taste and smell christmas

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving and maybe you even braved the crowds and went black friday shopping yesterday. I just got a new car last week so no more shopping for me this year ;) 
I thought I would share a somewhat German Christmas tradition with you guys today. Now that Thanksgiving is over so many of my neighbors are already putting up their decorations and lights that I feel like this actually fits quite well. We will be spending Christmas with my family this year so we won't be doing much decorating around here at all. 
This little DIY is super easy, fairly cheap, yummy smelling aaaaand as a bonus you can include the kiddos if you'd like. 


Here is what you'll need:


A few oranges
Lots of cloves (buy them at a bulk store or a specialized spice shop to get them a lot cheaper)
Ribbon of your choice if you'd like to hang them up


And here is what you do...

Oh yeah you definitely need a cute little puppy to watch you while you do this ;)
You can make lots of cute patterns or even spell out your names, initials, whatever you can come up with. If you would like to hang them around the house just leave gaps for the ribbon or stick cloves through the ribbon to hold it in place even better.
Group a few oranges together so that you can smell them better, they do smell wonderful. 
Easy right?
I loved making these when I was a little girl and these ones were made by the hubby himself. I was a little shocked to be honest with you, he usually stays away from all of my "craft" projects. He doesn't think he's creative enough but then I come downstairs and he has spelled out our name in cloves on an orange ;) 
Now you may still be wondering why this post title says smell and TASTE. Well, no you're not supposed to eat these oranges, EVER! Yuck!
But now that you hopefully have some of the cloves left over how about we make some Kinderpunsch? 


Kinder what???


The literal translation would be Kids Punch and trust me it tastes yummy :)
Now I don't really use a specific recipe and I also don't really measure out the ingredients, instead I just keep tasting it while I make it.

I didn't take my own pictures so this is taken from google. My punch looks more orange due to the orange juice.

Here is what you will need if you're making a lot like I did for Thanksgiving...


1/4 - 1/2 gallon of berry fruit tea
1 Orange cut into slices
1 Lemon cut into slices (try to buy organic for both if you can since they will be floating in your punch)
1 Jug of Apple Juice (half gallon)
1 Jug of Orange Juice (half gallon)
Cranberry Juice or Cran-Apple (whichever you prefer)
Cloves
2-3 Sticks of Cinnamon
Brown Sugar


Heat the tea water in a big stock pot, add 2-3 tea bags and let sit for 5-10 minutes. Remove tea bags. Now add in your juices. I didn't use all of the juice, it just depends on how much you want to make. I try to add a large amount of apple juice a little less of the orange juice and the least amount of the cranberry. 
Put cloves into a loose tea infuser so they don't float around in your punch. If you don't have one try to find something else to contain them in like a sieve or hand strainer. Throw the cinnamon sticks, orange and lemon slices directly into the pot. Use brown sugar to sweeten to taste. Heat everything to almost boiling. I wouldn't let it simmer but it won't hurt to let all the ingredients sit in the pot for a while. 
Now enjoy the taste of the holidays :) 


If you've ever been to a christmas market in Germany you may have had what they call "hot wine". It is very similar to this except for the alcohol. I actually have always preferred the Kinderpunsch over the adult version. 


Please let me know if you try this recipe and if you and/or your kids liked it. 

a walk in the park

We've had some gorgeous weather here in Western PA so we spent the day outside yesterday. Logan had a blast rolling around in the grass, really feeling it for the first time and of course practicing his crawling moves. He gets pretty far already. I think we are in trouble. I guess we have to start thinking about baby proofing the house a little earlier than we thought. Any recommendations on what we should get? I've started putting outlet plugs in but that's about it.


The hubs is mowing the yard one last time (we hope) and I am off to send out some orders for 1499 Vintage. If you haven't checked it out yet, you might wanna take a peek. I have a whole bunch of new items to be listed within the next few days. :)

{life} according to my cell

Lots of sleepy time going on here 

puppies, our bilingual family, sitting, ikea lunch 

daily messes and treats

love him 

baby bear, more projects, first snow (in October), my momma is here

Have a great weekend everyone :) 

starting solids

We've been doing a lot of this lately...

HaHa


I can't believe he is 5 months old already. Where did the time go? 
We just started giving him solids and so far he likes it, even though it doesn't look like it in that last picture. I still nurse him the same but I am starting to imagine the day when he will decide that he is done nursing and I am already sad about it. 


See, we had a rough time in the beginning...
There was the initial pain because you're not used to having someone trying to extract milk from there, especially not someone who is just as inexperienced as you are. Then there is more pain when your milk finally decides to come in full force and you feel like you are going to explode. There is also the frustration of realizing that the pain doesn't just go away after a few weeks, because it takes both of you much longer to figure this thing out.


But you stick with it and through the pain and frustration because you know it's the best for both of you. So you use all the creams and try all the techniques, you go to the BF support groups, you start pumping and you stop pumping, and slowly you both figure out just what works for you.
And then in the end you finally get to the point where you are both relaxed and comfortable, sharing these special moments, the smiles and the deep sighs when a belly is full. The heavy eyelids and the long hugs and cuddles - I never want them to stop.


I know I will miss those moments once he decides he doesn't need me anymore. I also know he is nowhere near ready to be done and that I have at least another 7 months, as long as everything goes smooth. 
I guess I am just a little sentimental at the thought of him growing older and getting so much more independent. I want to freeze all these special moments in time and relive them over and over. 


Well, I bet you mommas out there know what I'm talking about. No matter if you nursed or bottle fed your baby, I think we all have these special moments with our little ones that we never want to end. 
My mom is here from Germany this week to help out and enjoy her grandbaby. She's been cooking and cleaning, doing laundry and entertaining the babe. I really miss having my family around, especially now that I am a mom myself. Can't wait to spend some quality time back home soon :) 

{style files} mustard and gray

I'm wearing: Old Navy Sweater, AE Shirt, Juicy Couture Striped Tank, Seven Jeans, Ankle Boots bought in Germany,  Mango Leather Jacket, Lisa Leonard Bracelet and Michael Kors Watch.

The weather was nice yesterday so we actually got to take these pictures outside :) 

The hubby watched the bubs so that my mom and I could go shop for a while. I got a whole bunch of sippy cups and tiny little utensils and plates at TJ Maxx where I also found some American Crafts Cardstock for $1.99. I couldn't resist that deal. I am a serious craft hoarder, just ask the hubby...

It's so nice to have my mom around to help out and of course to shop with. 

It's funny how in every store I automatically look for baby stuff and cute little clothes. 

I think my little man is the best dressed 5 months old in town ;) 

diy: yarn wrapped painted jars

If you got here from Pinterest, Welcome :) This post has been quite popular and I'm glad you found it as well. If you like this tutorial please take a look at what else my blog has to offer. For more DIY posts simply click HERE. 

This was inspired by something I came across on the internet a while ago but never pinned and now I can't find it anymore. Go figure! 

I remembered that the original glass was white and had lines all over, so I figured I would just use some yarn and warp it around my jars and spray paint them to create the effect. 

Here is what you'll need:

- Several cleaned jars. I always keep mine for projects. Soak them in water to get the tags off and use some Goo Gone for the glue residue. Make sure to clean them with soap to get all the Goo Gone off or else the paint won't stick.
- Yarn or some sort of string. If the yarn has a lot of fuzzy fibers they may stick to the jar a little but it won't be very noticeable so don't worry about it too much
- A can of white spray paint. I used Flat. You can use any color you want but with winter coming up I though white was best suited. 
- You'll also need something to cover whatever surface you'll be spraying on. Spray paint doesn't work as well when it's cold outside so it will take longer to dry. Make sure to give it some extra time before you touch the jars. 

I used some regular packaging string and some yard with texture. Wrap the string around the jar tightly and tie a knot. Now wrap the string around the rest of the jar tightly criss-crossing and overlapping until you like what you see. Then just tie the end to the leftover string where you started and cut off the ends.

Place the jars onto your covered surface upside down and spray paint them evenly with 2-3 coats. Make sure to let them dry for 5-10 minutes in between coats. Once they are fully dried just cut the string in one place and unwrap. Now you can place a tea light inside and decorate away :) 

I think it would also look cute to wrap some twine around the bases of the jars for some more texture. 

I love the different effects the skinny string and the textured yarn create. The jars that were wrapped with the thicker yarn look like they have puffy clouds floating in the sky. 
This project is also super cheap since the jars were free and I had the string and yarn on hand, all it cost me was a can of spray paint. They would also make great little gifts, just tie a ribbon and bow around 3 and you're ready to go. 

{diy} entertainment center from pallets

I've had this idea in my head for a while now: Use pallets to build a real piece of furniture. 
Yeah, I know it's not all that original and a lot of people are pinning pallet projects all over Pinterest lately but they are all such great ideas.


So I didn't let that deter me and a few weeks ago I asked my father in law to pick up some pallets from work and drop them off at our house. We had to wait a week or so until he came across the right ones, ones that were in good enough condition to use for a piece of furniture. Then we spent an entire weekend prepping the pallets.

We cut 3 pallets in half and stacked them, bottoms facing to create the larger openings, on top of each other. Because the wall that holds the TV is wider we decided we needed to add to the unit for it to be large enough. So we cut another 3 pallets in half but this time in both directions and added the smaller cubbies on the side. Does that make ay sense? 

After figuring out how to configure the whole thing we sanded the heck out of all the pieces. This wasn't a lot of fun to do but totally necessary. Pallets are pretty rough and if you don't want to get a splinter every time you touch it you need to sand a LOT!!! Use power tools and don't try to sand by hand. 
The whole process probably took us 4 days since we also have a baby to take care of and the weather didn't always cooperate. If you stick with it more than we could you should be able to do this in 2 days.


After the sanding was done we mixed some white stain from Ikea (left over from our stairs and doors) with Polyurethane. Spend the extra money and get the one that cleans up with soap and water. The brand we used was Valspar.

We put on an even coat and let them dry. If you want to do this 'right' you should now sand again and do another two coats of stain with a sanding in between. I'm not patient enough and I also didn't want the wood to get too white. So we only did one coat ;)


We then brought everything inside and stacked the pallets the way we wanted. Hubby got some metal plates and caster wheels from Lowes and we went to town.
Be prepared to adjust the pallets a little bit, since they may not be square, by clamping them and attaching one piece at a time. It took both of us a few hours to get it all screwed together. 
Lastly we attached the caster wheels to the bottom, so now we can easily move it around if we want to.

I love it! I love the industrial look a la Restoration Hardware but with a waaaayyyy smaller price tag. 
I also like that it's not perfect. There is so much visual interest there and I just can't stop looking at all the details. 


Overall the project cost us:


$27 for all the brakets
$30 for the caster wheels
$30 for the Polyurethane 
The pallets were free :) 


So it wasn't a super cheap project but it was well worth the money we spent. 


Have you built anything from pallets lately? If you build something similar make sure to let me know, I would love to see it :)