Loving Heart. Happy Home.

I am so happy that I can finally post our mantel! Christmas is our favorite time of the year, our mantel, I feel, shows that love off. I have been preparing this Christmas mantel for weeks, and I am not even ashamed.    Like our Halloween mantel, our Christmas mantel had to be within budget. Dollar Tree is an awesome store for budgets, and I found myself there many times. Most garlands that I found at craft stores, and even Walmart, were a little high on the budget, so I decided to check out Dollar Tree as a last resort. I am so glad that I decided to check it out. It didn't disappoint! I purchased four garlands, at the price of $1 each. You can't beat that! Now, I know they're not the fullest, but that was why I purchased so many. I was able to cut three of them in half to fill up the mantel.

For our holiday mantel, I wanted to find reasonably priced candlesticks to go on one side. It's actually fairly difficult to find candlesticks at a good price. Now I know this is a long post for a small project, but to me, no project is too small! I explored a few stores, but most of the candlesticks were at least $10. We needed three, so candlesticks at $10 a piece would be more expensive than the whole Christmas mantel!  So off to a few local thrift stores I went! I decided to upcycle candlesticks from the thrift store with some paint. We have quite a few around us, but there is one that it my absolute favorite. CCA has stores around called reStore. They always have new things every time I visit. This time, I was on a mission to find a few candlesticks. I went down every aisle, looked over every item, until finally, in a few different places, I found three candlesticks.  Now, they were nowhere near perfect. In fact, they didn't match and they were definitely s...

I know, I know. It's early to start decorating for Christmas, but hey, I'm only about a week early! Lately, I have had an itch to decorate for Christmas. It is my favorite holiday after all. This year, I wanted to go for a silver and white theme. Do you know how hard it is to find cute garlands in stores? I went to every craft store! Don't get me wrong, they had plenty of cute garlands, but none that matched my "vision."  So, I decided to create my own garland. I remember seeing these garlands in classrooms as a child, and it seems to still look cute to me! It's simple to make and adds a touch of cuteness.

* This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive compensation at no added cost to you.  Every year, our little family goes out on a hunt to find the perfect ornament. Last year, it was a few. There was the personalized snowman with little A's birth information on it (my favorite), a picture frame ornament to put little A's picture in, and an "A" initial, also for little A. This year, I wanted to try and make our very own ornament. One that we could look at one day and remember that Christmas. I couldn't think of an ornament right away. I'm sort of a perfectionist. I don't settle for easy. So, I was on a hunt in the imagination store in my brain. It didn't take long before I thought of an initial ornament. Once the basis of my ornament was decided, I began wondering how this ornament would look. Would it be simple? Cute? Or would it be elegant? It finally came to me. Simple, cute a...

The best thing about Christmas morning, after opening presents, was sharing a nice, family breakfast together. It didn't matter what breakfast food we had, as long as we spent bonding time with each other, Christmas was set to be an amazing day. After having a child of my own, I've realized that these simple moments are what creates the best childhood memories. As we all know, candy canes and chocolate are a must for the holidays. The combination itself causes serious mouth-watering in my case. So it's no surprise when the thought of chocolate peppermint pancakes popped into my head. Seriously! Does that not sound delicious? After a little trial and error, I finally made the perfect batch of these decadent pancakes. Drool! Now, before I get into the recipe, I must say that these pancakes did in fact melt in my mouth. I almost didn't want to share! Almost. It's hard not to share with an adorable toddler in your lap who "helped" make them in the f...

Shopping for toddlers can be an easy task seeing as there are toys everywhere you look at this time. Shopping for stocking stuffers for toddlers, on the other hand, has proven difficult for me to handle. After much research, I compiled a list of stocking stuffers for my toddler boy, and decided I would help others out who were as stuck as me. Bath Crayons Hot Wheels Toy Story Storybook Bubbles Toddler Flash Cards Chalkboard Mat Chalk Caterpillar Stacking Cups Lots of PlayDoh Yo Gabba Gabba Singing Toothbrush Crayons Color Bath Dropz Babyganics Chapstick Books, Coloring Books, Drawing Pads Flashlight for Toddlers Walkie Talkies Coupon Book from Mommy and Daddy (coming soon) Rubber Ducks Stickers Fruit Pouches Sunglasses **Check any and all toys you purchase for age limits. Make sure there are no small parts that a small child could get a hold of. What did you get for your little ones this Christmas? Let me know in the comments and don't forget to check ...