Ho Ho Holidays

How is your holiday spirit? Are you that Grinch who ignores Christmas? Or are you more like busy elf, spreading cheer and giving gifts. How festive are you this holiday season? Take this quiz:
How Festive Are You Around the Holidays?

Each person has their own traditions during the holidays.
Whether it is big or small, elaborate or simple, any tradition is great to start and keep up. There are several traditions that most families in the US use each year:

Decorating the Christmas tree is one of the most popular holiday traditions that families do together. Some families wait until Christmas Eve to adorn the tree with their ornaments or others choose to get the tree, light it, and decorate it all in one day. Whichever you choose, try and stick to the plan each year as something solid to look forward to.

Everyone has their own traditions and preferred decorations. Check this out:

Sending Christmas Cards is something that many families do every winter. It serves as a nice way to contact distant friends and family, wishing them a safe and happy holiday. Whatever your family style is you can put family pictures on the card, go with a favorite cartoon or choose to send a holy themed card with wishes of holiday blessings.
Something my mother used to do is decorate the house with the Christmas cards we received. Not only would they be displayed on the coffee table, but she would tape them all around the archway to the kitchen. This is a festive but warming welcoming way to open your house to holiday guests. If you’re a more creative one, make your own. You can do tons of ideas with a computer but I often prefer doing everything by hand and on my own. Get some paint, construction paper, markers and scissors.
Also, you don’t have to spend a lot of money on them. Look out for sales especially right after the holiday season and even check out the Dollar Store.

Christmas Caroling is one tradition that many families choose to do the week or two before Christmas. Now do not shake your head and think this option is beyond your style. Christmas caroling is a fun activity that you should at least try and partake in once. If you are not feeling it alone, take your nephew or niece or any other little children in your life around with you. They will not worry if their tune if off, they will enjoy singing the songs they hear on the radio with people from your town or neighborhood.
Or if you want to take the lead and start up caroling in your neighborhood, go for it! Make music sheets with the lyrics to give to all the participants. Set up a time to meet up and dress warm. Knock on doors in your town, open your mouth and let those tunes set you and your audience into the Christmas spirit! Check this out: How to Organize Christmas Caroling (http://www.ehow.com/how_6118_organize-christmas-caroling.html).

Ornament giving is one thing that I love to do every year. It is great to decorate the tree and pick up ornaments from when I was two or three years old. I love seeing the ornaments my grandmother cross-stitched for us each year. Not only does this bring variety to a tree but it creates memories.
Making ornaments is another creative way of gift-giving. A hand-crafted ornament shows time and effort to whomever receives it.
Check out this video. It is so simple and quick and anyone of most ages can do it. Most of all it is cute and will last for years on your Christmas tree.

Playing holiday music. Some start playing the music once November 1st hits. I personally prefer to wait until the day after Thanksgiving. Then the Christmas season is finally declared.
Some great artists to check out and buy when prepping for your holiday tunes: Mariah Carey, Nat King Cole, Boston Pops, Nsync, Ella Fitzgerald, a fun mix like NOW Christmas and many more.
Giving CDs is also a good idea if you are stuck on what to get as a gift. The recipient can play the new CD during Christmas Day and will have something to look forward to for the next December.

Outside décor depends from house to house. Is your family crazy about getting the lights up and being the best around? Or do you prefer to keep it low-key and simple?
These are 2 videos I found that is decorated galore and goes to a Christmas song. They are amazing!

Baking holiday cookies is one of my other personal favorites. We always make dozens of cookies and give them out to our neighbors and family as part of a Christmas gift.
Cookies are sometimes a better option than a store-bought gift. They are homemade, creative and delicious. What is a better gift for Christmas that chocolate or sugar cookies?

Something else that is fun especially with roommates or friends is a Secret Santa. This is a perfect solution to gift-giving if you have a large family but not enough money to buy for everyone. Whether it is between several siblings or with cousins, aunts, uncles and grand-parents; it is simple and everyone give and gets one gift.
If you have a few roommates, spread the gift-giving out. Instead of just giving one gift on one night, it can be more fun to give 2 or 3 throughout the week and one at the reveal. Set a reasonable budget for that, around 30 or 40 dollars. A great website that allows you to send anonymous questions is Elfster.com. One person sets it up and then everyone gets an email with their person drawn. No one knows but you. Give yourself and your friends/roomies a few weeks to think of their gift ideas.
Some good ideas would be: a calendar of their favorite place or animal, a picture frame of everyone participating, their favorite candies, gift cards to their favorite stores, something for their favorite hobby.
Here is a slideshow of the Secret Santa I did with my roommates. The seven us were extremely into it and gave each other the perfect gifts. We ordered Italian food and made cookies. We sat in a circle and before exchanging we all predicted who had who. Here is a little PHOTO SLIDESHOW of our night of Secret Santa.

From coast to coast in the United States, people celebrate their holidays. Some have snow, and others have never seen a white Christmas. Some have real trees and others have artificial ones. This is just an idea of go the holidays go national!

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Color Splash

This is one designer and show that I love. David Bromstrad of Color Splash was a winner of the reality TV competition, Design Star a few years ago. His show is full of bright and brilliant ideas.

His artwork is something that every homeowner LOVES and wishes they had it in their space.

This is just one example of how funky and fun David’s designs are!

-kel

Be a Stager

If you like home design, but mostly the staging part of it, there is a school specifically just for that.

Haverhill Institute of Staging is growing more and more, especially as home design gets bigger and better.

Check it out if being a stager sounds like something you could excel at!

-kel

Fall Wreath

I stumbled upon this How To–for this fall Wreath. I love it.

If you have some time on your hands (like a rainy Sunday afternoon), this could be perfect.

Also–this could make a fabulous gift.

Pumpkins aren’t just for Halloween

Yes, carving them is a Halloween tradition, but once November hits, they have a new role.

Not only can you put them in food (yummy pumpkin pie, soups, or whichever you choose,) but they make for a great decor (no carving involved obviously).

Something I saw and just loved was making a pumpkin vase. Scoop out the insides, put a container/bucket in the center and add some floral foam. Fill with enough water, and add flowers! This is a beautiful centerpiece for your Thanksgiving dinner party!

Get creative!

-kel

How to: Make a Mosaic Tabletop

Here is a easy step by step guide on how to make your own mosaic!!

Click below for a detailed explanation!

how-to-mosaic

-kel

The way she made the room hers…

You can design your room all you want to have great “style” but the fact is that it needs to reflect YOU. Walking into a space that looks like a furniture store appears to be nice and homey, but you need to have those elements that are YOU. You want a space to plop down on your bed to, read books and watch movies. You should want your room to be your favorite place in the world, where you can go to and escape.

Justine is a student whose room is like a snapshot of herself, with some paint and accessories. Her room captures her personality and those things that are important to her, which all bedrooms should.
The first thing about the room is the big BAM of color. Two walls are yellow, one is orange and the other a deep blue.

She tells me what she has done to her room that made it her bedroom.

**(Bolded and italicized are things that you should pay careful attention to when making a space truly yours, just like Justine did!)

———

Q: When did you finally get your own room? And what did you want to change about it?
A: I got my own room when my older brother moved out when I was about 10.  The room was really plain and blah.
I love colors so that’s one of the most dramatic things I changed about it. I also wanted a bigger bed instead of the bunk beds I had before.

Q: Tell me why you picked these colors.  And how does it make you feel?
A: I picked the colors that were on the walls because I just love bright colors.  One wall is blue, one orange and the other two are yellow. When I walk in my room I feel happy because it’s my room, for only me. The loud colors put me in a energetic mood.

Q: What is your least favorite thing about your room?
A: Even with lights, the room seems dark.

Q: What are you favorite things in the room and why?
A: The top thing would have to be the bulletin board in between my two windows filled with all of my pictures. My friends are who I am with almost all of the time, and there’s pictures of me and them all over my room. They are my life.
The second thing would be the canvas art work I did that had the colors of my walls all pulled together on the canvas.  There’s the one with all of the handprints and then there’s the smaller striped ones. I made them with my best friends.
Lastly is my red circle chair and rainbow lights in the one corner of my room.  The chair is where I get a lot of my reading done. And the colored lights are just fun!

Q: How do you feel about those huge mirror closet doors?
A: The long closet mirror doors make the space seem a little bit bigger.  They are the best when I’m getting ready for school or a party and picking out my outfits and such.

Q: What are you hoping to change in your room in the near future, if anything?
A: I’m like moving my bed around every so often into a different position or angle. I want to get rid of the furniture I rarely use. It’s a waste of space and it’ll make the room look bigger.  I like to shop at stores like Urban Outfitters and Ikea.

Q: How is your room different than your friends?
A: My room I would have to say is the brightest room out of all my friends.  And none of my friends have the bulletin board or artwork like I do, which I love.

Q: Why do you think YOUR room has personal style?
A: My room has personal style because when everything is separate, you would think that they’d never look good together, but once they were all together it made sense.  The colors are loud and crazy and pictures take over most of my room, but that’s why I think it has personal style.  It’s me!

This is just one girls room that tells of her personal style and needs in her space.

What’s your room like? If you’d like YOUR room to be highlighted..shoot me a message~!

Not only should your room just be fun, but a happy room gives a good nights sleep. Check out this article!

-kel

Hardwood isnt just for floors

Just something quick–I was watching a show the other night and the designer put hardwood flooring, horizontally on the walls.

It looked amazing.  To avoid the dark, cabin feel–don’t match it perfectly with the floors.

It looks great and had a rich, royal feel to it!

-kel

Ceiling low?

If you have lower ceilings in your room (for example-some basements may fall victim to this) thats OK!

There are plenty of design tricks that can help lift the room and give it some height.

Try a warm color palette. The use of earth tones and comforting hues  will really expand the space. One example: a earthy brown/tan for the walls. Use purples, blues and deep reds in the space in furniture and accessories.

Also, for lighting, tall sconces will give you the light that you’re looking for, but will stretch out the wall.

But remember, unless you want to totally remodel your house, these are just tips to help a room LOOK bigger. So if you’re tall, don’t forget to duck!

-kelly

Antiques aren’t just some old thang…

They are something that makes a home unique and truly great. It’s hard to start collecting, but here is a simple and quick video I made, about an antique store in the Hamden, CT area.

Collecting antiques is not an easy and quick process. It takes awhile and is often very challenging.

Don was so friendly and great to interview. Check it out!