Seasonal Decorating — A Cultivated Nest

14 Creative Easter Egg Decorating Ideas

March 13, 2013 By Manuela

Easter is right around the corner! Try something a little different this year with your Easter egg decorating.

I’ve rounded up 14 creative Easter egg decorating ideas for you to try.

These pretty eggs are made from 3D scrapbooking stickers from Ladies Home Journal

Dip Dyed eggs by Oh Joy!

Monogrammed Easter eggs from Lil’ Luna

Stamped & dyed eggs from Lovely Indeed

Faux gilded Easter eggs from Just Paint It

Banded egg dyed Easter eggs – uses a rubber band from Better Homes & Gardens

Botanical eggs from Martha Stewart

Hand painted Easter eggs from Sugar and Charm

Water color Easter eggs from Spoon Fork Bacon

These use temporary tattoo transferpaper from Country Living

Reverse silhouette Easter eggs from Le Papier Studio

Subway art Easter eggs from Lil’ Luna

Animal Easter eggs from Family Circle

Aren’t these just amazing! Whimsical Easter eggs using permanent pens and acrylic paint from Alisa Burke

Which idea is your favorite? I like the simplicity of the dip dyed eggs but wish I had the talent (and time) to draw on eggs like those from Alisa Burke.

You might also like: 12 Recipe Ideas for Leftover Easter Eggs

Filed Under: Inspiration, Link Love, Seasonal Decorating Tagged With: Easter, Inspiration

Easter Decorations

March 8, 2013 By Manuela

Easter Sunday will be here before we know it! I finally got around to doing a little Easter decorating this week. I only bought 2 new things at the Dollar Tree (some candy and plastic eggs), otherwise everything else I already had. Alot I didn’t even use since I decided to keep it simple this year.

I like to put all of my seasonal decorations in one or two places (especially when I don’t have a lot). I think the impact is greater when you group things and putting stuff away is easier since I don’t have to look all over the house for decorations.

I bought those colorful marshmallow twists at Dollar Tree to put in my apothecary jar (not to eat). I like to decorate with candy – it’s a really easy way to fill those apothecary jars! I usually buy my “decorating candy” at the dollar stores.

I love this little egg topiary!

I love bottle brush trees! I love them at Christmas and any time really. I have a few Easter bottle brush trees. I don’t know where to tell you to get them as I haven’t seen any this year. I got these a few years ago (probably at TJX or Tuesday Morning).

I filled another apothecary jar with plastic Easter eggs. To make the polka dot eggs – I used those stick on dots you get at an office supply store. That little bunny looks angry {giggle}!

This wreath that’s hanging on the cabinet door is the coffee filter wreath with interchangeable center that I made last year. The tutorial is here. I covered a disc with some reindeer moss and glued on a blue speckled egg and then inserted this into my wreath. This is such an easy way to get a whole new seasonal wreath without having to make one from scratch every time!

That’s all the Easter decorating I’ve done this year! If you’d like to see some previous years Easter decorations you can check out this post or this post or use the looking for something search function on the sidebar to search this site.

Filed Under: Fluffing my nest, Seasonal Decorating Tagged With: china cabinet, Easter

DIY Moss Covered Frame & Free Easter Printables

March 6, 2013 By Manuela

I did this quick project the other day. I made a moss covered frame and put a free spring subway art printable in it.

I’m feeling mossy this spring! This is a super easy project and is going to be part of my spring mantel! Here’s how I made it and below are a few free Easter printables I collected for you to put in your frame.

Supplies needed for Moss Covered Frame

picture frame
glue gun
scissors
sheet moss (you can use reindeer moss etc but I’ve found sheet moss to be easier to work with because it is held together by it’s grid backing. Loose moss is messier but will work also)

Steps to making a moss covered frame:

Lay your sheet moss on your picture frame and cut 4 strips the length and width you need to cover your frame. I wrapped the sheet moss around the frame on the sides and top only. Glue your strips to the frame. You can fill in any blank spots with bits of moss and trim any unruly spots with scissors.

I re-used some toile rosettes I made last year for this spring wreath.

I love using free printables when decorating my home, especially seasonal printables! Here are few to get you started with your Easter decorating.

This is the cute spring printable I used in the moss frame I made. It’s from Purple Giraffe Crafts

Easter bunny subway art from Eighteen25

Chevron Easter bunny printable from 5 Thirteen Designs

Easter subway art in spring colors from Craftaholics Anonymous

Silhouette bunny printable from Craftily Ever After

It’s so easy to decorate with free printables. All you do is print them and pop them in a frame. What could be easier and all it costs is the ink you use to print them.

You need to go to the linked source in order to print out the free printables.

Filed Under: DIY Projects, Seasonal Decorating, Tutorials Tagged With: DIY projects, Printables, spring decorating

Easy DIY Felt & Yarn Spring Wreath

February 25, 2013 By Manuela

I enjoy making my own wreaths and the other day I was feeling crafty so I made a really easy, budget friendly, felt flower and yarn spring wreath for my foyer.

I had all the supplies I needed on hand so this cost me zero dollars. You need a wreath form, felt (I think you can get it 4/$1), yarn ( have tons from trying to learn to knit and crochet), ribbon to hang your wreath and a glue gun. Optional: decorative trim, small branch of some kind of spring flowering tree or shrub (fake)

A word about wreath forms – I’ve never made a wreath that I loved so much that I wasn’t willing to take it apart and re-use it or re-fashion it over and over again. I have a few different types of forms and different sizes that I got from various places. The thrift store (just pull everything off it), clearance, purchased with a coupon, the dollar store, the dollar area at Target etc. I rarely go out and buy a new wreath form for a project. Lots of times you don’t even need a “wreath form” you can just cut yourself a circle or square from cardboard, a cereal box, or poster board/foam core.

Easy DIY Felt Flower & Yarn Wreath

1. wrap your yarn around your wreath form…yawn…watch a movie while wrapping yarn around your wreath form

2. make various felt flowers & a few leaves. You can make your flowers all one kind. I chose to make a few different kinds. If you don’t know how to make a felt flower, I show how to make felt rosettes in this post Christmas Felt Rosette Tree or you can of course just google “how to make a a felt flower”. It’s SO easy!

3. glue felt flowers onto your wreath in a manner that pleases you

4. Optional: glue your pieces of trim onto your wreath and a branch of a spring flowering tree or shrub and then hang your wreath with a ribbon.

This was a really inexpensive and easy spring wreath to make!

I like making my own wreaths since it’s usually very hard to find ones in the colors that I like.

Last year I used a green fluffy feather boa for the base of my spring wreath. You can see it here Easy DIY Spring Wreath.

Spring will be here before we know it (I hope) !

Filed Under: Budget Decorating, DIY Projects, DIY Projects, Fluffing my nest, Seasonal Decorating, Tutorials Tagged With: Budget Decorating, Crafts, DIY projects, Wreaths

14 Free Valentine’s Day Printables

February 9, 2013 By Manuela

Are you looking for a some last minute ideas to make your Valentine’s Day special? I thought it would be fun to share a roundup of some free Valentine’s Day printables that I’ve found.

That’s a free chalkboard printable from one of my favorite blogs, Nest of Posies.

Just print and frame these Valentine Chalkboard Printables – from Nest of Posies.

Cute Valentine Cards for you to cut out - from A Fanciful Twist

How about wrapping some chocolate for the man in your life in this cute wrapper! from Jean Winters

Valentine party printables from Tiny Me

DIY Valentine Fortune Tellers from Design Mom

Valentine treat bag - you print directly onto your paper bag – from Twig & Thistle.

Here’s a pretty Valentine’s Day Tag for your treats from Eighteen25.

Here’s a super cute Angry Bird Valentine Printable from Brassy Apple.

Cute Valentine Tags from Hello, Good Gravy!

Free lollipop printable from Uncommon Designs

Isn’t this Valentine Alphabet cute! From Bloom Design

Cute Cupcake wrappers and more available from Iced Jems

Adorable Super Hero Hearts from Rockin The Boys Club

These sweet Valentine treat bags are from The Farm Chicks

Aren’t these all fun printables! Please go to the source in order to print.

I’ve collected lots of great ideas for Valentine’s Day on my Valentine’s Day Pinterest Board.

Filed Under: Inspiration, Link Love, Seasonal Decorating Tagged With: Inspiration, Printables, valentines day

Valentine’s Day Decorations

January 28, 2013 By Manuela

It may seem a little early for Valentine’s day decorations, but I decided to decorate my fireplace mantle so that we can enjoy it for a few weeks.

I basically re-used what I already had plus I made this cute felt and fabric Valentine banner from a kit that my friend Kathy (Kathy’s Cottage) sells in her Etsy store Hens In Daisies.

The kits come with everything you need to make this cute banner. I was fighting a cold when I made mine and didn’t have the energy to make the yo-yo flowers.

This is what it looks like with the yo-yo flowers (it’s Kathy’s photo). So cute, isn’t it! Anyway, you can also get the PDF pattern if you want to use your own materials instead of buying a kit. This is a great little project to do with the kids since you can glue everything together if you want instead of sewing it! She’s going to be adding different kits to her store (hopefully some pillow kits cause she makes THE CUTEST pillows ever). Go have a look! Hens In Daisies Etsy Store

The polka dot candle is from IKEA and the free Valentine printable is from Jensfavoritecookies.

I filled my largest apothecary jar with some fabric hearts and a smaller one with Christmas ornaments that have hearts on them.

I showed you my truck with the decoupaged toile XO in yesterday’s post about decorating with vintage toy trucks.

I reused some hearts I had from the Valentine tree I usually do and a heart wreath I made several years go to make a new wreath for this year.

I like to celebrate the different holidays and seasons by doing a little something but this will probably be the last year I decorate for Valentine’s Day. It was more important to me when my daughter was little or when we had more family in the area and would have special dinner with them.

Do you decorate for Valentine’s Day?

Filed Under: Budget Decorating, Decorating, Seasonal Decorating Tagged With: valentines day

Easy DIY New Year’s Eve Garland

December 30, 2012 By Manuela

To help celebrate the New Year, I made a really REALLY easy garland for my fireplace. I found the original craft idea on Martha Stewart’s site under Decorations for New Year’s Eve and changed it up a little.

All you need is some card stock (or any kind of paper that’s a bit heavier than printer paper – cardboard, cereal boxes anything like that), tinsel garland, ribbon, hot glue and scissors.

Here’s a quick tutorial on how I made my 2013 tinsel garland.

Step 1. Print out the numbers 2013 – 1. About.com has some numbers you can print out here or 2. you can use the numbers from the Martha Stewart site but those are for 2011 so you’ll have to find a 3 somewhere else or 3. use your favorite word processing program and change the size to fit a whole sheet of paper for each number.

Step 2. Cut out the numbers

Step 3. Glue tinsel garland to numbers. It doesn’t have be silver – that’s just what I had. This is where I differ from the Martha Stewart instructions. Her’s have you wrap the tinsel garland around the numbers. I only had that big fluffy garland and wrapping made it too bulky. So I glued it to the front and then I trimmed it with some scissor to get rid of some of the fluff and to accentuate the shape of the numbers.

Step 4. Make holes at the top of each number (I made two) and thread your ribbon (I used silver curling ribbon) through the numbers and hang.

Isn’t that a super easy and inexpensive project!

Filed Under: DIY Projects, Seasonal Decorating Tagged With: Christmas Decorating, DIY projects, garlands

Merry Christmas Everyone!

December 23, 2012 By Manuela

My family and I wish you all a Very Merry Christmas!

See you all in a few days!

Filed Under: Seasonal Decorating

A Cozy Christmas Guest Room

December 19, 2012 By Manuela

This is the last of my Christmas decorating that I have to share with you – our cozy spare bedroom.

Didn’t my husband do a nice job of tying this ribbon around the lampshade! I couldn’t for the life of me get it the way I wanted it to look and he did it in one try! I added the sparkly vintage brooch at the center of the bow. This has become one of my favorite Christmas decorations in this room!

I added a soft cozy throw to the bed.

This is was originally a wooden spool ornament. I took the hook part out and had my husband drill a little hole for the bottlebrush tree.

This is the same type ornament and I glued a tree to the top.

This free Christmas printable can be found at A Spoonful of Sugar. I did change the border around the words to yellow – it’ll print white for you unless you change it in Photoshop or Paint.

A pretty Christmas pillow next to the red toile one that’s always on the bed.

This is a small room and the other part has my desk and a bookcase – you don’t want to see that……believe me!

But this is the last hurrah for the guest room portion because after January we’re taking out the bed and most of the room will be my office/creative space.

I say most because my husband has to use the closet in this room for his clothes (old house). Now that my daughter is living downstairs her overnight guests stay downstairs with her (blow up mattress). The only relative that doesn’t live in the area likes to stay at the “W” in Atlanta (very posh hotel). So there really isn’t any reason to keep an extra bed in that room anymore ( & we do have two comfortable couches that can be pressed into service if need be).

I’m looking forward to having my own space!

Filed Under: DIY Projects, Seasonal Decorating Tagged With: Budget Decorating, Christmas Decorating, Crafts, DIY projects, Printables, upcycling

8 Fun Ways To Display Those Christmas Cards

December 11, 2012 By Manuela

Are the Christmas cards rolling in yet?

Are you wondering how to display the Christmas cards you’ve received?

Here are some fun ways to display your Christmas cards.

Martha Stewart Pinup Wreath made from clothespins. There are lots of tutorials out for different types of clothespin wreaths.

I love this idea by Yum Sugar! All you need is some festive Christmas ribbon and tape.

String Art Christmas Tree & Card Display uses 3m hooks so you don’t mess up your walls and it’s easy to take down after Christmas. Check out My Poppet for the easy tutorial

I also like this idea for displaying Christmas cards from Less Than Perfect Life of Bliss. You clip a ribbon to your curtain from which you hang your cards.

What a fun way to display cards!! Living in the Woods shows you how to make this display with lights.

30 Handmade days has a great tutorial on how to make this ribbon Christmas card holder for your wall.

If you’re lucky enough to have a sleigh (I wish!), you can string some ribbon or twine around and through it and attach your cards with tape or pins. From Midwest Living

This one is so easy and uses yardsticks! Go to Mamie Jane’s to find out how. Isn’t it cute!

As always, the photo’s are linked to their sources as well as a link in the text. Please go to the source to pin an individual idea.

Have you checked out 10 Easy Christmas Cookie Ideas ?

Filed Under: Link Love, Seasonal Decorating Tagged With: Christmas, Christmas Card Display, Inspiration

A Christmas Farm Truck & A DIY Snowglobe

December 10, 2012 By Manuela

I added a few Christmas decorations to my Ikea bookcase that I wanted to show you. My red farm truck is off to deliver Christmas presents and a tree!

I think this truck is going to be loads of fun to play around with all year long!

I made this snowglobe with a battery operated dollhouse light fixture and a canning jar. This is an easy winter/holiday craft!

How many ways can you upcycle a Ball Jar? Love this! It looks so pretty at night. This is super easy. Basically you just glue whatever it is that you want in your globe to your lid and fill the jar with some fake snow, screw the lid on, turn it upside down and you have a waterless snowglobe. I think one of those battery operated Christmas candles would be pretty too.