Our Quick Trip to Leavenworth

Last weekend we took a super quick trip over the mountains and through the snow to the cute little town of Leavenworth. It had been a long time since we'd gone to Leavenworth and if you remember last year we almost got there. So I was pretty excited. 

We arrived on Sunday afternoon and checked in just in time to watch the last of the Seahawks game (GO HAWKS!). We stayed at the Enzian Inn and I would highly recommend it. The rooms are comfortable. The lobby and the rest of the hotel is pretty sweet. Decorated like a Christmas lodge it was so warm and cozy, complete with a sleigh and a two story tree in the lobby (literally a tree went through the floor!). You even get free snowshoeing and the continental breakfast is amazing (complete with a make-your-own-omelette bar). 

After the game, we bundled up and went downtown for the last Tree Lighting Ceremony of the season. The main drag was blocked off so people could walk freely down the snowy street. There were even a few free standing fire pits in the middle of the road for people to warm up. We stopped and got some hot cho and wandered through all the cute shops. All the shopkeepers are so nice! 

There were so many people, especially for the tree lighting. The street was packed, the snow was falling, and we were freezing! It was so cold! Tons of kids were sledding down the small hill in the park. They had a stage set up in the main park with the high school carolers singing Christmas tunes. When the tree lighting ceremony began, the whole crowd joined in and sang along with the carolers. It was pretty awesome when they first lit the big Christmas tree, then the row of shops along the main street, then the rest of the trees in the park. I loved it! If you don't know by now, I LOVE Christmas lights! They make me so happy:). 

After the tree lighting, we grabbed some yummy sausages at the Munchen Haus. Then we had to go back to our room to warm up! It was so cold (did I mention that?)! I just brought my rain boots so I was dry but freezing. We hung out for a while and then went back downtown after the crowds had cleared to take some pictures and walk around.

The next morning, we had amazing omelettes and coffee, walked around some more downtown and then packed up to head home since the passes weren't looking great. We ended up driving through a blizzard on Stephens Pass! It was quite the experience, but Curvy did great with the All Wheel Drive (and Z was a rockstar driving!). 

Here's some pictures of our trip!

We had a great (quick) trip and we can't wait to go back. Leavenworth at Christmas really is amazing!

P.S. 4 Days til Christmas!!! Hope you are enjoying the holiday season with your families and friends!

DIY: Tree Leftovers

We don't usually have this problem. Usually we buy a tree that is an appropriate size for our apartment or house. This season, we ended up buying a tree that was a little too big for our little house. I don't have a before picture, but we trimmed down the bottom portion so now it looks like this:

and the aftermath of what we cut off looked like this:

It was actually Zach's idea that we use the leftovers to make something festive. I think I'm rubbing off on him. :) And so it became my mission to make something festive. I landed on a centerpiece for our dining table.

1. I trimmed off smaller branches, so they were easier to weave together.

2. I got out my candles and lantern and started weaving. One piece at a time, I placed the chopped end of the branch under the three-branch end of another branch and they kind of attached to each other because of the needles. Keep weaving all the way around the candle until it is complete! It's that easy.

Plus it smells amazing. I don't think I could ever give up having a real tree for a fake tree. They smell too good to pass up. 

The arrangement looks great all lit up. So festive!

DIY: Reindeer Glitter Art

I know, I know, I owe you guys a post or two on our new re-upholstered curvy wing back, but it's taking a while to get all our pictures loaded, edited, etc. So it will be soon! Hopefully really soon! :) I promise, the wait will be worth it.

A couple weeks ago, I whipped up this quick and easy reindeer glitter art to get in the Christmas spirit. This was a little Pinterest project I found, originally by Kelsey of the blog Daisy Dreaming (see her original post here). Notice her Anthro Inspired snow globes like I made last year? Great minds think alike!

Supplies: 

1. Canvas - I had bought a pack of 8x11 flat canvases a while back, so had this on hand.

2. Paintbrushes

3. Glitter - in any color, I chose red

4. Mod Podge (like Kelsey, you could also use glue) - I liked using the mod podge because it dries clear and I had a lot on hand from other projects

Step 1: Print out a reindeer stencil. I used the same one Kelsey did (find it here).

Step 2: Cut out the stencil and trace onto your canvas with a pencil.

Step 3: In segments, apply mod podge within the lines as best you can, then apply the glitter. Make sure you put some newspaper underneath, because glitter is messy! After I was done, if it looked a little thin, I just applied some more mod podge and repeated the process.

Step 4: Let it dry and frame it or leave it as is.

Ours is now sitting on our bookshelf behind my favorite nativity scene.

Project Cost Breakdown
Canvas - already had on hand
Mod Podge - already had on hand
Glitter - $4
Frame - $2 at IKEA
Total Cost - $6

What Christmas crafts have you been up to lately?

Zoolights

Hi there! How was your weekend? I hope it was filled with lots of Christmas lights, hot chocolate, warm fires and maybe some shopping (I definitely prefer shopping of the online variety this year). We had such a fun weekend. I took Friday off to catch up on life and use up some of my vacation days. It was much needed, especially this time of year when we are crazy busy, but in a good way. 

Saturday we had our friends, Kim and Jake, over for dinner and then went down to Tacoma to Zoolights. None of us had been before and it was so much fun! They sell discounted tickets online and at Fred Meyer, which I would highly recommend since the line was really long when we got there. Also, there's not a lot of parking. We got in the park about 8 and stayed until 9:15 even though the park closed at 9 (there were still lots of people there). 

I was in love with this green and purple tree. When we walked by, we even saw a couple that had just gotten engaged by the tree! So sweet.

The best part was the baby tigers! There were two baby tigers and right as we walked up the zookeeper went in their cage to feed them! When we saw them, Zach and I both thought they were just like Brody. Haha. Huge, gangly, clumsy, rambunctious. They were so cute! 

We had such a great time! We would highly recommend going to check out Zoolights. Hot chocolate, Christmas music blasting throughout. It was pretty busy, but you could definitely just walk around at your own pace. The only bad part was the penguins... if you know me, you know why... and they smell horrible! 

Go check out Zoolights (here's a link to buy them online).

Craft Day - David, Mitts and El Rudolpho

A while back, my friends Kim, Shan and I had Craft Day! Craft Day is a tradition we started a few years back where we get together and do crafty things. We've done Christmas crafts and Halloween crafts in the past, but this time there was a theme of spray paint. Kim spray painted her $20 David head (see her blog post all about it here) and I worked on my $1 reindeer from Goodwill. Shan brought her mitts (she was knitting) and they turned out great! I actually used the pattern on a couple knitting projects lately...

Here's Kim's David that she scored when we went to Pacific Galleries a few months back. It was a big debate between aqua or yellow. I think she made the right choice!

As for El Rudolpho, I got him at Goodwill for a dollar. Not too shabby. He was covered in some lovely mod podge Christmas fabric. Now I love me some Christmas, but I was not digging the fabric look.

The mod podged fabric had some wrinkles, but I didn't mind and decided to just spray paint over it. Unfortunately I learned the hard way to use primer! Luckily Kim let me borrow some of her white. :) You can see how the red isn't covering as well without primer.

You can also see that it looked like a war zone out there. After some primer, El Rudolpho was doing much better. The flat Rustoleum enamel in white worked really well as primer. Overall I think I did 2-3 coats of red, then two coats of primer, then 2-3 more coats of red (obviously if I did this next time I would leave out the first couple coats of red and start with primer:). 

I love how El Rudolpho turned out and can't wait to decorate with him for Christmas! You can definitely see the fabric outlines through the paint, but I actually like it. It looks more like a paper mache reindeer instead of just flat and smooth. 

Total project cost: Less than $5! Booyah!

For some reason I'm really into reindeers this year... so get ready for another reindeer DIY coming up!

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