Other Christmas Decor

In addition to my mantle and it's coordinating accessories, we had a few other Christmas decorations around our little Asian apartment. 

We still have our little fake Ikea purchased and inherited Christmas Tree, with a random assortment of lights and ornaments. 

Including some that I made last year, 

like these....

And some new ones, like this froofy one that I bought at Wal-Mart here....

and this CUTE bird that Hannah brought back from America for me. Isn't it cute? 

Last year, our tree was topper-less. 

Not this year! 

I bought this plain red star tree topper at Ikea. 

source

Cute, but a little too plain for my happy little eclectic tree.

SO I got a little creative with some glitter, rhinestones, and sequins AND....

Ta-Da! 

My happy little tree topper! 

The perfect finishing touch. 

I've loved all of the ornament wreaths floating around out there, and we really have TONS of extra ornaments around here. Four years of different foreigners living in our apartment buying their Christmas decorations at Ikea has supplied LOTS of red, silver, and gold ornaments- way more than would ever fit on our tree. So I set aside some of the balls to make an ornament wreath. 

It was SO much easier than I thought it would be! I highly recommend using the hanger method instead of a wreath form. It's really simple, and looks quite nice! 

Our little plant stand needed something festive. I have this bottle wrapped in yarn, and wanted to add something different to it, so I made these pinwheels out of Christmas scrapbook paper. They're pretty cute. For the frame, I used the corner of a sheet of Christmas scrapbook paper with a fun little whimsical scene. 

Perhaps my favorite part of our decorations is this fun "Happy Holidays Y'all" Banner! 

My friend who sent the supplies for the cupcake liner tree, also sent me a pre-made Paula Dean banner. 

It comes looking like this:

source

Super cute, but I wanted to spruce it up a bit. 

So I backed each letter with alternating red paper and brown wrapping paper. 

I added a little something different to each letter to give it a little pizzazz. 

Like sequins...

Beads...

and lots and lots of glitter!

It is quite festive. 

And we aren't trying to be PC with the "Happy Holidays".... 

It just came that way. 

Plus EA has LOTS of holidays all year round... not that this will stay up for that long.... but don't worry, Christmas is always of upmost importance. 

My favorite part is most definitely the "Y'all"

Makes me feel right at home. 

So happy and festive. 

Finally, we used a few locally purchased decorations. 

While we would never use these in the states, these foam cutouts bring lots of festiveness to our apt. here. 

Our "KongTiao" {free standing heater/ac} is adorned with Santa's head.... not creepy at all. 

And as Adam says....

"If they wondered if the foreigners lived there before, 

now they know for sure." 

When you come up the stairs to our door...

This cute bear and snowman are here to greet you! 

To make them even fancier, I added glitter to the stocking's stars...

and to the snow man's hat, mittens, and buttons. 

They might just stay up all winter. 

And that's about all for our Christmas decorations! 

We do what we can to make our home a long way from home feel a little more homey. 

Joyfully Homey & Decorated, 

Christmas Mantle

I hope that you had a very Merry Christmas! 

We had a great one over here. 

{Adam & I with my cute, very EA-ian Muff that I had just won during a White Elephant gift exchange at Adam's classes Christmas party we hosted}

I'll recap soon, but first I thought I'd post all of my decorations that I should have shared weeks ago. Trust me, I'm beating myself up for being such a slacker. After posting all things Christmas well into January last year I vowed to be more timely this year. But just pretend that it's 2 weeks ago and I'm sharing it then. 

So first, my "mantle"! I was going for a modern-ish "bold"/ "clean" look... if that makes any sense. 

On the shelf, I used a few different random things to bring some festive cheer. 

I filled this vase with left over Ikea ornaments that have collected here over the years. 

I found some fun little plates at the used furniture market a few months ago. I used these stickers {that I thought were rub-ons} to write "JOY to the WORLD" on a plate

I know everyone and their mom has used this printable, but I really love it. And it went well with my "look."

And of course we have lots of candles to use.  

I found these GIANT stockings at Ikea last month. 

I thought they were better than the funny EA-ian ones they sell at Wal-Mart here. 

On the table I used these FUN printables that I found on Pinterest. I bought the red frames at Ikea, and Hannah painted the other frame black for me. 

And finally, I made a cupcake liner tree. Last year my friend Sarah sent some craft supplies to me via a friend visiting. Shamefully, I never made use of them last year. But I did enjoy making this one this year. It's pretty simple too. 

And that's my mantle. I'm still enjoying it. And probably will until I come back from vacation in February. And then I'll probably create a new seasonal mantle that I will probably not share until 3 weeks after that season has past. Apparently that's how things go around here. MAYBE I won't go seasonal..... then it won't be "late". There's a thought. 

Joyfully always a little behind,

Homemade Christmas Cards

In November a friend from America came for a week, and I took advantage of the opportunity to send somethings homemade back to America with him to be distributed. I sent lots of fun EA-ian goodies back for people, that my mom and Jamie so graciously mailed out for me for me. I also ordered something else online {I'll keep it a secret for now just in case anyone who got one hasn't opened theirs yet} that is my new favorite of this kind of thing for some friends, and had them all shipped to Jamie's house. I wrote a card to {most} everyone that I sent them to, and Jamie put them in with said gift. She's kind of pretty awesome. 

For the notes, I decided to make my own Christmas cards, and then write notes and glue them inside. 

I started out a little over-zealous, and spent quite a bit of time on the first few I did.

This one is my favorite:

I used brown embroidery floss to write out "for unto us a child is born"

You can see how I wasn't going to be able to keep that up for a good 20 or so cards.  

For a couple, I went with using the recipient's name. 

With paper...

and paint....

And I made a little rhinestone Christmas tree

Then I went with some little presents using paper and more embroidery floss. 

Then I went with "joy" and stuck there for a while :) 

For this one, I made little ornaments with buttons & embroidery floss. 

I really like this one. I used foam letters to write joy, and made this cute little paper ornament. 

And then it was getting really late the night before our friend left, and so I kept the paper joy theme going, adding some ribbon here and there as I went along.... 

in different sizes....

with lots of different patterns of paper

There wasn't any rhyme or reason (for the most part) for who I gave each card to- I started with writing them all, and then glued them in the already made cards according to size. I made a few more, but didn't get to take pictures of all of them. I would have made more, but I spent a long time writing notes to everyone before hand, and then had to finish them all at 1am 

{When I also took these pictures, hence why they aren't so great}.

I'll tell everyone what the secret present was after Christmas, and then highly recommend that everyone runs out and gets one too. 

Joyfully Carded,

Linking Up Over at: {Organize & Decorate Everything}{Blue Cricket Design}{A Creative Princess}{Somewhat Simple}{Creations By Kara}{Thrifty 101}{The Shabby Nest}