Hedgehog Hollow

Lifestyle, Baking Crafting Blog

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Get a head start on your Fall Holidays – Day 5: Favors & Gift Boxes

Hi Hollowers!

Today is the final day of this series with Minted.com; but it has been so popular we will be doing it for lots of holidays going forward. If you are just joining us today you can catch up on Day 1, Day 2, Day 3 and Day 4 by just clicking the days and it will hop right on over.

To finish things up I’m going to be sharing how we made these favor boxes and my top wrapping tips; just like these from the place settings.

 

I love every single thing I got from Minted.com; and its all stood up so well.  I arranged it all on my home table; I moved it to and from the country club, the kids spilt cereal on the runners so then they had to be washed, no ironing needed! Then I staged up all those ideas at home and not a mark on any of it; not even a rip in the gift wrap!  The quality is great and it all co-ordinates perfectly and I just adore the face you can customize it!

Today I have two videos to share, first of all Hannah is going to show you how to create your own custom sized boxes using the Wr R Memory Keepers 1,2,3 punch board.  We have some tips from all the things we did wrong!

I hope you enjoyed that, it’s the first time I’ve made a video with anyone, it was so much fun; you can be sure that we’ll be doing it again! I hope you feel you need that punch board too, click here to find out more.


Next up I’m going to share my top tips for gift wrapping;

It really is easier (and much more fun) to wrap with a friend! I hope you enjoyed those tips, Hannah told me afterwards that she loved the tip for no bulk ribbon wrapping!  What was your favorite tip from the week? Leave me a comment below to let me know!

Thank you so much for stopping by for this series, next week we are back to paper crafting, we have some fun tutorials as well as inspiration week videos from LDRS Creative coming for you so stop by again soon.  Finally, don’t forget to stop over at Minted.com, let me know you came from the Hollow; I just know you’ll find something you love!

Happy Stamping

Alexandra & The Prickle

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Get a head start on your Fall Holidays – Day 4: Finishing Touches & Home Decor Tips

Hi Hollowers!

Welcome to day 4; sorry it’s a little later than usual, but I thought of a fab idea and didn’t have enough light to take pictures last night so I had to wait til this morning!! In case you are new the the blog or haven’t seen this series we are collaborating with Minted.com and I went shopping at my local Joann to produce some great fall holiday prepping and decorating ideas and tips for you.

Today we are talking about those extra little touches on the table and also how you can take the decor I showed you over the last few days to create decor for elsewhere in your home!

I showed you this plate yesterday and I shared my love of the clearance aisle, this is one of those finds last year and I added some (of my many) hedgehogs, a fabric covered pumpkin and some well placed fall smelling potpourri.

You could just go with Hedgehog too and some of those burlap leaves i’m such a fan of!  (No hedgehogs were harmed in the making of this series).

I also love this bowl full of potpourri; I found this at Joann and the ‘blessed’ was included and I just LOVE it soooo much, that I have been experimenting with making my own variations for other holidays and I’ll be sharing that in a future holiday series.  I added some large covered across and some twig balls to just jazz it up a little.

Bowls of seasonal items are perfect anywhere in the home, gather from the dollar store or big box stores; it won’t cost you much and you have a great piece of easy decor and the bowl is a $1 clearance find from a BBQ collection!

 

I put lots of fabric and glittered pumpkins to fill in spaces, these are great buys; use your 40% off coupon to gather big nets at a great price or pop by your local dollar store, you can spray paint them to match your color scheme, Mod Podge and dip in glitter; so many ways to personalize them!  The cones are from Joann and they have battery lights so they add a pop of twinkle.  The antler candle holders were another Joann find and I added (clearanced) log looking LED candles for a great finishing touch.  The bigger fabric pumpkin in the top picture was another lucky Joann find but you could sew your own, I found lots of patterns online if you are looking for a thrifty version.

As I mentioned yesterday, take your summer wreath and add a touch of gold with a spray or wax or even Nuvo Mousse; to add a touch of fall or pop your candle inside the wreath laying flat for a thrifty candle frame.

Next up, I want to talk about one of my favorite finds this year, something about it just makes me happy; it was a bit of a splurge.  I was impatient and didn’t wait for a coupon, it was a NEED for me, introducing my straw pumpkin;

Do you ever just find something that makes you happy every time you look at it? I have a few of those things and for me this is definitely one!

These wood slices are another great way to create thrifty versions of things you see at the high end stores.  The larger ones make great coasters, plus you could write place cards on them, so many options!! You can find the large ones here and these are the small ones.

No matter the time of year; garlands are a great way to hide cords; I use them at Christmas time everywhere and they don’t have to be pricey, this is string with tied strips of gingham fabric and burlap.

I also wanted to show you that all these ideas are not limited to a dining table; this is my hall table dressed with exactly the same items and I challenged myself for at least 10 different looks; take a look at the gallery below to see how I did, you can of course pin any image from the blog and just click each image to enlarge it and you can scroll through too. Plus look at that gorgeous glow.

I hope you are enjoying this series.  Tomorrow is the final day for this one, we will be looking at my gift wrapping and favor tips.  We can’t wit to share those with you.

We would love to know what your favorite tip is so far, so leave us a comment below to let us know; plus if you want to see more tips and ideas for future holidays you can let us know in the comments as well.

See you tomorrow!

Happy Stamping

Alexandra & The Prickle

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Get a head start on your Fall Holidays – Day 3: Center Pieces

Hi Hollowers!

I hope you are enjoying this series as much as we did creating it for you; today I have a number of different center piece ideas that can be changed up throughout the season as well as some fall specific ones that you can easily make with fall items already in your home.  In case you missed Day 1 and Day 2 we are giving you so ideas to help get a head start on Fall Holiday planning with table ideas, place settings, table gifts, center pieces, decor and more!  We have teamed up with our friends at Minted.com who offer 1000’s of different prints and 100’s of different items from table runners with matching place mats and napkins, to wall art, matching gift wrap & tags, and so much more.  Plus everything can be customized to your family, theme, color scheme and event.

I had originally found Minted.com when we were looking for someone to print our wedding invitations, I also needed some help with the design.  I did some internet research and had found good reviews plus I LOVED their style and designs.  This was way before the start of the Hollow so I shopped there just because I liked them, so I can 100% say I was a happy customer years before this collaboration.  Let’s look at a few of those center piece options:

This one is the first and probably my favorite; I found this lantern super cheap on clearance in Hobby Lobby, it had part of the rope handle broken but all it needed was some pliers to put it back on and since it was only going to be used in the home it was perfect, I wasn’t going to be moving it around too much.  These lanterns are really on trend at the moment and I think if you were to invest in one key piece this would be my pick.  You can fill it with whatever is seasonal, I full intend spraying some of the cobweb stuff on it for Halloween and then cleaning that off for the rest of fall.  I filled dit with some vintage looking fairy lights and stuffed pumpkins (plastic ones) inbetween;

That metallic one on the left is a Dollar Tree find they had 4 or 5 different colors and the fabric covered ones are from Joann; word to the wise, I chose non-LED lights which meant they got pretty hot after about 4 or 5 hours and those Dollar Tree pumpkins began to melt; I wish I had gone with LEDs and I will next time I empty it; my plan is to fill it with ornaments for Christmas and flowers in the spring; I think it is going to last me a very long time and I’ve lots of ideas to change it up so you can bet you’ll be seeing this one again!

On the top I added some more pumpkins, this time glitter ones you could make your own or I bought mine in Joann, some moss and twig balls from Joann which covered the cable from the lights, speaking of which, I used a super simple tied fabric garland to cover the cord on the back or even better buy battery powered lights (I will be next time!)

I keep walking past this lantern on my hall table and every time I see it I love it, here’s the full effect…

OK let’s look at some other centre piece options for you; because I could talk about the lantern all day!

This is another option for you, here I used some fall style cones that I will talk more about tomorrow and between them I added the antler candle holders I mentioned in yesterday’s post (my table runner and napkins from Minted.com also have antlers on); I actually had bought the napkins first and finding the candle holders was just good luck! I placed an LED candle into them which were in my favorite aisle…clearance! I used one of my Christmas wreaths to frame it, the color and texture on the candles matched the wreath perfectly; guess where I found the wreath after Christmas last year….yep clearance! It’s my favorite aisle and I urge you to browse those 70-80% aisles for gems, I have found so many as long as you don’t mind storing for the year, or maybe use some of the tips later in this post for using it season to season!

The pictures don’t show it so well but the wreath has a tinge of glitter on the edges and everything just popped amazingly together!

Next up is a Happy Thanksgiving sign I created for an upcoming PBS segment, I cut it using an electronic cutter, glitter and metallic vinyl from Styletech and put it on a pre-painted wooden sign from Michaels….you guessed it clearance!  I could create tables all day long, my Mum was an interior designer for a hotel and I just loved seeing the themes room to room and now I get to create and share with the whole world, I find that concept amazing!  We will be posting once we have the air dates but sometime in the fall and you can get all my top tips for creating these signs for your home.

Wreaths are just perfect for using as candle holders or to add some jazz to your table, this was a summer wreath from Joann and you can guess where I found it! I plan to add some gold Nuvo mousse to the edges of the flowers to really ‘fall it up’ but this is perfect to use in spring, summer and autumn; the sign it propped agains those same fall cones.

You don’t have to have a candle there, this is a pretty stuffing bowl I picked up on my travels and I popped some scented potpourri in there and I loved this one because of the wooden ‘blessing’.  You could totally create those yourself and change alongside the seasons and we will be teaching that in another episode for a future season.  I added a couple of Hedgehogs (of course) and an acorn decoration from Joann to complete the bowl, this is perfect because you could wash up the bowl and use on the table for your feast or remove the bowl and have room for your festivities and food.

I also took the original ideas and added the sign, perfect for an entryway or for a cocoa/food station or just as people arrive and then you can make room for your dishes.

Again re-using everything I have already shown you by stand the wreath in front of the lantern.  Plus did you notice the tea towel folded and hanging over, it’s just a nice finishing touch to make everything feel more luxurious, it of course can have a practical purpose to place hot dishes on too; this is a hedgehog one (what else?)!  It wasn’t pricey either, you could buy a Dollar Tree one and sew some pom pom trim on for a budget friendly version that would look just as luxurious!

In front there is a (clearance) plate from last year with some strategically placed hedgehogs, perfect for now because it looks great plus when the guests arrive I will pop the hedgehogs back around the table, (rinse) and then serve on the plate and there’s those burlap leaves again…BEST BUY EVER!

This metal bowl was 99 cents in my favorite Hobby Lobby aisle, it was in fact meant as a BBQ summertime piece but totally works through fall, I added those burlap leaves you got to see yesterday and a bunch of acorns, balls and pumpkins for the ultimate inexpensive center piece.

If you used the dollar tree pumpkins and cut your own burlap leaves or use ones from the garden you could make this for under $10 and the upmarket stores charge over $65 for pieces like this, I have been browsing around this week!!

I nearly forgot one last idea, my big straw pumpkin! This was one of those NEED to haves when I saw it in Joann and I just love it, I will be looking for them in the clearance aisle and keeping my fingers crossed!!

I hope this event is inspiring you in your own home decor and you are finding some tips and tricks; maybe it’s reminding you of things you already own that could be repurposed?  We would love to know your favorite tip so far in the comments section below.  Tomorrow we will be looking at general decor and extra table decorations.  I am going to use many of the same items to style my hall table so you can see how versatile key pie res are, and they really don’t have to cost a fortune; I will also share some of my favorite little pieces I’ve collected for decorating the rest of the table.

Can’t wait to see you again tomorrow!

Happy Stamping

Alexandra & The Prickle

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Get a head start on your Fall Holidays – Day 2: Placesettings

Hi Hollowers!

Today is day two in our series for this week.  Yesterday we showed a preview of this weeks theme and some of the elements we will be showing you.  You can catch up on that post, the whole weeks happenings and more, here.

Here’s a reminder of the whole table and how it all comes together;

I came up with two different place setting ideas; they both use many of the same elements; lots of the items are of course from Minted.com as I love how everything co-ordinates together; look at how pretty this all is…

First of all I want to show you the table runner and napkins that I order from Minted; they are in cream with antler’s one and it was fluke I found candle holders to match in Joann’s! 

They were a beautiful home decor weight cotton, they also have placemats and other items to co-ordinate; the gingham runner underneath is actually two thinner runners I picked up in a clearance sale and I put the two together and the antler one down the join, it added a great finishing touch.  The gingham ones were clearanced as they were from BBQ season, so be sure to check stores for those items, reds, grays and blacks will work perfectly for winter and fall too; and if they aren’t wide enough you can use the tick I used on this table.  In the first pricture above I opened the napkin pinched the centre and put it in the wine glass, in the picture below I folded a flap into the napkin (watch for a video on that in a future series) to put the cutlery in…

Before we get into the plated items I wanted to show you the wooden coasters and the place cards;

The cards come pre-scored and I chose to have them fulled printed and foiled.  Those flourishes around ‘The Smith Family’ are all foiled in gold (lots of other options available) and then the ‘Happy Thanksgiving -name-‘ I customized on their site for the whole family so I really can pull these out at Thanksgiving! Plus of course you could reuse them.  Think of what an easy and pretty touch these can add if like me you don’t have perfect handwriting to have them come printed.  You can also have them left black for you to complete with a name or message.  It’s completely customizable to your needs and occasion.  I put them on some wood slices I bought on Amazon, I have seen something similar in one of the high end stores but they were $18 each! I bought 5 of these for $18.50 here.  They are also the perfect size to pop a wine glass and place-card on:

Let’s take a look at one plating option; the first one contains the most details, all of which are from Minted and all of which match perfectly…

The chargers I bought in Hobby Lobby a while back, nothing pricey, they are in fact plastic so perfect for a big family gathering.  They have a rustic edge to them which not only looks great but dings over time don’t show either! As I mentioned the napkins are from Minted and I folded them to create a cutlery pouch. The larger thanksgiving cards are also from Minted and you can have the reverse customized with a message, religious verse, family news or simply with invite details.  I also chose to have them printed on pearlescent cardstock for a finishing touch of shimmer!  The smaller round wood slice ties the coasters element in really nicely and I bought some of the Minted gift stickers to match the gift wrap and tags.  I added ‘The Smith Family’ for a more personal touch; you can find those smaller wood slices for here; they are around $20 for 50 and you can use them for so many things.

The gift boxes I made with an American Crafts Punch board which you will see in Friday’s video and I gift wrapped them with the co-ordinating paper, also from Minted.  The ribbon and personalized tags are also from Minted but will will talk more about these on Friday.

Finally, I have those burlap leaves, they were I think 10 or 15 for a few dollars at a big box store, I’ve had them a while as I’ve been collecting items for the table but they proved huge bang for my buck.  One packet did 6 place settings and I just love the rustic burlap and how the leaf shape just adds to the warm fall feel.  You could also totally DIY these cutting out leaf shapes from Burlap which is really inexpensive and you could use a shapes or glue in the wire centre vein.

In the setting above you can see those leaves used as a coaster and another ticket under the small wooden slice, can you tell I was so excited that the most inexpensive item really made such a beautiful finish to everything?!

This is the second setting option, the wood slice is the same, also the napkin fold was the same; I used a solid ribbon from Minted rather than a stripe one, this one has a silky look and feel the other was more cotton-y.  I used a corduroy covered pumpkin I bought in a big net of similar type pumpkins in varying sizes from Joann (with my coupon of course!).  This time I stood up my slice and added a burlap leaf for my final fall element.  It’s a variation on a theme but I love showing a few different ideas.  Plus you may have some of these things anyway, you could spray paint pumpkins for previous years that have seen better days and give them new lease of live, or Mod-Podge them and cover with glitter for bling, or even cover them with fabric and use a glue gun to secure.  I also found some really nice metallic pumpkins at Dollar Tree which you’ll see later in the week.

Doesn’t that just look amazing down the table?  Tomorrow we are going to be talking centre pieces.  Including of course a few options but also some key pieces you can change up season to season and where to find the best buys! I can’t wait to share all that with you, don’t forget to check out Minted’s website, here.

Happy Stamping

Alexandra & The Prickle

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Get a head start on your holiday crafting with Minted.com

Hi Hollowers!

Hope you are all enjoying the end of summer.  In many places its back to school season; we have one more week but as school returns fall is definitely on my mind.  This week we are having a special event to help you get a head start on your fall holiday planning.

The lovely people over at Minted were as excited as us about this event and they let me choose some items from their store that will really make your holidays pretty and easy.  If you haven’t heard of Minted they are an online store who print custom invitations, cards, place settings and more.  They printed my wedding invitations a few years ago so when we were looking for someone to partner with Minted were top of the list as we have the best invitations in terms of design and quality.  They also have table runners, napkins and other soft furnishing items with prints designed by some leading designers as well as smaller ones.  It was a tough choice to narrow down what I wanted.  I also found they do tee-pees for little ones and beautiful artwork prints for the walls!

All other items this week are from Joann’s or American Crafts; two more companies we love!  Did you see us at the American Craft headquarters last month in Sal Lake City? You can see us hanging out after being exhausted from our shopping spree!!

We also live only a few minutes from Joann’s headquarters in Hudson, Ohio and last week we visited their new concept store in Columbus, look at this wall of paper!

We also have to say a big thank you to Silver Lake Country Club for letting us use their wonderful backdrop.  So let’s show you whats coming up; I am going to share a different element each day.  Here’s the table setting we will be creating…

of course you can chose one or all of the elements depending on your holiday needs, each element can be customized on the Minted site for your color scheme, event, time of year and more.  Check out their website here; make sure you have a cup of tea at the ready because you will just want to explore all the amazing designs.

As I mentioned we are having an all week event, so here’s what you can look forward to each day.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) – Place Settings, we will be looking at a couple of different place setting options; what elements I love to include and how to make everything play together.

Wednesday – Centre Pieces; I will show you how I created a few different elements on the table really inexpensively and how buying one key piece can be changed throughout the season to look so different or use the same piece for more that one season!

Thursday – Table Decoration; I will share my tips for finding inexpensive pieces for your fall table, all the wonderful things I used that match together perfectly and how you can use many of these elements elsewhere in your home.

Friday – Gift Wrapping Tips, I am sharing my favorite tips and tools for gift wrapping your table favors or small gifts.

I hope you will enjoy this series as much as we did making it for you! We’d love you to leave us a comment with your favorite holiday to decorate for and of course ask us any questions you might have about table decor and we will try to answer those over the week.  Thanks so much for stopping by today, I am going to share a few photos of the table we will be sharing tips for this week and of course, we hope to see you tomorrow!

We can’t wait to share with you all this week!

Happy Stamping

Alexandra & The Prickle

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