11.25.2013

weekend recap

On Friday, b and I dropped O off at preschool and headed to a new project I just accepted. It's kind of hard to see in this picture (house on right) but it's a new construction home that is being built by the same contractor who helped us with our house renovations. I am helping with exterior/interior paints, lighting, counter tops and other interior details. After we drove by the project, b and I headed back towards O's school and picked up some Starbucks. We killed a little time before walking into O's school for his Thanksgiving program. 
 It was fun to see O in his element without him knowing we were there. Once he knew we were there though, he was so happy to have us in his classroom. We had a brunch with the other families and then headed to the auditorium for the program. We stayed about a half an hour and then O was done. These are the parts about being a parent that I love. Seeing him grow and learn and develop into this amazing little boy! You can see him in the picture above with his buddy, William. They are so cute together but O is definitely more of a wiggle worm than W. :) 

Saturday was our "Friendsgiving" at our good friends, Susan and Michael's house. This was our second year celebrating and it was so fun! It's totally low key and comfy with good food and drinks! As each year passes, there are more kiddos added to the mix. Last year there was three, this year four and next year there will be five...or more. The best part of it all is the laughs we shared! 

We got home late Saturday, so in the morning I opened a package that was waiting for me...these beautiful ornaments that I ordered from Jessica Swift. They are so well made not that I expected anything less from Jessica! She does amazing work. They have a great weight to them and the antique brass top is so pretty.
 I can't wait to hang these in my kitchen!
On Sunday, we got out all the Christmas decorations and went through everything. I decided that there was quite a few things that I didn't want anymore. Luckily, my younger sister is coming soon so she can pick what she wants and the rest will be donated. As you might remember from this post, we got a new tree. It's much fuller then our old one. We also decided to make a new "skirt" for it. 
I gave b this idea and he created just that for me. As you can see, he took one of our old metal buckets from the garage and drilled a hole in the bottom for the tree "pole". 

It hides the stand so perfectly. I know some people use the bucket right side up and then drape a blanket or skirt on top of the opening but I really liked the idea seeing only metal. 

Don't mind the little "pine" needles...faux trees shed too. Boo.
This year, I got to decorate a mantle! Something I've never done...but I loved it. I stuck with neutral tones and added some shimmer for contrast. I wanted it to be simplistic but whimsical. 
I bought this metallic garland from Mailbox Happiness, a shop from Etsy a couple weeks ago with the hope that it would work well with everything else and was please as punch that it did!
The large twig trees that flank the mantle are from Target. I purchased them many years ago and it's funny because I never used them in the old house but love them here. The bottle brush trees are from I believe, The Country Living fair..maybe two years ago? The beautiful grey wooden snowflakes are from my Aunt Susie. They came from a shopping trip in Roswell....two years ago? The sweet little white ceramic houses, toy soldiers, laser cut cottages and tree are from last month's Crate and Barrel shopping trip. 
I am pretty happy with how it turned out! I love all the wood tones mixed with the bright white and the soft shimmery golds. This is pretty much our color palette for this year's Christmas except for we have the color green mixed in some places, which I love but it's still keeps that natural feel that I wanted.

I am working on the other areas of our house so I will share those once they are done. I realized last night as I was trying to place some items around the house that we will definitely need to add to our decor now that I have decided to omit some pieces...but that really is the fun part! 

Hope you all had a great weekend!!

by the way...did you know it's exactly one month until Christmas? 

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