A Coca-Cola Holiday and 2 DIY Coke Bottle Christmas Ornament Tutorials

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #SipsOfJoy #CollectiveBias

Coca-Cola Holiday

With Christmas and holiday parties right around the corner, it’s time to stock up on drinks!  This year Coca-Cola has added even more fun to the festivities with their special holiday inspired Share a Coke bottles!  These 8.5 inch aluminum bottles are the perfect size for parties.  They also have little Coca-Cola Christmas balls on them, and they feature cute message like, “Share a Coke with Santa.”  How fun!  With cute bottles like this, who needs fancy glassware?

Coca-Cola is also helping us celebrate the season with a #SipsofJoy Twitter Party on Tuesday, December 8, 2015 at 1:00 pm EST. RSVP here.

I got my Coca-Cola products through a special Cartwheel offer at Target.  Just visit this Share a Coke page and enter the Twitter id of a friend or family member. When you do, they will get a 20% off Coca-Cola Cartwheel offer, and YOU will get a 20% off Cartwheel offer! [Read more…]

Friday Favorites – Week 292 – With Fun Halloween Treat Bag Ideas

Happy Halloween Eve!  And welcome to this week’s Friday Favorites party!  Last night I was busy making Halloween treat bags for our son to carry to school for all the saxophone and tuba players in marching band.  (I LOVE making treat bags!)

Incidentally as I looked though last week’s link up, I found some cute and unique treat bag ideas for Halloween.  It may be a little late to use them this year…but if you have kids and you’ll be making treat bags next year, it’s never too early to bookmark some ideas!  Take a look!

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Friday Favorites – Week 290 – With Halloween Decor

Happy Friday to you!  Even though I’ve put my party post over every week, I feel terrible that I’ve missed out on doing features these last two or three weeks! And I especially regret that all this business happened during what is perhaps my favorite time of year for blogging….I LOVE featuring fall and Halloween ideas!

But on the flipside, one of the thing’s that has kept from me from doing features is all the great blog work I’ve been doing.  Lately I really feel like I’ve cranked out some fun and creative posts!  If you have time, I’d love for you to take a look at all the recipes and projects we’ve been busy with!

Now without further ado, let’s get to this week’s party featuring some oh-so-creative Halloween decor!

Friday Favorites Link Party

Hosted by:

Simply Sweet Home
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MustLoveHome

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The Chunky Chef

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Halloween Decor 1

Halloween Decor from Curly Crafty Mom

Halloween Decor 2

Fall Mantle from Sondra Lyn

Halloween Decor 3

Crafty Halloween Pumpkins from Debbie-Dabble

Thanks for joining us this week! Link up below!


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Banana Pudding Go-Paks + Wicked Good Treat Bag Printable and Tutorial

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #SnackAndGo #CollectiveBias

Over the last few weeks, I’ve shared a variety of back to school breakfast, lunch, & snack ideas.  Today we continue this topic with some snacks you can serve at home or on-the-go.  Plus I’m going to show you how I’ve taken a couple of simple products and created a fun Halloween treat bag that is a great alternative to your usual candy treat bags. (There’s also a cute printable and tutorial for you!)

On the Go Snacking Ideas [Read more…]

4th of July Printable, Tutorial, and GraphicStock Giveaway

GraphicStock Disclosure

I always love decorating for holidays throughout the year, but I don’t always have a big budget to spend to spend on items I’ll only be using a few a weeks.  Luckily I’ve been able to score a lot of great items at the dollar stores and thrift stores, and I’m always able to find really cute printable art online, and when I can’t find anything I like, sites like GraphicStock and PicMonkey help me to make my own.

GraphicStock is a website which offers over 250000 graphics, vectors, icons, buttons, images, and more!  These can be used for home and party decor, invitations, stationary, greetings cards, and banners, as well as media for businesses and organizations, such as a logo, business cards, flyers, letterheads, and more!  And you can also use the images to create your own custom graphics for blog posts and general web design.

And with so many images to offer, you can find an image, vector, or icon for any project and to fit virtually any style you are looking for.  Today I’m sharing a printable that I made using an image from GraphicStock.  You can download it here for FREE and then frame it.  It will look great on your wall or mantel! [Read more…]

Coca-Cola Happy Hour + Patriotic Coke-Inspired Table Decor

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #CokeHappyHour #CollectiveBias
Coke Bottles

I’m so excited about the hot summer weather here! One of my favorite summer activities is just sitting on the front porch or the back deck with my hubby.  Whether we’re sitting out in the hot sun or under the stars at night, it is always good to have this time to spend with him just laughing and talking as we share a Coke!

This summer Coca-Cola has brought back their Share a Coke campaign, complete with fun personalized bottles and cans.  Coke has always been my favorite drink, and last year I had my fair share of cans and bottles with fun words like “Superstar” and Soulmate” written on them.  Then this year I’ve gotten bottles that feature emoticons and the words “Love” and “Amor.”  But even better than that, I found a bottle with my husband’s name on it! [Read more…]

Craft your own Crafting Studio

The art of crafting and making things has now become a hobby that can be pursued for non-essential reasons. Whether you scrapbook or do pottery, making crafts allows you to make and preserve memories, and offer a fun hobby that can be done in your spare time. In addition, this is an activity that can be done with family and friends to help build personal bonds.

One difficult aspect of crafting is that it can be very messy. Small strips of paper, glue, paint, clay; these are just a few of the messier substances that you might be working with. It gets even worse if you have to use the kitchen or living room as your workspace. For those that have this problem, one idea that they turn to is to have a space in their home dedicated to making crafts. This is a great solution to allow for all the necessary space, as well as provide a permanent space that you won’t need to worry about cleaning up all the time.

Whether you are just getting started at crafting or you’ve been doing it for years; the two most important things when creating a custom craft studio is both the area you work in, as well as the equipment that you use. Here are a few ideas to help with your own home studio:

Where you work

Your crafting workspace can have a big effect on the type and quality of crafts that you create. When choosing an area for your studio, keep in mind the proximity to other areas of the house. You don’t want your work spilling over into the living room or kitchen, and you don’t want to be distracted while you are creating your masterpiece. Garages, basements, and unused bedrooms are all great spaces that allow for good proximity.

Another detail that you’ll want to think about is the lighting. Sitting in a darkroom with no windows is not helpful to the creative process. Make sure that you have windows, or a way to allow for plenty of lighting to stir your creative mind.

Finally, allow for good use a space within your studio. A cluttered crafting area can make it difficult to find things, and to work if you are constantly having to step over a mess. Organizing your area so that your tools and materials can be located easily is important. To do this make use of organizational structures (shelves, racks, etc.) to get the maximum amount of space for your area.

What you’ll need

With so many different crafts available for you to make, it is almost impossible to narrow the essential tools you’ll need down to a workable number. However, for the most part the tools you’ll need are the tools you’d need for an art class. Some things you might need to get you started are paper, pencils, markers, paint, hole-punch, jeweler’s pliers, cutting mat, and a paper cutter for crafting projects. The possibilities are endless, and depend a lot on what type of artisan you are.

In addition to the mundane tools that can be found inside of most craft studios, your craft studio might need something special. Working with wood, glass, and metal can be dangerous work, and require some extra safety equipment in addition to the extra tools. These things can easily be found on-line if there is not a craft store near you.

The best part about crafting is that anybody can do it. You don’t need special tools or a studio, you can make something great with just some paper and a few markers. However, for serious crafters having your own studio can be a huge benefit. Make sure your workspace has all the necessary tools and safety equipment, and allows your creative juices to flow.

DIY Christmas Wall Art and the Dremel® Micro™ 8050

 

Christmas is in the air!  I visited my local craft store the other day and was blown away by all the decorations!  It makes it very easy to get inspired to create your own holiday decorations and gifts!  A while back, I received the new Dremel® Micro™ 8050.  This rotary tool is perfect for crafters, hobbyists, and DIYers.  It allows you to cut, carve, engrave, sand, grind, sharpen, clean and polish.  The tool comes with a number of attachments for completing these projects, and it is also fully compatible with all other Dremel rotary tools accessories.  And it’s just $89, making it a great buy on a Christmas gift for your favorite DIYer!

Dremel

When I got my new Dremel, I immediately thought of all the different ways it could be used for home decor projects.  I got my husband involved, as he is the fixer and the tool guy around here.  I told him that I wanted to make some kind of sign or wall art for Christmas.  After a lot of back and forth, we came up with, what I think is, a great collaboration!

DIY Christmas Wall Art

This Christmas craft is a very affordable project.  As you can see in my picture below, I bought several products that I didn’t use in the final product, so in all, the materials actually used in the project add up to around $15 (which includes the paint I can use again later). [Read more…]

Friday Favorites – Week 247 – With Christmas Crafts

friday favorites

I love Christmas decor! There’s such variety out there, and I really enjoy just taking it all in. This week my hubby and I worked on a DIY project for Christmas (to be posted with tutorial on Friday), and with that I’m in a the mood to share some more decor from our friends!  Hope you enjoy these creative ideas!

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Friday Favorites – Week 246 – With Christmas Crafts & Activities

friday favorites

Hi guys. Welcome to this week’s Friday Favorites linky party. Sorry we’re running a little late.  I’ve been a busy bee all week, and then our son’s band concert was last night.  By the time, I finally got “back to work” and got ready to post, my site was down for maintenance, hence the delay….  Anyway, today we have a few Christmas activities and crafts.  Yay!  Also, check my sidebar for a $100 Target giveaway, $50 Academy giveaway, and a JBL Speaker Giveaway!

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