I'm Guest Hosting at The Scoop Link Party!

Hi everyone!  I'm a guest host at "The Scoop" link party this week!  Here are all the details: 

Welcome back to The Scoop

The weekly linky party featuring the scoop on the

best posts from around the web!

More exposure + less time = win win! 

 We are 

Anita from Cedar Hill Farmhouse

 Debbie from Confessions of a Plate Addict

and Barb from The Everyday Home 

Yvonne from Stone Gable ...

 Suzy from Worthing Court 

Our host this week is Yvonne at StoneGable.

Hi Everyone! Hope you are decking your halls and Fa-la-la-ing as you work like busy little elves to get ready for Christmas... and in all the frenzy I hope you stop and take time to remember the reason for the season!

This week at StoneGable I'll be putting final touches on all things Christmas and setting my Christmas Brunch table and filling up the coffee bar... I want to be ready for my very favorite day of the year... Christmas EVE!!!

I love the calm of that morning and the bustle of family coming home in the afternoon and going to a candlelit service in the evening, and giving all the kids (who are way too grown up, but oh well) their night-before-Christmas-pajamas under the lit tree and staying up late to watch It's A Wonderful Life with my hubby, Bobby!  Yes, Christmas Eve has been my favorite day of the year for decades!

Make sure you stop by StoneGable this week for all the fun Christmas posts!

Here's what you can expect this week at StoneGable...

I'm so thrilled to introduce our guest host this week... the talented Kristen from

SOPHIA'S DECOR

Kristen has a beautiful blog, filled with gorgeous images and lots and lots of creative and brilliant ideas.

SOPHIA'S DECOR is loaded with ways to live and create beautifully without spending a fortune... it only looks like she did! I have been following SOPHIA'S DECOR since it started and I always leave so inspired! I hope you will too!

Now let's meet Kristen...

Hi everyone!  I'm Kristen from Sophia's Decor and I'm so excited to be here guest hosting "The Scoop" this week!
    

I'm a farm girl from Washington State and now a mother to three girls.  I started re-habbing/painting furniture and selling my creations and vintage goods at local shows about seven years ago, but began blogging about two years ago after relocating to North Carolina.  I blog about decorating on a budget as well as sharing furniture painting tips to jewelry-making.  I'd love to have you stop by and say "hello"! It's getting closer to Christmas and if you are still looking for decorating or baking ideas, there is so much inspiration and talent out there.  

I can honestly say that it was very difficult to pick 5-6 favorites from hundreds of great ideas and beautiful projects from last week!  I hope that you find inspiration from some of these features that caught my eye.  

First up, take a look at Mallori's Christmas Home Tour from Vintage Finds. I love the fresh greenery and classy look that she's added to her home for the holidays.

Next up, these adorable Gingerbread Cookie Trees from Maria at Shopgirl make me want to get baking!  What a creative way to use a set of stacking star cookie cutters!

Need an idea for a small gift for co-workers, teachers, or friends?  Shannah from Just us Four shared her recipe for Scents of the Season made from various dried fruits, etc that can be packaged up for the perfect little gift.  I can almost smell it through the computer screen...

Leslie at Gwen Moss shared her beautiful "White Christmas with Red Accents" and it is stunning!  I love her attention to detail and all the little touches she incorporated into decorating her dining room for Christmas.  She has a beautiful blog and I plan to spend some more time exploring it!

Another Christmas home tour that knocked my socks off was from Doreen at Hymns and Verses...  Every room (from her kitchen to her porch) is perfection!  Make sure you visit this one...

Lastly, Mary from Home is Where the Boat is has the most wonderful potting shed that she decorates for the seasons.  Check out how she "Decked the Halls" of her potting shed this year...beautiful!

It's been fun being part of "The Scoop" this week!  It's been an honor to select features from such talent!

Thanks so much for hosting with us this week, Kristen!

Please read the guidelines before participating:

• Follow and/or subscribe to your host blog.
• Be sure to include THE SCOOP button or text link to in your linked post...mandatory to be featured!
• By linking up you are agreeing that the photos are yours or that you have permission to use them, that we may use those photos to feature your project on a blog post, Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter with a link back to your blog, of course.
• Please go to the source of a photo to pin it to Pinterest so that the originator of the post gets the credit.

This post was written by Kristen from Sophia's Decor. If you are reading this post from any other method other than email or reader subscription, it is not from the author.
Copyright (2009-2013) Kristen from Sophia's Decor @ sophiasdecor.blogspot.com

Woodland Christmas in the Dining Room

Have you ever been inspired to decorate a room from a scrap of fabric, piece of artwork, or even a pillow? Sometimes I find something out shopping or through my travels that sets of a chain reaction of decorating and in the case of decorating my newly-painted dining room for the holidays, a simple decorative towel inspired a "Woodland Christmas" feel...

Yes, it all started back in late October when I visited the Country Living Fair  and found this woodland-inspired decorative towel in one of the booths.  It caught my eye because I had already painted the dining room and picked out the tree fabric for the curtains and I thought the towel could be made into a pillow for my dining bench...

One evening after the Fair, I was finally able to check out a Pottery Barn Outlet and these just had to come home with me...

These cute stag salt and pepper shakers along with the butter dish (below) were great deals and went perfect with the towel pillow so I've had the Christmas theme for this room figured out now for a while...

The rest of it has just been filling out all of the details...  I mentioned when I revealed the dining room for Fall, that I would be changing the artwork out seasonally with botanical poster prints that are copyright free and inexpensive to print out at Costco ($8).  For winter, I picked out a couple of images with pretty evergreens...

I also had a pair of grapevine wreaths hung inside the chunky frame before, but swapped them out with an antique German roe deer antler mount that I bought in High Point and attached them to a large slice of basswood.

When it came to decorating the table, I knew that I wanted to mix some more silver elements into the tablescape to tie in the new salt and pepper shakers and butter dish so I simply filled my antique trophy cups with potted cypress and white roses (also from Costco) mixed with greenery...

I then simply layered an inexpensive green and white houndstooth table runner from Target with birch logs, pinecones, and glittery Christmas picks (all from Michael's)...

 I also tucked in bright green reindeer moss, candles, birch orbs, and a few acorn ornaments (from Hobby Lobby).  The antler is a shed found in the woods in N. Idaho before we moved to NC.  Yes, deer, elk, moose, etc shed and regrow their antlers naturally almost every year.

I was hoping to get some wood-slab chargers to go under the plates this year, but I used these round moss mats on top of some placemats I already owned...

The dining room is definitely feeling "woodsy" now and in many ways reminds me of home back in the Northwest where lodge-decor is a mainstay...  All we need is Christmas dinner!

I've joining up with 29 other talented bloggers sharing Christmas in our homes in a "12 days of Christmas Tour"!  Make sure you check out some of the beautiful home tours on the schedule below... Lots of inspiration...

Monday DEC 2nd-
FIRST HOME LOVE LIFE
DIO HOME IMPROVEMENTS
Tuesday DEC 3rd-
AT HOME WITH THE BARKERS
RESTORING OUR 1890 VICTORIAN
Wednesday DEC 4th-
FRESH IDEA STUDIO
THE GOLDEN SYCAMORE
HOUSE ON THE WAY
Thursday DEC 5th-
CURB ALERT
PETTICOAT JUNKTION
Friday DEC 6th-
ARTSY CHICKS RULE
RAPPSODY IN ROOMS
Saturday DEC 7th-
SIMPLY FRESH VINTAGE
COUNTRY DESIGN STYLE
Sunday DEC 8th-
MRS HINES CLASS
SNAZZY LITTLE THINGS
Monday DEC 9th-
JUST PAINT IT
THE RUSTIC PIG
JUST A GIRL AND HER BLOG
Tuesday DEC 10th-
OUR SOUTHERN HOME
VIRGINIA SWEET PEA
MEEGAN MAKES
Wednesday DEC 11th-
SOPHIAS DECOR 
A LITTLE CLAIREIFICATION
GIRL IN THE GARAGE
Thursday DEC 12th -
MOMMY IS COOCOO
LITTLE MISS CELEBRATION
INSPIRATION FOR MOMS
Friday DEC 13th-
MY SOULFUL HOME
CONFESSIONS OF A SERIAL DIYer
LILACS AND LONGHORNS

Linking up to:

The Scoop - Stone Gable

Home Stories A to Z
Savvy Southern Style

This post was written by Kristen from Sophia's Decor. If you are reading this post from any other method other than email or reader subscription, it is not from the author.
Copyright (2009-2013) Kristen from Sophia's Decor @ sophiasdecor.blogspot.com

The Scoop On Creating a Handmade Christmas - Embellishing Christmas Gifts

Ever since I was a little girl, I can remember looking forward to wrapping the presents I would get for my family members.  It was so fun to get ribbon, bows, and tags and make the gifts look pretty.  I can even recall a time (long before I could ever purchase anything) when I wrapped some tinsel and an evergreen branch up in a little box for one of my older brother's Christmas presents!  I'm sure he was thrilled to receive that :)

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This post was written by Kristen from Sophia's Decor. If you are reading this post from any other method other than email or reader subscription, it is not from the author.
Copyright (2009-2013) Kristen from Sophia's Decor @ sophiasdecor.blogspot.com

Christmas in the Living Room

What a whirlwind last few days of decorating it has been!  I held off until after Thanksgiving to start decorating for Christmas, but that meant getting all the decorating done quickly.  It didn't help that I needed to paint all the walls before I could start decorating either!

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This post was written by Kristen from Sophia's Decor. If you are reading this post from any other method other than email or reader subscription, it is not from the author.
Copyright (2009-2013) Kristen from Sophia's Decor @ sophiasdecor.blogspot.com

Decorating with Natural Elements...Highlights of Christmas Pasts

Christmas Living Room 2012

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  I've held off decorating for Christmas until this weekend so I'm knee-deep in ornaments and greenery right now, but I wanted to share some Christmas highlights from the past couple of years from my previous home in case you are also decorating this weekend and would like a bit of inspiration...
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This post was written by Kristen from Sophia's Decor. If you are reading this post from any other method other than email or reader subscription, it is not from the author.
Copyright (2009-2013) Kristen from Sophia's Decor @ sophiasdecor.blogspot.com

A Few of Our Favorite Things - Furniture, DIY and Paint Supplies Giveaway!

I'm excited to announce that some of my favorite furniture re-finishing and DIY blogger friends and I have teamed up to share our favorite supplies that we've tested and approved over the countless projects we've worked on over the years and we're giving them away!  

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This post was written by Kristen from Sophia's Decor. If you are reading this post from any other method other than email or reader subscription, it is not from the author.
Copyright (2009-2013) Kristen from Sophia's Decor @ sophiasdecor.blogspot.com

Updating Mirrors with Chalk Paint

Do you ever run across those ornate, gold mirrors at thrift stores, flea markets, auctions, etc and wonder how you can change them up a bit?  I find these all the time and they've almost become staples in the booths and shows where I sell from because they are simple to update...
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This post was written by Kristen from Sophia's Decor. If you are reading this post from any other method other than email or reader subscription, it is not from the author.
Copyright (2009-2013) Kristen from Sophia's Decor @ sophiasdecor.blogspot.com