Lemon Thistle - Rad DIY and design for 'the rest of us'

Dec 05

Simple Activity Advent

Dec 05

This simple activity advent is a fun alternative to the traditional advent calendar. It’s simple to pull together year after year thanks to photos printed as postcards.

Simple activity advent calendar idea- photo garland

Every year we put together an activity advent calendar for the kids where each day we get to do an activity together instead of just eat chocolate together. Although we do like chocolate ;)

I’ve shared about this tradition on the blog before- one year I even put together a printable list of ideas of activities to put on your list. They’re not extravagant, but they help to make the busy holiday season more intentional. Things like, ‘play in the snow’ or ‘hot cocoa by the Christmas tree’ or ‘read a holiday book’.

Simple activity advent calendar idea- I love how it's not dated! And the photos are so nostalgic

The one thing that I’ve found a challenge is knowing what each day will hold when I select the activity. I’ve tried not writing the activity on the card until the night before but this year- I’m excited to put that decision on the day of with this years activity advent!

Dec 04

Christmas Home Tour

Dec 04

Welcome to my christmas home tour! I’m sharing my living space, kitchen, dining, and entry decked out for the holidays. Full of family friendly decorations, neutral colours and lots of greenery.

Holiday home tour full of cozy christmas neutrals

Today I’m excited to be joining up with some incredible bloggers to share our homes all decked out for the holidays as part of the Seasonal Simplicity series! If you’re doing the tour in order and stopping by from Cassie Bustamante, welcome!

My Christmas home tour is of our main living space- living room, dining room, and kitchen. You can see our boys bedroom all decked out right here and Aubreys bedroom from last year (almost identical) right here. And the only thing I would show in our bedroom is this guy right here. Because he’s so pretty. And I need to finish trim in the rest of the room. Ha!

Garland above a bay window for christmas decorations

Our home is full of neutrals and I love it that way. When Christmas comes around- I decorate much of the same way. Lots of fresh greenery and neutral decor pieces. We do have a little bit of red in the entry and the boys room- but there’s not much.

Dec 03

How to Use a Barn Door Extender

Dec 03

What is a barn door extender and how do you use one? I’m sharing how we used one with step by step photos.

how to use a barn door extender (and why you would need to)

This is one of those tutorials that feels like it doesn’t need to be a tutorial. But I spent a good chunk of time searching the internet for some simple instructions when I was planning my office build and couldn’t find a straight answer… so now that I know, I thought I’d write that for anyone else looking. If you want to see more photos of the office build and how we put a DIY barn door over those built in shelves, you can find the full reveal here!

This post is part of our office makeover which was sponsored by The Home Depot Canada.

How to use a barn door extender for an extra large barn door

What is a barn door extender?

Dec 02

Boys Nordic Christmas Decor

Dec 02

Sharing the boys bedroom all decked out for the holidays! With kid friendly nordic Christmas decor, this room is ready for the season.

Adding christmas decorations to kids bedrooms

Last year, after making over Aubrey’s bedroom for the One Room Challenge, we decorated her new room for Christmas. It was magical and she slept by the tree lights every night. This year, we made over the boys’ shared bedroom for the spring One Room Challenge so it was their turn to get a Christmas tree and some decorations of their own to put up year after year.

It just so coincided with Calder’s big kid bed arriving so this weekend when the kids went for a grandparent sleepover, we put this nordic christmas decor together for them to come home to. I’m SO in love with how it came out and they have been showing it off to anyone that comes through our door since.

Small Christmas tree with paper snowflakes

Today I’m excited to be sharing all the holiday decor touches we’ve added to this room along with some other amazingly talented bloggers for a Kids Christmas Tour- if you’re joining in from C.R.A.F.T. blog, welcome! You can see all their spaces linked at the bottom of this post.

Nov 30

Add Colour to Your Christmas Tree

Nov 30

I’m sharing how we change up our Christmas tree colours easily and affordably- only using one box of coloured ornaments!

1 Christmas tree 4 ways- how I add colour in to my tree!

When I shared my frosted whites Christmas tree earlier this week, I mentioned I would be adding a colour in here. So today I’m excited to be sharing not just one colour option to change up the feel of this frosted whites tree but three! I’m joining in with my friend Christina from The DIY Mommy on her YouTube challenge, ‘2019 Christmas DIY and Decor Challenge’ to share a Decorate with me style video. I go from decorating the tree from scratch to changing the frosted whites tree to have a different colour theme easily… and without purchasing loads of new ornaments every year!

Growing up, I had a friend that had extravagant and gorgeous themed trees every year. They would deck it out in a different theme and start the planning in September. They were beautiful, but when I started buying ornaments of my own after Shane and I got married, I realized we wouldn’t be changing it up too much each year… because it wasn’t affordable! So I wanted to make sure I kept it attainable when I was changing up the colours on this one- just one shoebox of ornaments to change the whole feel of the tree.

We love the rustic but sparkly white tree as is- but adding in a little bit of colour changes it up from what we’ve had the past few years. Three years ago, this was pretty much how it looked (see that here! It was the best I’ve ever done this ribbon!) and last year I didn’t take any daylight photos I realized… because we were in major renovations but I added in some rose gold ornaments and this year? We’re adding in gold and green.

So the four different options you’ll see here are this frosted white Christmas tree, rose gold + burgundy, gold + green, and lastly a woodlands red. All of them except one have NO glass ornaments… because kids break things. Guess which one has glass? The one we chose this year! Why? That’s a great question. We’ll see how it goes. It’s been almost a week and no breaks so far, so wish me luck ;)

Nov 30

Basement Office Reveal!

Nov 30

A basement office reveal full of bright white, warm wood elements, Scandinavian style and tons of creative storage solutions for craft supplies (with DIY tutorials!).

It’s that day, friends! The FULL reveal of my basement office and studio! If you missed it yesterday, I shared the studio side of this basement office and today… the rest! This project has been such a labour of love, making over this basement storage room into the office of my dreams, Honestly… photos of this side just don’t do it justice. Let me just tell you… it’s a total dream in here.

DIY Blogger Office Reveal... tons of pretty storage!

Before we get to the details… should we remind ourselves what this space looked like before?

Simple Activity Advent

Christmas Home Tour

How to Use a Barn Door Extender

What is a barn door extender?

Boys Nordic Christmas Decor

Add Colour to Your Christmas Tree

Basement Office Reveal!

I’m Instagrammin’ it Up

colleenpastoor

Subscribed?

Pin With Me