More Christmas decor and the machine that will change my crafting life.

I was not quite done with my Christmas decorating until now.  I had a few areas to finish and I will show you what I have been doing...

I am always a bit stumped on what to do with the half wall behind the couch in the living room.  I had this partial pallet in the garage and knew I could do something with it.  So started but hanging it up on the wall.

Then it was time to embellish it.  I have been drooling over DIY JOY signs in Pinterest lately and I knew I wanted to make my own.  It was more difficult than I thought it would be to find the right letters but here is what I came up with...

I honestly cannot get the "dwell" off the wall, may need to paint over it at some point.  Also, these pics are crooked and I am too lazy to adjust them so you are just going to have to deal.  #bloggingnono

I found the J and Y at Michaels and spray painted them red.  I got the pom pom garland in the $3 bin at Target.   I had the wreath and lace trim laying around.  I lighted the wreath with a strand of the Phillips Dew Drop lights (which I cannot find in any of the Targets around here anymore unless you want the multicolored variety.  I already own 8 strands and it is not enough.  People are eating these up.  The secret it out!).

I added a little holiday cheer to the bedrooms in the form of mini tinsel trees and dew drop lights.  But I decided to add a bit more to the master bedroom.

I literally can't stop hanging things from these deer heads.  They are the perfect holders for banners.

I went with gold and green in here, kept it neutral.  I didn't take a pic of the tree on my dresser but it is gold as well.

 I finally hung those windows up on the wall.  I saw them on my way to work one morning on the side of the road.  Felt like I won the lottery:)

Here is the view from the hallway.  I had big plans to change out this light fixture since the day we moved in 10 years ago.  Clearly, that has not happened but I did remove the glass fixtures around the lights and hot glued the shade on there.  I expected it to stay up for a week, tops, until I could get to the hardware store and get the proper screws to keep it up there, but a year later, it is still holding strong (and I still have not gotten the proper hardware for it).

Finally, I have been doing some online christmas shopping (for myself) recently.  I have been eyeing up a Silhouette cutting machine for years now.  There was a black friday sale for 50% off the machines and I decided it was time to get one.  I could not pull the trigger on the more expensive, larger machine so I settled for the Silhouette Portrait machine after reading some reviews and doing some research.  It arrived yesterday.

Cue the chorus...

I set that baby right up.  I didn't have any of the fancy vinyl that Silhouette sells yet so I just used some black contact paper I have and made my first project...

Some antlers I stuck onto a mirror.  You guys, watch out.  The possibilities are endless with this machine and can barely even contain my excitement!  Probably going to start a whole blog series for Silhouette project, stay tuned.