Simple & Natural Thanksgiving Table

I mentioned before that we are hosting Thanksgiving again this year. Our dining room table is a little tight with eight people, but it is cozy and I love eating in the dining room (because we never do so otherwise)!  Besides the bouquet, I already had everything on hand, so this table came together quickly!

The placemats are pieces of cut kraft paper. I purchased several rolls of this paper at Dollar Tree last year, and am using it again this year!  The silver chargers are also from Dollar Tree, but you can get these almost anywhere for cheap.

In the center of the table, I placed a piece of scrap wood from our recent hardwood install. It was already stained and was the perfect size, I just added some gold craft paint to the sides to glam it up a bit. I like how it adds a little height in the center of the table.

The gold candlesticks are from an antique store, and the striped candles are from Homegoods (from last year). I added some mercury glass candle holders (from Michael's) and a few pears to finish it off. The autumn bouquet is from Trader Joe's.

I used paper napkins, accordion folded them, and tied them up with twine. The place cards were an easy DIY watercolor project.

Super simple and natural, and I love the mix of silver and gold. There is still plenty of time to throw together a festive looking table!  Happy Thanksgiving, friends!

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Watercolor & Pinecone Place Cards

We are hosting Steve's family for Thanksgiving again this year, so I starting working on the table setting yesterday. I decided to use all items that I already had on hand and as usual, wanted to keep it super simple. I will show you the finished table on Monday, but for now, I wanted to show you how I made place cards using pinecones and watercolors.

I am using paper napkins in orange, pink, and gold. I decided pinecones were an easy choice to use again this year, and added some watercolor name cards to bring out the napkin colors. I used watercolor paper and paints and used simple brush strokes to create the cards. The names are written with a gold paint pen.

This took about 5 minutes and I love the look of the watercolors. I accordion folded the napkins and tied them up with a little piece of twine.  

This is about as simple as it gets!  Now I need to get moving on grocery shopping and cleaning!  Have a wonderful weekend!  xo

Linking up with: http://betweennapsontheporch.net, http://www.keepingitsimplecrafts.com, http://www.skiptomylou.org, http://thededicatedhouse.blogspot.com, http://homecomingmn.blogspot.com, http://www.notjustahousewife.net, http://www.homestoriesatoz.com, http://somedaycrafts.blogspot.com, http://www.savvysouthernstyle.net, http://thediydreamer.com, http://diybydesign.blogspot.com, http://www.reasonstoskipthehousework.com, http://www.craftionary.net, http://whipperberry.com, http://frenchcountrycottage.blogspot.com, http://shabbynest.blogspot.com, http://www.504main.com, http://www.itsoverflowing.com, http://diyshowoff.com, http://www.bystephanielynn.com, http://housebyhoff.blogspot.com

Easy DIY Shelving

I mentioned recently that we have done some rearranging of how rooms function in our home. A friend of mine inquired about the shelves we had up in the old toy room. I realized I never blogged about the shelves we installed soon after moving in. This shelving system is from Home Depot and they were easy to install, inexpensive, and worked very well in our space.

We had two sets, side by side, along a large wall of our toy room. We used the shelves for bins and smaller toys to get them up off the ground. The higher shelves displayed some of Drew's lego creations and are great for board game storage.

Having vertical storage was a huge space/floor saver! The shelves are already white, and you can customize with different sizes to fit your needs. These are not hard to install, but you must make sure everything is level so you don't have leaning shelves!

I would highly recommend these if you need any extra storage in an office, desk space (they have larger pieces that could serve as a homework station), toy room, closet, etc. See below how Duo Ventures has made these shelves look super clean, chic, and organized!

Duo Ventures

We are currently trying to figure out where these shelves can best be utilized now that they are out of the toy room. Maybe in the new office space downstairs or extra closet storage? I will keep you posted!

Cotton Candy Cones (Party Favors)

Kate turns five next week, and we celebrated this past weekend with a roller skating party! The party pretty much ran itself (the best kind), and the only things I really had to do were make cupcakes and assemble some party favors. I decided to give out these cotton candy cones at the end of the party. Let's be honest, kids just want the sugar!