DIY Autumn Projects & Decorations
A round-up of Fall decorating ideas, Halloween costumes, and the best tips for hygge sleeping
It was in the 30s when we woke up this morning, and it was HARD for us to get out of bed. The house was cold, the duvet covers were warm, and none of us wanted to get up and get moving. But we did!
Despite our chilly mornings, I absolutely love fall. It is cool, crisp, and perfect here in Colorado — with the possibility for snow later this week! Eek!
I am deep into the One Room Challenge, but it is also time to decorate for Fall and Halloween and all things pumpkin! I don’t do pumpkins until October — I like to use real ones, and I want them to last until Thanksgiving, so we wait until mid-October to bring on the fall decor.
If you are still making that seasonal transition like we are, I have a few projects and ideas to help you along as well as some amazingly easy DIY Halloween costumes. I rounded it all up for you here as an easy reference!
Cozy, Hygge Beds for Fall
First, up: sleeping. This weekend I changed out our duvets from the lighter summer-weight duvets to our warmer, cozier duvets for winter. I’ll be washing those lighter ones and stowing them away this week. Why are we so cozy at night? Because we sleep Scandinavian-style. This is one of the best things I learned in my travels. Sleeping without a top sheet and blankets, cozied up in a duvet cover is the definition of hygge — and it means better sleep for all of us. Read on for more about why!
Autumn Decorations
I am pretty practical when it comes to seasonal decor — especially fall and Halloween. We don’t do scary Halloween, first of all. We do cute. And I don’t want to decorate for Halloween and then less than a month later turn it all around for Thanksgiving. So I rely on the same colors, themes, and ideas for both Halloween and Thanksgiving. Lots of pumpkins and gourds. Natural elements. Candles. Then I switch out just a few things — a table runner, jack-o-lanterns, and whatever we make to hang on the branch chandelier. Here’s an easy DIY bunting that will take your home from September through Thanksgiving. And here are some details about how to create your own branch chandelier, too.
Halloween Costumes
Part of the reason we don’t do much decorating for Halloween is because I am usually really busy making Halloween costumes. I LOVE making costumes! Here are a few of our most recent costumes. The Lumiere costume (from Beauty and the Beast) is still my favorite! And I’ll add this year’s costumes to the post once they are made… but we haven’t even nailed down what those costumes will be just yet!
Books for Fall
Finally, if you are looking for some good book suggestions for the next few weeks with the children in your life, here’s a list of what we are reading. We have a book basket by the bed which I keep filled with seasonally-appropriate books for bedtime reading. However, this week we started the Harry Potter series, so I think we will be occupied with witches and wizards for a good long while.
Happy Fall, Ya’ll! Here’s to a great week! Work continues on the One Room Challenge Workroom Makeover. You can follow along on Instagram, and I will have another weekly update on Thursday. But if you are a subscriber, you’ll get the update on Wednesday!
Cheers!
Angela
@Midmodernmama
Confronting my Inner Sexist at the Toy Store
Travel blogger, Rachel Heller, stops by with some reflections on sexism in children’s toys — and her own unconscious bias when buying toys.
Rachel Heller of Rachel’s Ruminations.
Today’s guest post is from Rachel of Rachel’s Ruminations, an independent travel blog based in the Netherlands. I’m delighted to have her perspective on giving gifts to children.
A few years ago, I was planning a visit to my relatives in Israel. This set of cousins included a total of 11 children at that point. I had only actually ever met three of them, but I wanted to give all of them gifts.
So once I decided on the trip, I kept my eyes open for small, inexpensive gifts that would be appropriate for 11 children, aged between 13 years and six months, whom I didn’t actually know.
The day before I was due to leave, I sat down to wrap the purchases I’d accumulated and was ashamed and horrified at what I saw:
My choices contradicted everything I believed about raising children without pre-conceived assumptions or expectations about gender.
For a boy, aged six, I had bought a self-winding flashlight.
For two girls, aged six and almost six, I had bought bracelets: pretty, glittery bracelets in two different colors.
For two boys, aged 11, I had bought harmonicas.
For a girl, aged 13, I had bought a pretty barrette.
For a girl, aged four, I had bought a flowery hair clip.
What was I thinking? Was I a sexist? Why hadn’t it occurred to me that a six-year-old girl would enjoy a self-winding flashlight just as much as a six-year-old boy?
Even the most progressive toy stores are still stuck with sexist packaging targeting children by gender at an early age.
What made me think that a 13-year-old girl would be happy with a barrette?
And what was it about me that I didn’t think about this at the time I made all these purchases?
As soon as I realized what I'd done, I jumped in the car and went back to the store, where I bought two more self-winding flashlights for the two girls. I bought a very small notebook and magnetic bookmarks for the 13-year-old girl, both of them "Gorjuss" merchandise aimed at teenage girls, decorated with rather gothic-themed drawings. (I was horrified to notice a whole section of Top Model merchandise, clearly aimed at even younger girls. Who would buy that for their kid?) I didn’t have much time at that point, so the four-year-old girl would have to settle for the barrette, plus a bracelet.
It occurred to me that I can blame this unthinking conformity to some extent on my own upbringing, and to some extent on my kids.
My upbringing
As a child, I got dolls and stuffed animals to play with. I wanted Hot Wheels cars more than anything, but “those are for boys”. Whenever I visited my only male friend’s house (We were friends because our mothers were friends.), all I ever wanted to do was play with his cars, and all he ever wanted to do was play Monopoly, which he always won.
Because I had no brothers, there were no “boy’s toys” lying around for me to play with. I ended up turning to books as soon as I learned how to read, and didn’t need much else after that.
Lego advertising from 1977 was gender-neutral and egalitarian.
Later, in the 70’s, my mother discovered feminism, and I read every issue of Ms Magazine from cover to cover. By then, though, my own socialization was pretty complete: I knew to keep my knees together when I sat, especially in a dress, and that wearing a dress meant I couldn't climb a tree. I knew that it was good to be smart, but being pretty got you attention. I knew I could choose any profession, but was aware of very few role models outside the norm.
While at that point my mother was telling me I could be whatever I wanted, she continued to fulfill the gender expectations of the stereotypical suburban housewife: she cooked, she cleaned, she did the shopping, and, on the side, to make some extra money, she worked as a realtor for a while and later as a dealer in antique porcelain. My father, on the other hand, was the family breadwinner. He left the house every weekday morning for work, and never did any cooking or cleaning. (I can remember the one time my father ever cooked during my childhood. He tried to follow a recipe for Welsh rarebit but had to ask me what a saucepan was.)
Most families I knew conformed to these standard gender roles. I didn't meet anyone who didn't conform – that I was aware of – until I went away to college.
My kids
Recognizing all of this, I resolved to do things differently with my own kids. My daughter, right from the start, had dolls and Legos and cars and action figures and blocks and books.
I also insisted on dressing her gender-neutrally: blue went beautifully with her big eyes, so my favorite for her was a blue shirt and OshKosh overalls so that she could move freely. I told her how smart and strong she was, but left the comments about how she looked to other people.
Baby dolls only come in pink on these shelves.
Nevertheless, her wardrobe included “girly” clothing because other people, including my mother, bought them for her. And as soon as she was old enough to express a preference, she did: she wanted pink and red. She wanted dresses, preferably with frills and lace. She most emphatically did not want to wear jeans, unless they were red or pink and preferably fringed with lace. Was this some inborn preference, or did she pick it up from her environment?
And as for toys, she almost never played with her toy cars. Instead, she lined them up very neatly along a crack in the floorboards. She did the same with our shoes. But she never rolled them anywhere: just lined them up and then moved on to another toy.
At three, she wanted a Barbie more than anything. All her friends had them, but I refused to get her one. To my great annoyance, she received one on her fourth birthday from one of those friends. She was thrilled. And I was furious at her friend’s mother, but too well-trained in politeness to let her know.
The only way she used her Legos was to build stables for her My Little Pony’s, which she loved.
When she was five, her little brother was born. Again I made sure to dress him gender-neutrally and to give him access to toys of all sorts. And again, it was all for nothing.
He loved the cars: to roll off tables or crash against the wall. Legos were great for making more cars or planes (preferably if a friend did the actual building of the machine and he could just play with it).
He showed no interest in dolls whatsoever. There was some interest in action figures, but only in terms of the violence they could inflict on each other. A toy weapon would have made him very happy, if I'd allowed it.
My son did have a period in which he declared that pink was his favorite color, and he would wear hand-me-down pink shirts from his sister. That only lasted until he went to preschool. One day one of his little friends declared that “pink is for girls” and that was it: he refused to wear pink again.
Today Lego’s Friends line is marketed toward girls and features strangely skinny figures — not their standard minifigs — with sets that conform to more feminine stereotypes.
Lego sets marketed toward boys include sets that promote violence, careers traditionally dominated by males, and weapons marking a documented escalation in violence in Lego toys.
Later, from about the age of nine until he was about fourteen, he chose to wear his hair long. People often mistakenly assumed he was a girl, but that never seemed to bother him. I loved that: his ability to ignore what anyone thought and be comfortable with himself, long hair and all. At the same time, though, he was completely gender-conforming in every other respect.
So as I was shopping for all these children, I was thinking of my own. My daughter, at six years old, would have loved those glittery bracelets. At 13, that barrette would have been perfect. My son would have loved a hand-cranked flashlight at six and a harmonica later on.
I can blame my unconscious gender conformity on what my parents and children have taught me, yet I’m the one who fell into this stereotypical pattern. I have called myself a feminist ever since those Ms Magazines back in the 70's, but I realize now that being a feminist isn’t something that is attained and lasts forever, like a college degree or an appendectomy scar; it has to be consciously maintained and rejuvenated, like tuning up a car or watering a plant.
Perhaps we all need a regular feminism tune-up, to make sure we haven't regressed into facile, complacent acceptance of the status quo: becoming unconscious sexists. My gift-shopping endeavor seems to have done the trick.
Thank you for your candor, Rachel! I know this is an important conversation in our family as well. Be sure to check out Rachel’s website: RachelsRuminations.com .
Budget-friendly gift suggestions for everyone on your list! Lists include:
My Favorite Gifts | Gifts Under $15 | Gifts for Mid Modern Lovers | Gifts for Children | Books to Give Gifts to Make | Wines to Give | Bubbles for the New Year
Happy Valentine's Day
Valentine’s Day always makes me a little Romesick. Valentine’s Day has its roots deep in Italy, and so much of what we now associate with this holiday of love is deeply rooted in Roman history.
Happy St. Valentine’s Day!!
Valentine’s Day always makes me a little Romesick. Valentine’s Day has its roots deep in Italy, and so much of what we now associate with this holiday of love is deeply rooted in Roman history. St. Valentine lived in Rome and was martyred about 278 ad. But the iconography of Valentine’s Day is even more ancient.
Take Cupid — the Roman god of love and desire. He is everywhere! And Cupid can easily be confused with putti — naked, winged babies who are all over the place in Italian art and seem to be everywhere on Valentine’s Day. But they are part of an artistic tradition that is more than 2500 years old.
I bought this antique Florentine box from @vintagecollected a few weeks ago. So pretty! The image decoupaged on the top of the box is a print of a fresco from the House of the Vettii in Pompeii. This ancient piece of art shows little putti making perfume. There are three scenes in the actual fresco, but only two appear on my box: putti crushing something to make the oils, and then setting up shop to sell the perfumes. So if you give or receive a bottle of perfume today, it is part of an ancient tradition and a link to the past, too.
However you celebrate Valentine’s Day, may it be a celebration of love! 😘
XOXO
Angela
Originally posted on Instagram. Are we connected on Instagram? If not, follow me! There’s a whole lot going on on IG!
Happy Galentine's Day!
Celebrate Leslie Knope’s favorite holiday, Galentine’s Day, every February 13. It is a celebration of female friendship and sisterhood — and it is awesome!
I am lucky to have some really lovely, wonderful women in my life! I have always been the kind who has a few very deep friendships, and some of those friendships now stretch back more than 25 years. For all of my sweet girl friends cast about across the country and the world — I am so thankful!
Happy Galentine’s Day!
If you are in the dark about Galentine’s Day, well, you aren’t alone, and clearly you didn’t watch enough Parks and Recreation! As Leslie Knope says, “What’s Galentine’s Day? Oh, it’s only the best day of the year! Every February 13th, my lady friends and I leave our husbands and our boyfriends at home, and we just come and kick it breakfast style. Ladies celebrating ladies. It’s like Lilith Fair — minus the angst. Plus frittatas.”
Here’s a little Leslie Knope joy to help you in your Galentine’s Day celebration!
Happy Galentine’s Day!
XOXOX
Angela
Valentine's Day Decoration Ideas
Vintage-inspired Valentine’s Day decor using milk glass and vintage Italian glass as well as flowers, paper garlands, and DIY mailboxes. Inspiration for simple but elegant Valentine’s Day decor including homemade elements.
Hello! I hope you are doing well — staying warm and cozy! We had lots of snow this week which made for some fun creation time. Our house is all decorated for Valentine’s Day which has been a fun project. I have three Valentine’s Day projects to share with you this week!
First up: our favorite homemade Valentines! Bambino painted these last year, and they were really fun to do — and basically free!
I also have instructions to make this crazy-cute and really easy Heart Garland and Love Bunting! I made this for our mantle, and I love how it turned out! I’ve included files to download in PNG and SVG formats.
And finally for those of you who have a Cricut or a Silhouette, I have free file downloads to make these awesome Valentine’s mailboxes! We love them, and they are the centerpiece of our dining room table this week. Check it out!
And if you just want to peep at our decorations, feel free to check out the photo album…
Wishing you all a great week and a happy Valentine’s Day!
XOXO
Angela
Bubbles for the New Year!
We are cozied up for the New Year with our closest friends — a group we have gathered with at New Years for almost two decades. Such joy! As I think back on 2018 and forward to 2019 I am filled with gratitude and joy. Thank you to all of you for your love and support in this new venture — supporting The Nice List, reading all things Mid Modern Mama, and supporting me on social media, too. Thank you!
Gratitude is my word for the year for 2019, and I’m beginning the year with a brand new section on Mid Modern Mama — all about gratitude. I hope you will check it out. There’s a guide to writing good thank you notes, suggestions for host and hostess gifts, and a guide to keeping track of gifts received, too.
I also have a review of AJ Jacobs’ newest book — Thanks a Thousand — which chronicles his quest to thank everyone who makes his morning cup of coffee possible. It is a great read!
But for tonight — be sure you take Aaron Sherman’s list of Bubbles for New Years to your local wine shop! He has some wonderful suggestions for your New Years toasting pleasure.
Above all, I wish you joy and love and peace as we bid 2018 farewell and welcome the New Year. I’ll raise a glass to you, my dear readers, tonight. Thank you for your support! Here’s to an amazing 2019!
XOXO
Angela
Happy Santa Lucia Day!
Today is the Feast of Santa Lucia — an Italian saint who over the centuries became very important in Scandinavian countries. Santa Lucia Day is a day celebrating light in the darkest days of the year, and sharing with your neighbors. It is one of my favorite parts of the Advent season!
Tonight we will be having a Scandinavian smorgasbord including Swedish meatballs, homemade lefse, and krumkake — all traditional Scandinavian foods. My family roots run to Norway and Denmark. My husband is Italian. So Santa Lucia is the perfect holiday for our family!
I’ve written quite a bit in the last few weeks about our Scandinavian traditions, Santa Lucia Day, and the books in our library that connect us to our heritage through the Christmas holidays. I hope you’ll take a look!
God Jul!
Angela
And the stockings were hung...
Our Christmas stockings are done, but it took almost six years for them to be completed. That is today’s story…
I finally finished them! A few days ago on Instagram I posted this…
I figured if I declared it publicly, then I really would finish those stockings. And I did. It has taken me six years to get them done, though. Bambino’s stocking was done right away. Don’t worry! That child has not been deprived in any way! But when I started this project, I actually prepared for five stockings. Infertility has its way of making even the simplest projects a little more painful at times.
I made Bambino’s stocking for his second Christmas when he was 18 months old. But I was working at a church when I started this project, so getting one stocking done that Christmas season was an accomplishment.
Every year since then I have had a reminder set on my calendar: “October 15 — finish the Christmas stockings.” And every year I snoozed and then rescheduled that reminder. It made me angry. It made me anxious. And it made me sad.
You see, these Christmas stockings became so much more than decorations for me. Sitting together in a drawer in my office were the embroidered pieces for stockings that are not to be. When I made Bambino’s stocking, I embroidered a few extra pieces in hopes that perhaps lightning would strike twice, and we would have a second miracle baby.
But a few weeks before Bambino’s third Christmas, the doctors told us definitively that it just wouldn’t happen. We were a one-and-done family. That Christmas was one of quiet grief. We clutched Bambino closer, treasured his chatter and his joy all the more, and contemplated a change in our life’s storyline.
The next Christmas we were packing to move across the Bay. The following Christmas we moved across the country. And the next we moved back to California. Each year I snoozed that reminder and reset it for the coming year, hoping that it would be a little less busy, a little less agonizing to finish those stockings.
I’m not sure how it happened, but here we are with three finished stockings — Mama, Daddy, and Bambino — hanging on the mantle. It is done. The other bits of embroidery are tucked away — they won’t ever be stockings, but perhaps some sweet pillows for the window seat.
And my heart is full.
To read a bit about how I created these Christmas stockings, click the link below!
More Christmas links…
Budget-friendly gift suggestions for everyone on your list! Lists include:
My Favorite Gifts | Gifts Under $15 | Gifts for Mid Modern Lovers | Gifts for Children | Books to Give Gifts to Make | Wines to Give | Bubbles for the New Year
