We made a trip to IKEA on December 1st to go shopping for our guest room we are decorating. I can't even tell you how much I love this place and how excited I get no matter how many times I go!

Our little town had a Holiday Festival this year! We only have a population of 490 people so this was actually one of the most impressive floats during the parade.

Gifts wrapped and placed under the Christmas tree... so cheery!

Target has the cutest Christmas candles EVER!

Pretty gold washi tape. Perfect for Christmas crafting!

My gorgeous front door wreath. In love with the bright red on white!

Merry Christmas, Simba!

Peppermint Blizzard from Dairy Queen = AMAZING!

My mom decorated their beagle dog's house to resemble Snoopy's. I had to document the cuteness!

Everyone together at Christmas. So glad this happened!

Visited downtown Lynchburg, Virginia with my mom and brother who goes to Liberty University. I so want to move to this place now.

My favorite brother. Hehehe!

Driving back to Indiana through West Virginia. It was so beautiful with all the snow!

Merry Christmas!

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I hope you all have a beautiful Christmas wherever you may be! Enjoy the yummy food, have fun, and most of all treasure the time you will get to spend with your families!

Christmas Time!

We celebrated the first of our four Christmases this past weekend. It was off to Kentucky to celebrate with my Mom's side of the family and it was all I expected it to be! This is a very easily excited group. There were lots of oohs, ahs, and squeals and I loved every second of it! If I had to pick a favorite photo from the bunch it would be the cousins shot. We were missing a few of the original Doyle cousins, but we have added a few more due to marriages (and one almost marriage). That's a hint directed at David to hurry up make it official with Stephanie. Anyhow! I love the cousins shot because it's so natural and I love that I am so clueless that they are making reindeer antlers behind my head! LOL. I'm just posing away! So great. I love these people!

Things I'm Loving Thursday : Peppermint

No doubt one of the things I look forward to at this time of year is Peppermint. It's probably my most favorite flavor ever. This year I am dying over the millions of recipes you can find on Pinterest with Peppermint in them! My mouth is watering just thinking about it. It's really too hard to choose, but here are some that I am putting at the top of my "must make" list this year.

Peppermint Oreo Fudge 

Peppermint Kiss Sugar Cookies 

        Peppermint Bark



Peppermint Ice Cream



Peppermint Brownie Cookies



Peppermint Crunch Cookies



 Peppermint Hot Chocolate



Peppermint Red Velvet Crinkle Cookies



DIY Twine Wrapped Christmas Trees

Happy Wednesday, everyone! Today I want to share with you how to create Twine Wrapped Christmas Trees. This is a super easy and affordable Christmas craft that you all must try! So let's get on with it, shall we?!

You will need Baker's Twine or yarn (either one will do), cardboard or cardstock, and a hot glue gun. I used Baker's Twine since it's what I had on hand and I used empty cereal boxes and Kraft paper cardstock to make my trees.

First you need to roll your cardboard or cardstock into cone like tree shapes. Use the hot glue gun to hold them together. I cut my cardstock into different sizes so I could get a variety of tree heights. They don't need to look good on the outside since you'll be covering them. Just make sure the shape is what you want.

Next start wrapping your twine or yarn around the bottom of the tree. Use the hot glue gun every so often as needed to secure it. I did a dot of glue about every 1/4 inches. Don't worry about getting every little spot covered on the way up the tree. 

Once you get to the top start working your way back down and fill in the empty spaces as you go. Once you get back to the base of the tree make sure you do a couple more dots of hot glue to secure the bottom strands. 

And that's it! This is something that you can do even if you think you aren't crafty. What's even better is that this could be used longer than just during the Christmas season. Make your trees in white, silver, and blues and display them all winter long!

A Saturday Afternoon Date

I got to go on a date with the husband this weekend! Fun, right?! Yes, I know that we do EVERYTHING together, but it's still fun to do something different that we wouldn't normally do. I call those occasions a date.

So on Saturday afternoon we drove to the Exotic Feline Rescue Center which is located about 30 minutes from our house. This rescue center is one of only a few of it's kind in the entire United States. We are pretty lucky to have one so close to us, but for some reason neither of us had ever visited before this weekend! I'm so glad we finally went. We learned so much about the lions, tigers, cougars, and other exotic cats there and it was just an overall amazing experience. It's astonishing to hear of all the cats that have been rescued from the most horrible situations. I'm so happy that there is an organization like this out there. If you are located in the South/Central Indiana area, I highly recommend taking a tour. It's kid friendly, but also extremely informative.

Here are some of my favorite shots from our visit. A lot of these aren't even zoomed in... we were so close!

Things I'm Loving Thursday : DIY Handmade Christmas Gifts

This week's Things I'm Loving Thursday is all about some of my favorite handmade Christmas gifts. They are easy, affordable, and I would personally love to receive each and every one of them! Which one is YOUR favorite?

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