Holiday Mantle

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My mantle is all decked out for Christmas.  After Thanksgiving I took down all of the Fall decorations shown here.

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Here's my empty mantle before:

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And here's the after:

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Much, much better.

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The glass candlesticks are from CB2 and are really inexpensive - they range in price from $2.95 - $4.95 each.  Can't beat that!  I bought the red balls at Pottery Barn.  They have hooks on them and can also be used as ornaments.  The green balls I've had forever and are usually on my mantle year round.  The mercury glass birds came from Target last winter.

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I made the glittered 'PEACE' banner using cardboard, glitter, and a ribbon to string the letters together.

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Linking to:

The Stories of A to Z

Blizzard Preparedness. . .

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We've had a blizzard warning here since yesterday afternoon and still have another 9 hours to go!  I've been working from home, enjoying my Christmas tree and decorations,  working on my Christmas cards, cooking this {again!} and sitting by my warm fireplace with a nice glass of vino.  A glass of wine makes any blizzard better, right?

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Snow is now covering my wreath and planter.

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Happy Winter!

Holiday Planter

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This weekend I put together a holiday planter for my front porch.  It's not as exciting as the Chicago sidewalk planters my sister posted on her site, but I still like it!

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Here's what you'll need:

- Planter with dirt

- Pine boughs (mine came from the bottom of my Christmas tree; they were the ones I needed to cut off in order for my tree to fit in the stand!)

- Branches

- Red berry branches

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Here's the empty planter:

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First add the pine boughs around the base of the planter.

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Next add in the branches.  I bundled mine together and stuck them right in the center of the planter.
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Add the berry branches just above the pine boughs.

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That's it!  It's a fast, easy, and inexpensive ourdoor decoration.  I usually make one of these each winter - the pine boughs will easily last in the planter for a couple of months.

Christmas Wreath

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This weekend I put together a Christmas wreath for my front porch.  I started with a quite ugly, plain wreath I bought at Michael's for $9.00.

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I wanted to add a few things to the wreath to make it look better.  I purchased three pine branches with pinecones and red berries on it.  I also used three branches of red berries that I already had.

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I started by adding the three pine branches and wiring them to the back of the wreath.

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Looking better already!

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Next I added the red berry branches.

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The last step was to add a string of white lights and hang the wreath outside.

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That's it - it was pretty easy to make and only took me a half hour or so.

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First Snow. . .

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Last night we got our first big snow of the season.  Where I live we had at least 6" on the ground when I woke up.  Normally I don't really like the snow, but for some reason I really enjoyed it today - it really put me in a holiday mood!

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Tomorrow I'm getting my Christmas Tree!

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Apple Pie

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My sister and I made a delicious apple pie for Thanksgiving while we were out in Arizona.  The recipie comes from Smitten Kitchen.  You can find the complete recipie here.

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We made the dough for the crust the night before which saved a lot of time Thanksgiving morning and also gave the dough plenty of time to chill in the fridge.  I am really liking Smitten Kichen's pie crust recipie and directions.  I always thought I made a pretty good pie crust until I tired hers!  She has some great tips and a tutorial that can be found here.  Really cold butter is the key to making the pie crust nice and flaky.

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The pastry blender makes mixing the butter into the flour super easy.

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Ice cold water is another trick.
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Here is one of the finished balls of dough.  We made enough for 3 pie crusts - a bottom and top for the apple and a bottom for a pumpkin pie we made.

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After we got back from the parade on Thanksgiving morning we got to work on peeling and slicing the apples.

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Rolling out the dough was really easy.  I think letting the dough chill overnight as opposed to a couple of hours really made a big difference.

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All set and ready to bake. . .

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Fresh out of the oven and looking good!

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A close up of the flaky, yummy crust. . .

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I was too busy eating food at dinner and forgot to take a picutre of the pie once it was served, but it was delicious!