Christmas House Tour 2012

I am linking up with Jen Rizzo Christmas house tour. Here are a few pictures of my Christmas decor for this year.  Thanks Jen for hosting this on your blog.  This is a lot of fun to see everyone's decor.  Some very beautiful homes and Christmas decor. 
http://www.jenniferrizzo.com






Here are some of my pictures.  Thanks for coming by.

This is my Family Room Christmas Tree.  I put it in an old vintage wagon from my garden.

This is the tree lit up at night.

Staying in the family room this is my old vintage mantel decorated.  I used an old ladder to hang the stockings.

This is the mantel lit up at night.  I used white lights in the angels.

This is above my tv cabinet in the family room.  The beautiful Santo's angel my daughter bought for me from Jennifer Rizzo at the Holiday Market this year in Morris.   She is so beautiful.  She somehow lost her crown when I got her that night and Jen is so sweet and made me a new one.  It is so pretty.  I took a close up so you could see the detail of this beautiful angel.

I took her down so I could get a better picture of her.  I love the old vintage pieces she used on this beautiful angel.  I embellished her a little bit too (sorry Jen I can't help myself).  I had an old antique ornament I put on her and Jen sent me the old vintage necklace along with the crown.  I also added some feather wings I had to her paper wings.

Small vintage bucket with a tree.

Stuffed wicker basket with vintage ornaments, burlap and lace and bottle brush tree

Moving into the kitchen. Old farmhouse truck and tree is a must in a farmhouse kitchen.

Kitchen Christmas decor

More kitchen Christmas decor

Entry Way into my home. Lovely old theater seats I got from Jen Rizzo too!!!! She sells the best stuff at the Kane County Flea Market. Very unique pieces with alot of history. Love it.

Entry Way Christmas



This is an old vintage watering can I put a tree into in the entry way

Love blinging up old vintage ice skates.

Dining Room Christmas Decor

Added a simple wreath with ribbon and a white bird ornament to my dining room chairs.

Dining Room Christmas Decor



Outside of the House

Thanks for taking a look at some of my Christmas Cottage Decor.  Thank you Jen for hosting this fun house tour party.

I have to give a shout out to Jennie Morgan that has a shop on Etsy.com.  She made me some beautiful drapes and I wanted to show everyone how beautiful they are and how she gives designer looks for affordable prices.  My camera does not do these justice.  Take my word for it they are beautiful.

The curtains in my bedroom I had made and the white panels that I hung on my french doors I won on her daughter Tiffany's blog.  http://thehouseofbelonging.com

I was so excited to get these.  I have seen other custom work like this on etsy and they were so out of my price point so when I found Jennie I was so excited. She does truly beautiful work and very affordable prices.

Her company name on etsy is Shades Up and Company.

http://www.etsy.com/shop/ShadesUpandCo

Jennie is a real sweet heart and gets the job done quickly and these panels are really beautiful.  I just hung them when I got them.  No wrinkles to deal with.  So if you are in need of new drapery panels check her out.  Thanks so much Jennie I love my drapes. I noticed on her site she has a new panel called Farmhouse romantic with a large ruffle on the bottom. Really pretty so I am now thinking about where can I possibly hang these panels in my house:) !!!!!!

These are the pottery barn inspired farmhouse kami with a "wave" effect on the ruffles.  The wave ruffle is a unique design that Jennie does.  These are made out of muslin and the bottom cream ruffles are tea dyed.  I wish you could all see them in person they are so gorgeous and they hang beautifully.

These are the panels I won on her daughter Tiff's blog.  I was so excited to get these.  They are so beautiful.  This pattern is called Kami too I believe.  So beautiful and romantic.  If you have a minute check out her daughter Tiffini's blog .  She has a very cute  blog.  Tiff is a sweatheart and did the give away to help her mom's talent get showcased.  I was so thrilled when I was picked to receive these. 

http://thehouseofbelonging.com

 

The way the light comes in my french doors it is hard to capture these but they really are pretty on this door. 

Ok my dear blogger friends.  I said I would try and take come pictures of my charity girlfriend party so here are some of the pictures from last night.  I missed a few things because of having so much fun and running around being the hostess but I have to say it was alot of fun.

I really have the best group of friends and it was nice to celebrate them last night.  We eat, drink, laugh cry and do alot of hugging.

I know these pictures I am showing you mean alot to me I am just hoping seeing the fun will inspire some of you to celebrate the true friends in our lives.  I do not know what I would do without my great group of girlfriends.

Enjoy!!!! Be inspired to plan a get together and celebrate friends and family.

My center piece for the food table. Simple fresh greens and great smelling candles and of course those fab candles that smell nice and look like real candles.  I love the flickering wicks.

Yummy foods.  All recipes from pinterest!!!!

My friend Pat and Sandy enjoying some of the yummy goodies.

Cindy, Nancy and Sissy enjoying some yummy food too!!

This my blogger friends is what this party is all about.  The greatest group of girlfriends ever!!!!!

My daughter Jen and her bff Amy.  They made there cute outfits.  Footed jammies from Target with the Christmas story theme and then they made tutu's with jingle bells.  They were so adorable. They won the prize for cute!!!!!

These are my two daughters Jen and Kimmie. Love them both so much and I feel so blessed.  They have brought really great girlfriends to join our group too.  I am so excited I can share this party with them.

Beautifully wrapped gifts that all benefited wonderful charities.

Some of the beautiful gifts to be exchanged.

Marybeth and Val with their pretty gifts to exchange.

My friends Ann, Linda and Kathy holding some pretty little gifts.

Val scored this beautiful tote bag that the proceeds helped a domestic battered women's shelter.

OMG I wanted to steal this special gift.  Pat got this beautiful three tiered cake/cookie plates.  This went to help a women's shelter too.  This was made out of old vintage plates. The picture does not do this justice it really was a beautiful gift.  Recycled and also helped to benefit women in crisis.

Nancy scored this beautiful handmade scarf that helped women outside this country in 3rd world countries make a better life for themselves and their children. It really was so pretty and soft.

My daughter's friend Katie got Kimmie's gift in the exchange. Kimmie purchased this comfy pair of Tom's shoes for her gift. Tom's then donates another pair of shoes to someone in need with the purchase of these.  They were Katie's size too so it was meant to be for her to win these in the exchange.

My friend Sissy won my gift which was baking sheets that helped the local food pantry and also a cookie cook book from Kohl's cares and the pretty painted two tier cookie container that helped women in need.

These were are three runner ups for the ugly/cute Christmas sweater contest.  Sandy on the left won first place and Kimmie came in second and Val 3rd with her sparkly snowman sweater.  We had alot of fun digging out those old Christmas Sweaters from the back of our closets.  It was fun to see what everyone came up with.

Once again this is why I do this party each year.  This celebrates the best group of girlfriends anyone could have.  I am truly blessed to have them all in my life.  We had a great night celebrating all together.  I love you all.

I wanted to post about my charity girlfriend party I am hosting at my home on Friday night.  This party started about 6 years ago and has been a big hit ever since.


The whole idea of the party is for all of us girlfriends to get together and celebrate each other's friendship and then we also have a gift exchange where the proceeds from buying the gift go to your favorite charity.  It always is so special to see what everyone comes up with for gifts.  We play a cute story game exchange and then when you end up with your gift you open it and the person it is from tells why they chose this particular charity to buy their gift from.  The stories are heartwarming. 

We also do an ornament exchange and I have a few other fun games we play where the proceeds for the prizes go to charity too.

Here are a few of the prep pictures I have for the party.  I will try to remember in all the fun on Friday to take some pictures of my girlfriends and what beautiful gifts they come up with to post later.

At this time of year we get so busy trying to get the house ready, bake and buy and wrap gifts so this night is a special gift from me to my bff's.  I am so blessed to have the most fantastic group of girlfriends and I love to host this party in honor of them.  My life would not be the same without them.

A night for all my angel girlfriends to come and celebrate our friendships.

The invites go out.

Each year I have a theme for my charity girlfriend party.  This years theme is Tequila and Tiara's.  Everyone will get a Tiara when they arrive and we will be drinking special Christmas Margarita's.  Everyone knows no Tiara is complete without pink fuzzy slippers.  I got each of them a pair of NAP fuzzy comfy slippers to wear too.  This party is all about comfort and joy!

Special pink magical wand glasses for our beverages!!!
Everyone brings a special appetizer to share too. Good food and drink.

I do a party favor for each girlfriend and this year I found this yummy pink moscato wine where the proceeds went to breast cancer awareness and the cute girly ornaments were just a cute added touch to the wine bottles.
 

Each ornament on the wine bottles was just a little different and one was cuter than the next.  So each girlfriend will have a cute ornament to take home too.

This is probably my favorite twist to this years party.  We are all wearing our cutest or ugliest Christmas sweaters.  The one who wears the "cutest" or  "ugliest" as the case may be sweater to the party will receive this prize.  It is the Bulls EyeTarget dog and all the proceeds go to St. Jude's Research Hospital.  He is wearing his cute Christmas Sweater!!!!! I also attached a Target gift card where the dog on the gift card has a Christmas Sweater that lights up!!!! I just loved this prize this year.  How appropriate I thought for the party.  The prize matches the contest and also benefits charity.  Love it!!!!!

Of course if you saw my last post I showed you these cute little nests I got from the Dollar Tree for a buck.  Everyone will be going home with one of these little ornaments for their tree and one to pass on to a complete stranger or friend or family member or neighbor etc.  The German legend is that if your Christmas Tree has a nest in it the family will have good health and prosperity throughout the year.  I want these to be passed on as a charitable act.  So everyone will receive these little cuties.

 

We also play a game with a Christmas story poem.  Each person gets one of these identical gifts and we read a cute story and pass the gifts around.  Everyone one ends up with a gift at the end of the story.  The gifts are identical and are from Laura Ashley. They are washing bags for your bras to keep them nice in the wash.  Some of the proceeds of  these went to Breast Cancer Research.  The special part of this game is that one of these packages has a hidden Victoria Secret Gift Card.  So someone by luck will not only get a great wash bag for lingerie they will also receive a gift card to VS.

This is my all wrapped up girlfriend charity gift for the exchange. The lucky person who receives my gift this year will get a beautiful set of baking cookie sheets where the proceeds went to the Chicago local food pantries to help feed children locally and they will also get a hand painted double decker cookie container that is just painted beautifully with an angel.  The proceeds from this purchase went to the Angel Network for Children and then I was in Kohl's and saw the Kohl's Care's Charity had a wonderful cookie cook book for $5 where the proceeds went to Koh's Cares so that was great to go with my baking theme.

My wrapped ornament for the ornament exchange.  I hope whoever gets my pretty ornament will love it.


This Party is so much fun.  We laugh and cry and hug and have a great time all together.  My two daughters now that they are grown and live by me bring some of their girlfriends that night too. Our girlfriend celebration has really grown.  It is a special night to celebrate each other and how blessed we all are to call each other friend.  I love that the gifts we share with each other go to help others less fortunate too.

I will try to remember to post some pictures from the party on Friday night.  It should be so much fun.  I can't wait to see the Christmas sweaters everyone has dug out of the back of the closet to wear for the contest!!!! Hmmmmmm Tiara's, pink fuzzy slippers and  cute/ugly Christmas Sweaters.  Should be interesting!!!!

I hope this will inspire some of you to remember the importance of girlfriends in our lives and also those less fortunate and have a girls night out of your own.
XXXOOO
Kris