ELF ON THE SHELF

this year my mom and sister had the ultimate 'elf on the shelf' challenge going on.

24 days leading up to Christmas the the elf named 'pixie' got into some serious mischief around the 'girl house'. i saved a few of the pictures from the tricks played by 'pixie' to share with you on the blog. 

in the last picture you can see that 'pixie' left a note, the note was to me. while i was out of town for a weekend, 'pixie' let himself in and switched my living room to my dining room and dining room to  my living room.. that was quite possibly the biggest trick 'pixie' took on this season.. oh that silly elf!!

DAY TO NIGHT (CHRISTMAS FOODIE)

welcome back sweet readers- hope you all had a lovely holiday surrounded with the ones you love most! 

today i wanted to share with you our Christmas day table and traditions. 

Christmas morning we normally round up the dogs, stop by the grandparents house and we set out on a morning 'mimosa walk'- all bundled up with drink in hand. but this year, with the thunderstorms and rain that morning, we settled for mimosas by the fire! we set the table for breakfast and enjoyed german pfannekuchen, 'girl house' casserole and fruit salad- we made the casserole from scratch, who knew it would turn out so good, we wrote down the recipe for next year!?!

dinner was served at my momma lanes as well this year...and my did we eat well. the best beef tenderloin (thanks to Chamberlains Steakhouse for the amazing piece of beef!) mashed potatoes, creamed corn, green beans, tomato salad and warm rolls of course!

the meat was so perfectly cooked, you could cut it with your fork- now thats what i call a good Christmas Day Dinner!

*recipes to share with you*

german pfannekuchen *use butter instead of oil

'girl house' casserole

beef tenderloin 

CHRISTMAS CHEER

giving gifts its always fun- giving a gift that grows, and keeps on giving is even better! so this year i gave each of my friends just that... 

a fresh paperwhite bulb that just needs a little water and love to grow!

here's what i used:

gift tags, bakers twine and stamps (same as from my gift wrap)

paperwhite bulbs (find them at your nursery or amazon)

river rocks (at your craft store.. or if you have a creek...!)

mason jars.. i got the 4oz to use less rocks. 

**i left the twisted part of the lid on, but removed the cover seal

WRAPPED

wrapping gifts has always been a lane family favorite. this year is no different. 

i went with the basics, and tried to buy as little as possible, more about recycle and reuse this time around. wrapping your gifts with love is all the matters though really!

while the snowflakes may look a little time consuming, they turned out great and added just enough holiday cheer to the packages! (i linked two links below for you!!)

if you are a last minute wrapper- then dig in your kitchen  drawers for some baking paper, or even newspaper will do the trick!

i used a large roll of baking paper gift wrap i found at michaels, recycled kitchen baking paper will do the trick too on smaller boxes..

here and here are step-by-step on how to make paper snowflakes!

find bakers twine here - you will have enough for years... 

and i found the red rafia at SampleHouse&CandleShop

the little stamps and ink pad are also from michaels...so cute for personalizing!

here are other wrapping inspirations- happy wrapping!

1 // 2 // 3 

DECK THE HALLS (BRANDY'S HOME)

hello lovely readers- it has been such a fun week with so many wonderful guest bloggers!

i hope you enjoyed each post and each bloggers christmas cheer and decorations!

last but not least of favorite bloggers sharing their Christmas decorations is brandy from 'cashmere&camo' - her blog is so pretty and i envy her sense style! 

Hi All! I’m Brandy from Cashmere & Camo and a big thanks to Life of the Lane’s for asking me to guest post and share how I’m decking my halls this year!  

Every year I have a few primary influences and build off of those ideas. This year I really wanted to reuse some of my favourite birch bark decorations and incorporate golds and reds. Some of my favourite finds were from Restoration Hardware and decorated a winter wonderland tree and used some of the starry string lights to dress up the mantle and an old lantern. I also wanted to try my hand at some DIY’s this year and one of my favourites was the mason jar snowglobe I made. 

You can visit us over at Cashmere & Camo to get more details!

Thanks so much to Life of the Lane for featuring this post. 

Hope everyone has a wonderful holiday!