ornate gold tree ornaments hanging from the kitchen fire place. The place is also scattered with Welsh holly that I picked up from a market when I went home to Wales over the weekend. And then there's the fairy lights! I suppose some things will never change!!

I hope you are having fun with your decorations, I'd love to see them!!

Until then, lots of festive love.

Lexie

x

Tis the season part 4: Wrapping to impress

Well hello, how are you all doing on this blustery Tuesday?

The time has finally come for me to share with you my Christmas wrapping inspiration.

Now, let me tell you I have very limited skill when it comes to wrapping gifts, in fact I have always rather disliked it. I love the result but hate having to do it. This year I was looking forward to it though. I was desperate for a rustic, simple theme with lovely Christmas ribbons as an accent.

And so, inspired by these lovely images that encapsulated everything I was looking for:

                               

                                        Source

Source

I loaded myself up with reels of red gingham ribbon, a roll of standard brown paper from a post office, some brown paper lunch bags from ebay (Thank God for Ebay) and some brown card gift tags as well as some free printable tags I had printed earlier in the year.

The effect is rustic simplicity with a splash of festive colour and I am really pleased with how my gifts have turned out.

These paper lunch bags are so easy to make and perfect for smaller gifts.
Pair with some pretty ribbon and a tag to create the look. I love it!

I'm completely sold on gingham ribbon. It's lovely!

And there you have it. For someone who normally hates wrapping I have found a new appreciation for the art and I really think brown paper is the way forward. Understated and easily customisable, it's cheap to buy and you get yards of the stuff on one roll! Although I did wrap all my nieces and nephew's gifts in some beautiful bird print paper that I picked up in January for 75% off!

So if you're a lover of all things rustic chic and you have yet to wrap all your festive treats then why not try brown paper and let me know how you get on.

I'll be posting my penultimate installment of the 'Tis the season' series later today. Stay on the edges of your seat won't you?

Happy wrapping,

Lexie 

x

Christmas craft

Hello, another Sunday has come around and I thought I would try and squeeze in a little blog post. I hope you are all enjoying the build up to Christmas and you're all keeping yourself busy with wrapping paper, ribbon and baked goods! I have been waiting so patiently to post the next two parts of my Christmas craft series and I will be doing so on Tuesday now that everything is wrapped and I have put the finishing touches to my decor. But until then I have some little pieces of wonderful to share with you all..

We took a little trip down the road to see what local craft talent awaited us at the Christmas craft fair at Osterley park. Unfortunately it was much smaller than I expected but fear not, I came away with some little treasures including some little felt owls for my tree and some beautiful Christmas note cards. Oh but that's not all...there was one stall there that I could have explored all day, it was utterly enchanting and definitely fit for my blog pages...have a little look for yourself won't you..?

There were ditsy prints galore on top of a polka dotted back ground- my absolute dream stall! Pearlescent hues, vintage florals, heart shaped loveliness and girly gifts for all ages. Teddies, bows, wall hangings, hearts, cushions, homewares and trinkets, all beautifully hand made. Christmas baubles, homemade notebooks, garlands...you name it! I have never seen anything else quite like these...and I've seen a lot of handmade beauties to compare!

Beautiful angels on fabric hearts!

Just some of the cushions on offer.

These wonders are a collaborative effort between Aubrey Garner and a very talented parent. Although they are new to the craft scene they certainly deserve to be noticed. Unfortunately, they don't have a website or blog to their name which is such a shame because these treasures need to be seen, trust me on that!

I fell in love with the stall so much that I am now the proud owner of three of the most beautiful wicker decorations that I shall use this and every Christmas, they are truly lovely...but you'll see more of them on Tuesday.

If you can get down to the Osterley christmas craft fair at Osterley Park in West London next weekend then stop by and see Aubrey and her adorable gifts, I can't express how lovely this stall was! Entry to the craft fair is free but for a small price you can spend some time taking a look at the house all dressed up in its Christmas best.

It was certainly very atmospheric:

If you can't get to the fair and you're interested in these beautiful crafts then let me know and I'll pass on Aubrey's contact details, she was kind enough to hand them over to me after I had got in everyone's way by taking too many blurry photos....I couldn't help myself.

See you on Tuesday for the next two installments of my 'Tis the season' Christmas craft series.

Lexie x x x

Tis the season: Part 3 - Homemade Christmas cards

Here we are again folks, another Sunday and another Christmas craft. I have been really enjoying my various crafts and this one in particular- I have been so excited to share them with you!!

So today I am sharing with you my home made Christmas cards- made with a hint of inspiration from Pinterest and a lot of my own imagination!

It all started when I saw these beautiful cards on Pinterest:

Card one Source, Card two source, Card three source

Of course, mine did not turn out looking as exquisitely professional as these but I had fun making them and that was the whole point!

To make my cards I purchased a whole lot of card in various colours and some Christmas stamps and coloured ink in black, gold and silver. I raided my own ribbon, button and fabric scrap collection and got to work and here is what I came up with:

I used a mixture of card, fabric and buttons to make a selection of individual cards, no one card is the same and that makes them more special! My Pinterest inspired cards turned out well, quirky in their own way..

Four little stockings hanging in a row made using a selection of fabric, including some Cath K designs.
Inspired by the card I found on Pinterest.

Some cute button baubles hanging from some East of India
ribbon. I love the effect of this one and it was so very easy to make.

After failing miserably at the beaded bauble card I made a fabric bauble card instead, complete with bow and ribbon which looks lovely. Be warned that if you try the beaded bauble card make sure you have patience and good glue!

After being inspired by the cards on Pinterest I decided to try some of my own designs and I am glad that i did:

I cut up an old book to make a tree and star design and used my Christmas stamp
to create the gift tag design. The window design was more experimental and I love the way
it turned out.

And my three favourite cards came from a sudden burst of inspiration and some help from printable templates:

Look at them standing there! I love these designs so much that I am going to make more of them.
I found templates online very easily by searching on google and used them to cut out the fabric,
this idea is perfect for using up fabric scraps and
they look truly handmade and lovely. You could use any template you want as well!

I also made a fabric snowman, using three circles in different fabrics and a ribbon star made by overlapping six ribbons into a star shape and placing a button in the middle.

As you can see, my loved ones will be getting some unique cards this year and each of them made with love! So, if you hadn't considered the fun of card making before then give it a go before you run out of time. The best part of making cards, for me, was the fact that you can come up with whatever idea you like and have some real fun putting the idea onto paper! It really is a treat! Let me know how you get on won't you?

Coming up next in my Christmas craft series I will be sharing my Christmas decor inspiration, Christmas wrapping ideas and some mince meat treats!

With love,

Lexie!

Lexie really loves..

Well hello! I hope you have had a wonderful week.

I simply had to stop by to take a break from my Christmas craft series and share some loveliness with you all.

Cast your minds back to the warmer days of October- you may remember I posted about a delightful little shop called 'Lexi Loves'. Well, a few short weeks ago while browsing the Lexi Loves facebook page I stumbled upon an image of Lexi's most wonderful handmade Christmas baubles..let me tell you, I was sold then and there..completely lovestruck. So I contacted the very lovely Lexi via her twitter and managed to snag myself a pair of these beautiful baubles at a real bargainous price. After waiting two whole weeks to be able to get to the royal mail depot (What a pain it is when you work full time and the depot only opens between 8 and 12 everyday) ..today was the long awaited day and my, how lovely the baubles truly are! Just take a look at what was waiting for me inside the little box wrapped in pink..

Aren't they pretty? I love them, I really do! They are so well made and they are quirky and whimsical and they go perfectly with my other decorations! They look perfect on my tree (Yes..as of today my tree is up and standing proudly in my living room..don't judge me though, I'm simply too busy to put them up next weekend and I must have them up for the entire of December because I love Christmas so much!) and I couldn't be happier.

Thank you Lexi Loves for my baubles and my beautiful postcards. I am a fan for life!

So, if you are admiring these beauties with lust in your hearts then you must make some time to visit Lexi's shop..you won't regret it! 

You can follow Lexi Loves on Twitter, Facebook or Via her blog...make sure you do!

I have also been busy making my handmade Christmas cards and I will be sharing them with you tomorrow in part 3 of my 'Tis the season' Christmas craft series..

Tis the season part 2: Cookie cutter ornaments

Hello and a happy sunny Sunday to you all,

It's time for part two my Christmas inspiration series and today I bring you another special idea for a unique home made tree ornament. Now, I don't know how you feel about Christmas ornaments but over the years I have really begun to appreciate the ornaments that have a story behind them, not the ones that come in sets of 30 from Homebase but the odd baubles and trinkets, the ones that were handed down to you or that you spotted on a market stall one Christmas. Last year I painted my own ceramic bauble and I was so happy with it and the story that I have about it and this year I want to add some more unique ornaments made by my own hand. To that end, today's craft idea is..

Cookie Cutter Ornaments

I believe these little trinkets are the brainchild of one Martha Stewart and when done properly they look a little something like this..

Source

Aren't they precious?? Now, those of you who have been keeping tabs on me for some time may remember that I posted about buying some cookie cutter shapes that were too small, minuscule in fact, and fit for nothing...until now. If you don't have old cookie cutters lying around you could invest in some Christmas themed ones, no big expense required. 

Get hunting for some of your favorite patterns and print them onto card or paper. All you Cath K lovers could use some of the digital wallpapers that are available on her website or keep your eye out for any free printable  wrapping papers in your favorite prints.

Next, simply draw around the outer edge of the cookie cutter and cut out your paper shape, attach with glue and there you have it, an easy, country chic ornament made by you to be handed down for years to come. 

For my little stars, I used some left over pink polka dot card that I had from a different project and I love the effect. I didn't need big ones because my tree will be fit to burst this year even if it is a foot and half taller than my old tree..

And there they are, all spotty and chic! 

Join me again for part 3 where I will be sharing my home made card designs.

Lexie x