Christmas at Junk Chic Cottage

Happy Holidays.  

Now that we are living in a smaller place I decided less is more this year.  

Just simple, soft and quiet.

My tree is done in whites, silvers and sparkles!  My tree is decorated with many angel ornaments I have collected over the years.  Lot's of beautiful memories make up my Christmas tree.  My tree base this year is a garden urn.

As most of you know it is hard to get that perfect night time picture of the tree lighted.  You will have to take my word on this.  The tree is beautiful at night with all her sparkles and lights.

This vintage farmhouse window we got on our anniversary trip to Michigan has my pretty angel wings this year.

Nothing says Christmas serenity and beauty like a madonna and candelabra.

Very pretty at night.

I did a winter scene on top of this cabinet in the living room.

Love my sweet angel hanging on this chippy window.

My favorite saying.

This beautiful angel was gifted to me by a dear friend a few years ago.  Just love the pretty and sweetness of this angel.

I dressed up my vintage watering can with some winter greens.

I added some Christmas greens and crystal lights with my angels above the china cabinet.  I added white lights to the greens to light up this area at night.

Inside the china cabinet I have more of my Madonnas.

Another one of my cute angels from the creative talents of Cathy from Cheswick Company relaxing in the wreath.

This is my original angel Grace from Cathy at Cheswick Company on Etsy years ago.  Just love Cathy's beautiful angels.  This one was gifted to me from Terry several years ago.  Through the years I have collected a few more of her one- of- a- kind- angels.  This Angel is Grace and will always hold a place in my heart because Terry surprised me with this angel for Christmas.

Grace sits happy in the bike on the door along with a few other Vintage Winter Garden pieces in the entry way.

I got this old picket and dressed it up on the window sill with some Christmas greens and a couple of cute birds.

A few Christmas decorations put up in my kitchen.

Just simple pieces I love added to the shelves in the kitchen.

This passage from the bible done on this old piece of barn wood is all the things I hope to have under the tree this year.

Blessed to own a sweet nest to decorate for the holidays.

My kitchen Christmas stocking made out of an old sugar bag.  

My Chalkboard Advent Calendar.

My old fireplace mantel simple and sweet for Christmas.

Love when the candles are all a glow in the evenings and the Christmas tree and garland are lighted.  Just a pretty and serene feel to the house for Christmas this year.

I want to wish each and everyone of you a beautiful holiday season.  This is such a beautiful time of year.  May you enjoy all the blessings of the season.
Merry Christmas.
Happy Decorating, Shopping, Wrapping and Baking and Eating.  Enjoy!
Love,
Kris

PS:
A big hug and Thank you from Me and Coop to Tina from What We Keep.  She embroidered this cute vintage towel of Cooper.  I put it on the back of the white chair he loves to lay in.  Thank you Tina.  Love this and will treasure it.

Yep loves this chair.  XXOO Tina from Cooper

Parties:
Inspired Designs
Shabbilicious Friday Christmas
Best of the Weekend
Bouquet of Talents
Creating Christmas
Home For Christmas
Show Us Your Home

Thank You

Happy New Week.  Hope all your decorating, shopping, baking and preparing for Santa's big day is fun and going great.

Right in the middle of an ordinary day I got a special package in the mail.  Yep! made my whole day and I want to share this with all of you.

As most of you know we adopted Cooper our Basset Hound from a rescue in Ohio back in April of this year.  Shortly after bringing him home we found out Cooper had a very aggressive non curable cancer.  We were devastated to say the least.  We were given the sad news that this kind of cancer is very aggressive and little Coop would probably only have weeks to maybe a few months.  Together with our caring Vet we came up with an experimental treatment that would not cure the cancer but give Cooper a little more time with us.  We were on board.  You can read  Cooper's story here. 

We are going on month 8 with this guy and he is officially in remission.  Together with the new medication and lots of love and prayer our little guy is hanging in there with us.

This is my favorite picture of Cooper.  This was his smiling face when we put him in the car to drive the 5 hour trip home from Ohio to Chicago.  He smiled the whole way!!!!

Now on to the big hug and thank you part of this post.

Cecilia is a blogging friend over at the b farm blog.  Cecilia is a artist and creator of all things beautiful.  She has a shop called TinRoof Studio that you can visit to see all her pretty creations.

She took this picture of Cooper and painted a personal portrait of Cooper for us to treasure.

Thank you sweet Cecilia I will treasure this forever.  Blogland brings the most beautiful angels into our lives.  Touching gifts like this from a blogging friend I have never met makes my heart sing.  Life can be so full of wonderful blessing.

Enjoy this great new week and getting ready for the holidays.  I have been not getting too much sleep with getting on my Ipad in bed at night and touring all the wonderful Christmas Home Tours.  So much beautiful decor out there this year for Christmas.

I am working on getting my decor home tour post done this week.  Stay tuned!

Have a great week.

Hugs,

Kris

Lets Get This Party Started!!

Hello Everyone.  Happy Sunday.

 I had my annual Girlfriend Charity Christmas Party last night and here are some pictures and a fun surprise to share with you.

Let me start by saying I have the greatest group of bff's ever.  I host this party each year to celebrate our love and friendship.
My daughters now as young adult women are part of the party and invite their special bff's to come.  It is fun that they want to be part of this wonderful tradition.

Now on to my surprise.

Not sure about you guys but I hate being surprised.  I just have never liked it.  My hubby Terry knows better usually not to surprise me with anything.  Nope just do not like it.

Well that Man pulled off a good one last night!

I know a lot of you know Diana from Nana Diana Takes A Break Blog.  I have known Diana for the past few years and we have become very good friends. Diana lives about 4 hours north of where I live in the Chicago burbs.  Diana has a beautiful home in Green Bay Wisconsin. We are always saying let's find a half way point and a day to meet up.  Like with most well intentioned plans we never seemed to come up with a day for a meet up.  That all got remedied with Terry surprising me and  having Diana come in for the party.

Here we are meeting in my living room Friday night.
I was so surprised when Diana walked in the door.

We had such a great time together at the party.  We felt like we have known each other all our lives.  She fit right in with my crazy bunch of friends and everyone said they all felt Diana had been in our circle of friendship for a long time.
Thank you sweet Diana for coming in for the party and spending some time with me this weekend.

Here are some highlights of the party.  I promise I will not bore you with a lot of pictures.

The house was all a glow for the party.

The sweets table was ready for later in the evening.

Terry's "Fireman" Cave converted to a "Chic" Cave for the night.

A long table so we girls could all sit together to eat, drink and play games.

Terry's fireman Christmas tree was glowing with all his collected fire department ornaments.

Walking Taco Bar ready to go.

Remember those cute little reindeer/Frito bowls I made for the walking Tacos.  Ready to be filled with yummy taco meats and toppings.

Prizes for the games we played.

Here is a group pic.  We were missing a few girls that had to leave early before we got the group picture taken.  Even though we told Cooper no boys allowed he wanted to be part of the girlfriend group shot!

We had lots of fun eating and playing games and of course the gift exchange.  Each girl brings a gift that some or most of the proceeds for buying the gift benefits a charity.  It always amazes me each year the beautiful gifts the girls bring for the exchange and how beautiful these gifts are to share.  It fills our hearts to know we have received a beautiful gift to take home that also is benefiting someone else in need.

This is my fun friend Pat trying out her spa gift!  Pat was feeling her Zen with her new spa items.

These are the two brave bouncers for the party.

We tired Cooper out with all our laughing and fun.  This is why we told him no boys allowed they cannot keep up with us party girls!

Hope you all are having a great weekend preparing for Christmas.  This party always kicks off the season for me.  Stay tuned this week I will have my Holiday Home Decor to show you.

Have fun decorating and getting ready for the big day.
Glad all my decorating is done.  It just makes this fast moving time of year more enjoyable.

Have a great start to the new week ahead.
Hugs,
Kris

Totally love this idea!

I am getting ready for my annual Charity Girlfriend Party this Friday.  I am cleaning and getting food prep done this week.  I thought I was all done planning things for this party and then I saw something really cute on my bff Diana's blog Nana Diana Takes A Break that she does with ginger bread boys for guest leaving her home.

Light bulb went off!!  

Here is Diana's post on this cute idea.

I baked Angel Wing Sprinkle Cookies for the girls coming to the party and thought how fun would it be to tie these off in bags and hang them on my advent calendar on my back door.  That way each girl can take a cookie as they leave the party.

All these girls that come to the party are sweet angels in my life so these cookies are a nice reminder of how they make my life sweeter to have them in it.

Thanks Diana for letting me steal,  oh wait steal is such an ugly word,  I mean borrow and be inspired by your idea!!! Yeah that is what it was!!!!

This is my Chalkboard Advent Calendar.  Each day has a cute little brown paper bag.  The brown bags have seen better days so next year I will have to come up with something cute to hang on this calendar instead of the bags.  I am sure I can find something creative and fun.

I baked my "famous" asked for angel wing sugar cookies and sprinkled each one with fairy dust sprinkles.  I then tied them off in a cello bag and hung them on the Advent Calendar.
The recipe for these sugar cookies can be found here on my pinterest board.  So easy to make and so yummy.

Here they are hung on the calendar ready for each girl that leaves the party to take one home for the car ride.  You always need a roader treat for the car ride home right?!!!!

Thanks Diana for this fun little idea.  I loved her gingerbread men hung by her front door and each guest as they leave cuts a little guy to take home.  Super sweet.  That Diana is the hostess with the mostess.

As we slide on down to the big day.  Enjoy all the decorating, shopping, wrapping and baking prep.
I have most of my stuff done and am a head of the game this year.  Just feels like I can relax and enjoy the holidays more being on top of things.

Big Hugs,
Thanks for your visit.
Kris