bits + pieces

Happy Friday! I have a killer cold. Or a man cold. I'm lying on the couch groaning that I'm dying. So I may be dramatic, but it's the most annoying thing ever. Anyways, here are the bits + pieces for this week. I appreciate not everyone is on Instagram so here is a roundup of some of the recent Instagram shots that sum up what we've been doing. (You can click on each one below to be brought to Instagram where you can see the original post.)

1. I found peonies in November! 2. Andrew. The cat. 3. Switched things up a bit. Going with a boxwood wreath for our front door. 4. We got rid of our chandelier, but now we need something new. So string lights are giving us light for now. 5. A painting I did awhile back hangs at my Mom's house 6. Collecting rocks on the Beach 7. New ribbon 8. Hair cut + selfie at Starbucks 9. Exasperated husband 

Today is Oscar's half birthday! And yes, we totally celebrate half birthdays with cake and birthday banners. Life needs reasons to celebrate (and eat cake).

Ps., I'm don't have any Black Friday deals in the shop but you may like to grab some twine at $5.00 a roll (prices already adjusted on the site) (Black, Red, and Pink/Red are exluded) 

Styling with Pottery Barn Ornaments

A few weeks ago Pottery Barn sent me a box of the most gorgeous ornaments from their collection with the following challenge....They wanted to see me use the ornaments throughout my home, everywhere but the tree. (I don't even have my tree up, so they were in luck.)

In terms of the challenge I thought about wild and crazy ways to show my ornaments in use. But truthfully - I'm not wild and crazy. I'm a traditional girl so I found that my comfort (and what I really honestly thought I could show you as something I would do....) would be traditional ways of using ornaments - even though they aren't on the tree. So yes, you may have seen these ideas before somewhere else, I'm not recreating the wheel. But what I wanted to show was the beauty of the decorations. And, have some fun with styling.

The first things I thought of doing was setting a place setting with an ornament. The little bird ornament I just clipped to one side of the plate - so it's sitting there perched, and it can be clipped off when the guest sits down. The Pottery Barn owl ornament is more substantial, and placed gently on the folded napkin on the plate, it presents beautifully with a sprig of boxwood slid in at the top. I can see this as something a Grandmother may do on Christmas dinner - a keepsake ornament for each family member. The nice thing about Pottery Barn ornaments is that they are substantial - so they do lend themselves to the keepsake gift.

And then you have, for the special ones in your life, the same idea of adding a beautiful gift of a heirloom ornament on top of a gift. It's super easy to do, and really presents beautifully under the tree or as a hostess gift.

There you go. So although being used for a non-traditional use (not on a tree) I think that these are still pretty traditional uses of ornaments and help add some beautiful detail, and personality to your home / wrapping for the holidays.

Ps., I had so much fun styling these photos. I also found those blue plates at Value Village a few weeks ago. They are ah-ma-zing. So, pair high end, with low end and ta-da!

Blue Plates: Purchased at Value Village
Ornaments: Provided by Pottery Barn
Ribbon: From my shop Penny Paper Co.

*Disclaimer. Pottery Barn gifted me ten ornaments from their collection for this post. No other compensation was provided. Read more about my blog and how I get compensated. xo

I'm thankful for you!

Enjoy your Thanksgiving!! I'm taking today & tomorrow off to spend some time with family. But don't forget to come back on Monday for The DIY'ers!

1 Kanal House Plan + 3D Front Elevation - 273-1 , Lake City M-2 ,Lahore

A new advent calendar idea...

For a number of years now I've talked about Advent calendars around this time of the year. I was inspired by this one, saw a similar one here, then did my own here, and here, but I truthfully found the whole process exhausting to find little things to put into the bags. Oscar also had a hard time understanding that each one was meant to be a different day. So for us, it was pretty hard (perhaps because I am pretty worn out by the time December 1st rolls around) that I have absolutely zero energy to tell a three year old he can't open ALL the bags all at once. But my hope, and perhaps Christmas spirit came back when I saw a pin last night of the advent calendar below.

Called the Advent Calendar of service, it is a free PDF of download of kind things to do .... what I consider - Christmas spirit. So I have decided to try this one this year for us. It just made me smile, and I think the person that came up with this is a genius. (And obviously a nice person) You can do envelopes like is shown above, or, do the cotton bags or even kraft bags.

Anyhow, I had to share it. It is so sweet.

Home Renovation: Progress Update #2

Hi friends, and happy almost Thanksgiving!! I know Justin & I are looking forward to a few days off of work and the remodel, so Thanksgiving couldn't come soon enough.

We're seven weeks into our master suite remodel and we're doing good!  We're behind schedule by about four weeks at this point, but that was a conscious decision that we made. We felt like we were pushing ourselves too hard. For the first three weeks, we were putting in 4-5 hours of remodel work after 8 hours of real work each day and we were completely drained. So, we needed to slow down and let ourselves rest a little bit each night. Our new plan is 3 hours of remodel work each day after 8 hours of real work. :)

Since our last progress update, we've made it a really long ways. We no longer have a 'Dexter Room', but now have real walls up and insulation to keep our house warm in the 18 degree temperature we've been having. And as a refresher, here's our overall plan, the master bedroom mood board and the master bathroom mood board.

So here's what we've done:

We decided to work on only the bedroom for a while so we can get moved back in and out of the guest room. Then once we finish that up, we'll move onto the closet and master bathroom!! So everything below is Master Bedroom only. 

We've installed the wall insulation throughout all rooms & covered in poly (aka. plastic sheeting).

We put up the Sheetrock, and I finally got to help more than just watching!

We mudded, and mudded, and mudded for days. Seriously, this process takes forever.... And although I'm not pictured, I definitely helped. Way too much work for one man.

After mudding for days, we sanded it all down nice and smooth. 

And this is what we looked like after. We only got a little bit on ourselves.

We "installed" blown-in insulation in the attic, which was actually kind of fun!

I sprayed primer on the walls with our handy-dandy new paint sprayer.

And Justin started building the trim for our windows.

And lastly, I've started playing with some paint samples. What do you think? Gray, gray or gray?

And that's it!! That's four weeks of "after hours" work. Next up is finishing the Master Bedroom trim & painting. Then moving onto the closet and Master Bath. Can't wait!!


Linking up to: Give Me The Goods Monday, Make it Pretty Monday, Motivate Me Monday, Craft-o-Matic, Monday Funday, That DIY Party, Mod Mix Monday, Tuesdays at Our Home, Tell Me Tuesday, Remodelaholic, Time to Sparkle, Take a Look Tuesday, Work It Wednesday, Simply Create Thursdays, The Weekly Creative, Inspire Me Please What's Shaking Link Party, Craft Frenzy Friday, DIY Weekend, The Humble Brag, Friday Flash Blog, Lovely Ladies Linky, Best of the Weekend, Tutorials and Tips, Wow Us Wednesday,  Making Monday, Before and Afters, Craft, Create & Inspire, Pincentive Blog Hop, Wow Me Wednesday, Live Laugh Linky,  Create It Thursday,  Inspiration Gallery,  Craft Frenzy Friday,  Feathered Nest Friday,  Friday Flash Blog,  The Party Bunch,  Friday Follow Along Party,  What's Shakin' Link Party,  Inspiration Monday, Link it or Lump it,  Let's Pour Tea Party,  Frugal Crafty Home Party,

Simple things by Riikka

Cette année, je vais passer Noël et Nouvel An en Suède, alors il n'y aura pas beaucoup de décorations de Noël chez nous... Cela dit, même quand on passe les fêtes à la maison, j'aime les décorations simples: un sapin, des fleurs de saison, quelques guirlandes électriques, des peaux de moutons, plein de bougies partout, et voilà!

Mon amie Riikka à Weekday Carnival a réalisé cette série de décoration de Noël simple et épurée, parfaitement à mon goût! D'autres photos sur son blog.

This year I will spend both Christmas and New Year in Sweden, so our home won't be that much Christmas decorated... But even when we do stay at home, I like to make it simple: a Christmas tree, some season flowers, a few string lights, sheepskins, lots of candles, and voilà!

My friend Riikka at Weekday Carnival has made this series of simple and light Christmas decoration, right up my alley! More photos on her blog.

Styling & photo Riikka Kantinkoski / Weekday Carnival

10 marla house plan layout

Coffee & End Table feature at Remodelaholic

Hi friends. I'm pretty excited to share that today our DIY End and Coffee Table are being featured at Remodelaholic. I'm such a big fan of Remodelaholic that I'm so incredibly honored. Everyone be sure to swing by and check us out!!



P.S. Don't forget to enter my giveaway for a chance to win an awesome pillow cover from Michelle Dwight Designs! Enter through this post.    

2013 Etsy Gift Guide

For years I've purchased some of my favourite gifts for loved ones from Etsy sellers. I love that I can ship items directly to people, and many Etsy sellers will even gift wrap and include little gift cards for the recipients. This year is no different - I've compiled some collections of my favourite items for him, her, little ones, and others in my "Etsy Tastemaker" collection. So here you go! My 2013 Etsy Holiday Gift Guide...

See more of my gift ideas for her 

See more of my gift ideas for the Mr. in my Gift Ideas for Him
(I purchased the stamped luggage tags show above for Aubrey last year and he loved them!)

See more of my gift ideas for Babies & Kids

I have some other collections on the go that I'll showcase later, but I thought these three would get your mind working for creative ideas on gifts for those on your list.

xo Lindsay

*This post contains affiliate links. (Click on the link to read more about affiliate links on my blog) - Lindsay 

The DIY'ers #39

Happy Monday and welcome back to The DIY'ers. Thanks to everyone for being here to share and check out some great inspiration!

Here are my Top Three DIY Projects from last week's link up.  And don't forget, all featured projects will also be pinned to The DIY'ers Pinterest board - so don't forget to follow. Or, follow along with all of my Pinterest boards here.

Sam from Atkinson Drive shared this beautiful book page banner.

Martha Anne showed off her DIY Mantle (sans fireplace) and how she decorated it for fall!

Camille from Imperfectly Imaginable shared her finished Restoration Hardware inspired bed. Beautiful!

And now onto the party!

<a href="http://homecomingmn.blogspot.com/search/label/The%20DIY%27ers" target="_blank" title="Running on Happiness"><img src="http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8096/8492982155_c22507aecc_t.jpg" width="100" height="100" alt="The DIY'ers" /></a> />

The Rules? They're simple!

1. Take a picture of your DIY and link it up below. 
2. Text link back to Home Coming or pick up The DIY'ers button from the left sidebar and include it in your post so others can get involved in The DIY'ers.
3. Become a follower of Home Coming. I'd love to have you! 

P.S. Don't forget to enter my giveaway for a chance to win an awesome pillow cover from Michelle Dwight Designs! Enter through this post.