Wishing each of you a beautiful week preparing for the big day on Thursday.

May you enjoy all the blessing around your tables this Thanksgiving.

xxoo

Kris

Sharing and Caring

Happy Sunday.  Hope your weekend has been fabulous.

I wish I had one of these for each of you that entered the giveaway.  Only one and the name I drew is Cathy Thompson.
Cathy this sweet bag is on it's way to you.
Happy Black Friday Shopping!!!!

While I am on a roll here with Sharing.  I wanted to give a little shout out to a couple of sweet bloggers and Etsy crafters and this sweet share bowl for a good cause.  This sweet angel is from Pattie at TatteredTreasures1 on Etsy.

I love that Pattie uses old vintage lace and material for her angels.  This angel of mine has a sweet halo made out of vintage pearl buttons.   

Another beautiful angel creator on Etsy is Linda from Eastern Ave Designs.  I got this sweet angel from her recently for gift giving.

Sweet Jemma from At Home With Jemma  does a great blog post each week on Etsy Talent for your Christmas Shopping.  I found Linda through Jemma.  So if you want to see some other very talented crafters for gift giving this year go to Jemma's posts Here and Here.

Also this share bowl I got at my girlfriend charity party last year.  For very bowl purchased from Pampered Chef a donation was made to feed someone in need.  I love to find gifts that are sweet and useful and give back to someone in need.  A gift that keeps on giving!!!!

While you are starting to make your gift lists think about small business people on Etsy and also organizations that have unique gifts where the proceeds help others in need.  Along with companies like Pampered Chef there are also many great people on Etsy that make handcrafted items that give back.  Your gift that you give to  someone dear will also help someone in need.  That is what it is all about.  Sharing and Caring.

Enjoy the beginning of the new week.  We are in the beginning of the slide on down to the holidays!


Congrats Cathy.
Enjoy your Black Friday Shopping with this sweet tote.

Hugs,
Kris

Prizes Prizes and a Giveaway!

Hi Everyone.  Hope your week is going great.

I wanted to share some more of my preparation for my girlfriend Christmas party with you.

I showed you the Walking Taco appetizer in my last post.  You can see that here.

Today I want to show you some of the prizes I have for the girls at the party to win.

Here is one of the prizes.  I put together Josh Groban's beautiful Christmas CD and a Josh bottle of wine.  Yep! with all the holiday hoopla I think a time out with some sweet wine and Josh playing in the background is a must at this time of year.  So one of the lucky girls will win this.

I bought two of these rescue mugs from the Rescue Agency we adopted Cooper.  They were having a fund raiser and I bought these sweet mugs for prizes.  I am attaching a Starbucks gift card with each mug.  My theme at my party is charity and gifts that give back so these will make for perfect prizes.

Cooper is very excited to have the agency that rescued him benefit from me buying these mugs.  LOL Cooper loves to sit in the booster car seat of my granddaughter Abby.  Crazy boy!

Tied the mugs off with the Starbucks gift cards and they are ready for the girls to win.

Another fun prize is a spa gift.  If you want wonderful restful sleep this Pure Spa oil diffuser is great.  You fill it with water and put a few drops of your favorite oil in the top and it runs for 4 to 6 hours putting the lovely scent into the air. Helps you have sweet dreams and a good night rest.   I have one by my bedside and love the lavender for a great night sleep.
Makes your room smell great too.  You can buy several different oils to use in these.  I am giving the lavender and peppermint with this one. 

Have you seen these cute Wish Jar's.  I got this one through the Make A Wish Foundation.  They were selling these to raise money to help make the wishes of children with cancer wishes come true.

I am going to use this jar  for each of the girls to put a thoughtful wish and their name in the jar.  I will then pull out the names and they will win the above prizes the night of the party.

The kit comes with the jar to fill and wish tags along with a pen to fill out the tags.  Very cute idea.  I have also seen these jars sold in gift shops for special occasions like weddings.  

I got some Jingle All The Way pink and gold sparkle bags to put the prizes in.  Found these cute jingle bags at Home Goods.  

 Now on to the Give Away!!!!!!

I purchased this cute little Shop Black Friday tote on Etsy for a giveaway on my blog today.  I have not done a giveaway in a very long time so it was time.  I also think it is so important to buy gifts from small community crafters and business.  Etsy has so much talent and wonderful ideas for gifts.  I do a lot of my shopping for gifts on Etsy.

So how fun will it be for one of you die hard Black Friday Shoppers to have a sparkle tote bag?!
Love how fun and full of sparkles this tote is.

So all of you that like to be out with all the crazy's on Black Friday (me included in this group)  here is a sweet tote for you to try and win.
I really do not need anything that is offered on Black Friday but my daughters and I love to be in the crowd of people.  Watching the die hard black friday shoppers trying to get that one TV or electronic item or blender etc. etc.  at that very reduced price is fun to see!  We get a kick out of this day every year.

So to win this tote
  all you have to do is leave me a comment.  That's it.  You do not have to post anything anywhere, go to a million social media sites or like me on my IG or Facebook!  Nope just leave me a message here that you want to be in the drawing for this tote.  I got this and want to share it with all of you for being loyal and fun friends that visit and leave me sweet comments.

So it is easy peasy.  Stay calm and shop on!!!!  If you are a no reply then you will have to leave me a way to contact you if your name is drawn.  Come back on Sunday and I will have the winner posted.  Good luck.
We are beginning the downhill slide into the holidays!  So to kick off my start to the holiday season I want to share a give away with all of you.

Enjoy the week ahead.
Good Luck
Hugs,
Kris

Getting Ready For Girlfriend Charity Party

Hi Everyone.

Happy Sunday.

Where did the month of October go ??!! Now we are only a few weeks from Thanksgiving and then the down hill slide into Christmas!!!!  I love this time of year but hate how fast everything moves.

Each year I have a Girlfriend Christmas Party.  I have been doing this party for many years.

Each year I have all my girlfriends come to my home on the first Friday of December to celebrate our friendship.

The idea of the party is each girl brings a girlfriend exchange gift where the proceeds had to benefit a charity in some way.  The gifts the girls come up with each year are just amazing. The stories shared about why they chose their particular charity is so touching and up lifting.

The best gifts are given from the heart and it is even more special when your gift not only benefits a dear friend at the party but also helps someone else too.

Each girl wears her comfy Christmas jammies and we eat, drink and have a great time all together.  Let's face it eating, drinking, laughing and having fun must be done in comfy jammies!!!

Girlfriend Christmas Party from Last Year 2015.  You can see the post here.

Girlfriend Christmas Party 2014 Post.

The past few years I have been doing walking tacos as one of my appetizers.  

Have you ever had walking tacos?  They are a crowd pleaser and yummy.  So today I am going to share with you my walking taco preparation and a sweet treat idea too.

Walking Tacos are easy to do if you have a large crowd or small.  Perfect for everyone and fun.

You take the small lunch size Fritos or Dorito bags and they become the base for your walking tacos.

 I will set up a taco bar with chicken and beef taco fillings and several taco toppings.

Everyone gets a taco bag and then can fill it with their desired filling and toppings and you can walk and talk and have fun as you eat your taco.

Here is how I give the walking taco Frito bags a little more stability and fun.

Here are some of the supplies I got to put my walking taco boxes together.

I found white gable boxes at Michaels.  They came 10 in a box.  I just folded down the gable part of the box to make this smaller box/bowl to put the Frito bags in.  Instead of each girl having to carry the taco bag alone these boxes will give the walking taco a little more stability.

Found these cute reindeer tags at Home Goods to tie off my napkins and forks.

Easy Peasy to do.  Wrap the fork up in the napkins and tie off with the reindeer tags.

I lay the taco bags on their sides to give more room to add your fillings and toppings.  Just cut across the top of the bag.  I also found these cute Christmas tags at Walmart.  20 in a pack for $1.49.  I thought these would give the front of the boxes a little festive bling.

So I glued the tags onto the front of the white boxes and then put in the Frito's and reindeer forks and napkins.  All together and ready for the Taco Bar.

I put them into a white gift box that I will set on the Taco Bar. I will set this at the beginning of my taco bar fixins!  That is it.  Fun and easy and a real crowd pleaser.  You can find lots of great ideas and recipes for Walking Taco's on Pinterest.

Every year I have some kind of sweet treat for each girl to enjoy at the party or take home.

Found these sweet little snack bag kits at the dollar bins at Target.  Gotta love those dollar racks at Target.

Each kit came with heavy lined bakery treat bags, white doilies, and a tag that says So Very Thankful for Sweet Friends Like You.

So I just glued each of the bags with the doily and tag.  Easy Peasy!!!

I usually do cupcakes for desert so these sweet bags will be nice for each girl to take home a sweet treat.  Nothing like having a cupcake roader for the trip home from a party!

I found these cute napkins at Home Goods.
This is one of my favorite sayings and so wonderful for my bff's at the party.

Just a few of the ideas I have gotten done for the girlfriend party.  I will be working on some favors and fun party ideas that I will be sharing with you soon.

Are you thinking about the upcoming holidays and fun things to do for get togethers?

The time will fly with list making, decorating, shopping, and baking.  I love this time of year.  So much fun to get ready to share the love of family and friendships.

Have a great new week ahead.

Hugs,

Kris

Coffee Table Change

Hello Everyone.  Happy Friday.

Terry made me this coffee table awhile back and I have loved it but I felt it needed a little change.

It is a pretty little coffee table but the light pine top just was not mixing nicely with my darker floors.

I decided I was going to white wash the top.  That was my first step.  Easy peasy just dry brushed the top with slightly watered down white paint.  

I then took some antique glaze and applied it to the top of the table with a rag.  Wiping off the glaze with another dry rag.

The antiquing stain gave a more gray tone to the pine w00d underneath.

I added this vintage door knob to the backside of this table to give her some character.  Easy peasy change up to give a new look to this table.  It is just fun to take some paint and experiment to see what different looks you can achieve to a piece you already have.

Have a great Friday and wonderful week end.
Going to see the release of the new movie Trolls with my granddaughter Abby today.
Should be fun.
Kris

Parties:
Share your Style

$2.99 Goodwill Make Over

Good Morning everyone.  Hope your Halloween was Spooktacular.

I want to show you what $2.99 and a man with tools can do for a sweet grandgirl!

Abby our 6 year old granddaughter wanted her grandpa to make her a special lego table.  She is so into being creative with legos.

Terry and I found this Lane piece solid oak at the Goodwill for $2.99

Terry said he could not buy good pieces of wood to make the table for $2.99 so we grab this chunk of wonderful wood and took it home to be re loved into a lego table for Abby.

Abby went with us to pick out the color of paint.  She loves purple so she picked out grape jelly for the legs and a lighter purple color for the main part of the table.  Looks pink with the way the light was hitting it but it is a light purple.

Dollar Store Bins with lids to store each of her lego kits.

Target sold the lego squares so it took 3 squares to make the base on the top of the table.

I could not resist these sweet fur stools I found at Hobby Lobby in the clearance.  So we painted the legs to match.

There is the "crew chief" sleeping on the job!!!!!

So here it is a lego table big enough for two to four kids to build for a $2.99 Goodwill find and a can of paint $20 and a sample $3 for the darker purple,  and twelve $1 bins. Terry said he probably could have gotten the lighter purple in a sample size too for $3 which would have been even more cost savings.  He said those sample Valspar paints go a long way.  So if you are thinking of doing a smaller paint project on furniture think about just having them mix up a sample for you.  Saves $$$$$.  Lego sq's for the top $15.  So for about $55 dollars you have a fabulous lego table.
I have seen these lego tables sell on Etsy for over $200.

Happy New Week.
Have a fabulous week.
Kris

Parties:
talk of the town

Happy Halloween

Have a Spooktacular Halloween.  Hope you see lots of cute ghosts and goblins at your doors.

The pumpkins are carved and lite and ready for the dark and spooky Halloween Eve!

As a lot of you know the Chicago Cubs are in the World Series.  We are all White Sox Fans in this family but are cheering on the Cubs.  My daughter and Son in law are crazed cubs fans for this Halloween!

Abby is going as a purple witch and she has her little black cat Charlotte to accompany her too!  I will try and get more pictures later tonight when Terry and I go over for trick or treating with these cute goblins.  Abby was excited this morning to wear her costume to school.

Happy Halloween.
Kris