My first Christmas tree! (Updated)

Like I said it my last post I have never had my own Christmas tree, and never really planned to have one. My husband and I didn't really liked Christmas trees growing up, and ever since we were dating we had planned to have some other fun alternative. Our first Christmas was a little over a month after we got married and we didn't really have time to think of anything, so we just didn't have anything at all... except for a pile of presents in the corner of our living room. Our second Christmas we were a little more creative and I made stockings and a wreath, which we hung above an old chest and window panel where we piled our presents.

But, it just never did the trick, never felt quite like Christmas so this year we went out and got ourselves a Christmas tree :) (after a lot of begging on my part). And I love it! I have also spent a lot of time over the past couple of weeks making ornaments for the tree, and am proud to say that I made all except two of our ornaments! We have two cats so we didn't want to bother with the glass ones you can buy, so all of mine are cat friendly. Not that I want my cats playing with my tree ornaments, but if they do (like I know they will) they wont make a giant mess and they wont hurt themselves.

I made the star out of a cracker box we had in the recycling bin. Update: Pretty & Cozy  has a tutorial on how to make these kinds of stars. They used cardstock but I didn't have any in white, so I just used some cracker boxes and painted them. The first attempt I did was with regular paper, and it turned out horrible, so I suggest something sturdy. There is a templet available on that website that you can print out. Since we don't have ink for our printer, I just took a ruler and measured the templet on my computer screen and then made my own templet. It was a little difficult to figure out and would be way easier to just print, but I made due with the resources I had available.

Covered styrofoam balls with coffee filters.

The garlands are painted styrofoam balls strung together with beads. Inspired by something I found at a holiday faire.

I hand crocheted "doilies" and sewed them onto a heart that I made from brown linen I had. I made lots of doilies in different patterns. This was inspired by these ones at Ikea.

And last years stockings that I made from burlap and wood letters.

Update: For those who saw earlier, I got a new picture of the whole tree with decorations on it.

The D.I.Y. Christmas is going great so far, although I think I am a little behind.

I'm linking this post up to my first link party! Check out some other bloggers and their DIY Christmas decor!

My first yarn wreath and a flower tutorial.

Over the last few months I have sort of taken a little crafting/blogging hiatus. At some point awhile back I went from working 20hrs to 30hrs a week and then this summer went to full time. Unfortunately this hasn't left me a ton of time to do all the things that I love. Since we've been back from Hawaii something just kind of clicked and I realized that what is important to me is for both my husband and I to be doing the things we enjoy, and not just the things that pay the bills. It just isn't fulfilling to wake up every morning and wish you could spend the day doing something that you actually enjoy. So with that said, in January I will be going back to school and soon after going back to part time. I'm so excited to be taking a step towards the future we want. Also since being back we have kind of gone a little crazy on overdue projects. Ok, let's be honest I have gone a little crazy and he has just given in to my whims.
So to kick off the soon to be Christmas season, here is the yarn wreath I made yesterday:

I know that the yarn thing has been done several times so I'm not going to bother with a tutorial, but here is one by Take Heart if anyone needs to see how it is done. But it was super super easy.

Here is another fabric flower that I made with different fabric which shows you a little better what these guys look like in person.

There are tons and tons of fabric flowers out there and I'm sure someone somewhere has a tutorial for these, but I personally couldn't find one so I will show you how I made mine.

Step 1: Cut a strip of fabric, tapering it so one end is wider than the other. It doesn't have to be much wider, just about a quarter to half an inch.

Step 2: Fold fabric in half (hot dog style) and cut slits in the fabric. This should be self explanatory and you probably don't need me to tell you this, but I made the silly mistake of accidentally cutting all the way through the fabric a couple times and had to start over, so beware of that.

Step 3: Fold in half and do a simple stitch through the solid side of the fabric (aka: the non-loopy side)

Step 4: As you are sewing pull the thread through the fabric so it starts to gather. Continue to the end of the fabric. As you go the fabric will spin into a flower shape.

Step 5: (No photo) The fabric should be all gathered into a flower shape now, you can adjust the layers as you like and then sew through all of the layers of fabric until it feels good and secure. Add buttons or whatever embellishment you like.

 Well hopefully that was helpful! Hope everyone has a great week and a wonderful Thanksgiving!