I'm over on the Heidi Swapp blog today with a look at how I'm adding a little touch of the season to our dining table...


...using just a few pieces from the brand new Heidi Swapp Instax Vintage Collection - found exclusively at Michaels.

Thank you so much for stopping by!

xo

I love Thanksgiving...

I think it's my favorite holiday next to Christmas.

I especially love setting the table each year...I love to try something new each year...and I especially love to use non-traditional colors in my decor.

This year I'm using something a little different to create my place settings...here's what I'm starting with...


The brand new Heidi Swapp Instax Card Kit and a number of pieces from Heidi's new sticker collection (both available now at Michaels Stores).

And here's what I've created...


Personalized place settings for each of our Thanksgiving guests!

I started by asking each of our guests to send me photos of themselves...then I printed them out using the FANTASTIC Instax Printer (also available at Michaels) and placed them inside the little cards that come in the kit.

But instead of then folding the cards up and putting them into their adorable little envelopes, I folded the cards backwards and turned them into these little tented frames.



I decorated each one with a few pieces from the Sticker Collection and added a little monogram so that each of our guests would know where to sit...


A piece or two of washi tape (also from the sticker collection) helps to keep the photos in place...

You guys know I love to decorate...I mean,  I really truly love to decorate. So when I received my assignment for the Heidi Swapp Media Team this week (to create a tablescape/tablesettings) I was completely over the moon!  And, with Thanksgiving so close (!!!), there was no better time to get this project.

As I mentioned in my last post (on Heidi's blog), I host Thanksgiving each year...so now I'm one step ahead of the game! woo hoo! Let me show what my dining room looked like before I started my table...this is pretty much how it has looked for the past week or so since I put all of the Halloween decorations away...


Yeah. Sooooo boring. I know. I have found in the past few years that my style has gravitated toward a really neutral pallette...I decorate with mainly browns, blacks, cremes & whites...then I add a few punches of color here and there.

This way of decorating really allows me to change things up easily & quickly. And I don't have to spend tons of money to get completely different looks in my home.

My Thanksgiving decor is really no different...I've stuck with a table rich in white and browns...with just a tiny pop of green...oh! and some Heidi Swapp digitals...(smile)...


The main wall in the dining room has been empty since I repainted...so I hung up some grapevine wreaths, just so the space didn't look entirely empty...


I really believe that a simple color scheme/layout/style can pack such a punch. And for this big day, the food is the main attraction. So I didn't want to go overboard with my decor...


I added some dark green chargers to the table first...to ground the white plates to the white tablecloth...


Then I spraypainted some pumpkins that I had in a floral arrangement and added them to the table...


I picked up some grain sack towels from Ikea ($.99 each!!!) to use as napkins. They have red stripes down the side, but no worries, I just folded them so that the stripes were covered. Then I simply tied the napkins with a length of jute and tucked a pheasant feather into them...a little faux pear completes the setting...almost...

 
I know in my last post on Heidi's blog I mentioned that I will be making muffins for all of my guests to take home after dinner...but when I saw Heidi create a little notebook on her last Memory Files Live show last week, I decided I needed to do that, too. I have been keeping a gratitude journal ever since my fellow Media Team member, and friend, Jamie Pate, mentioned that she kept one. I think this an amazing idea...and what better time to remember how grateful we are for all that we have?

So I created a tiny little journal for each of my guests to keep. As I've said a million times before, I love texture...so I decided to use Heidi's Gratitude digital files and some little canvas scraps to make these notebooks extra texturized (it's a word...don't judge). Here's all you do to get those amazing quotes onto the fabric...(and if you've ever done any sort of project around your house, you probably have all of these items on hand):

 

 *Take a remnant piece of canvas/linen (or any non-printed fabric you have...preferably not too heavy-weight) and spray the back with repositionable craft adhesive. BUT, before you spray it, make sure it's ironed well...

 *Then take a piece of computer paper and lie it down onto the sticky side of the fabric. Press it down so that it sticks well and so that the fabric won't move.

 

 *Wait for this new fabric/paper combo to dry (I waited about 1/2 hour...I had some laundry to fold). *Take your paper cutter, or scissors, or whatever you have that gives you a nice clean cut and cut the extra fabric from around the computer paper. You should have an 8/5x11 piece of fabric/paper left.



  *Open the graphics you would like to use (Heidi's graphics are PERFECT!) in a photo-editing program and resize them to fit your paper... then... *Pop the combo into your printer (fabric side up...or however you need to to get the printing on the fabric side) and voila...!

 

 Now, I was scared at first about putting fabric into my printer...but seriously, it was completely stuck to the paper and the fabric is thin enough that the combo made a piece of "paper" that was not much thicker than Bazzill cardstock. No problems at all!

One tip: make sure the design you are printing out is not too lightly colored (unless you're printing on white). I had to re-do mine a couple of times to make sure I got the look I wanted...the dark grey I wanted kept coming out too light.

I cut the graphics down to fit the front of my notebooks (3"x4") and simply sewed the fabric to the covers (I used Heidi's Vintage Chic Textbook and Bookkeeping papers)...easy peasy!  Then I just cut down some loose leaf paper for the inside pages...again, simple with big impact.



Don't you just love how the quotes look on the canvas? It's like they just belong there...


 
I really love these darling little notebooks...and I'm sure they will be come a crafting staple for me...


And I think they look absolutely darling on the place settings...they are the perfect little simple touch...don't you think?