Pumpkins and Owls

It's no secret that I love owls. They have become increasingly popular over recent years and can be easily found in all kinds of stores and decor. Owls used to be used as scary Halloween decor once upon a sad time, but now have a nice place among fall decor without being ghoulish or creepy. I have included some of my owls in my fall decorating and they fit right in! So in my last blog post you saw a peek at some of my decor, some of them being pumpkins. Pumpkins are my most favorite thing about fall!! The options with them are endless when it comes to decorating them and I had a large blank white one that I couldn't decide what to do with at the time. Enter good ol' trusty Pinterest. After lots of great ideas, this was my favorite!

Cute isn't it?? Owl pumpkins made with a large white pumpkin (real or craft), and some sunflower seeds!! Supplies needed: a large white pumpkin, sunflower seeds, a hot glue gun, and a craft/utility/pumpkin-carving knife.
There are a couple ways to carve into these bad boys, my pumpkin was a craft one, and therefore already hallow and made of foam. If you have a real one, you have to do the drill of opening a gutting out the pumpkin, same way you would be prepping for any jack-o-lantern. I assume the easiest way to do this would be using the drill gun with a large drill bit to make the holes for the eyes, but our drill gun hates me and decided to kill over as soon as I touched it. So I used a serrated steak knife (not the most appropriate or sophisticated tool for the occasion but it gets the job done and it's all I had on hand).

Since my drill committed suicide, I carved out the holes by hand, once I had the general hole I twisted the knife around to scrape it evenly. Next step is carving the "beak" by carving out a simple upside-down triangle.

Now the fun part, start hot-gluing the seeds with the fatter sides around the outside of the eye holes. The original Pinterest picture showed two rows of the seeds, to which I tried just two but ended up fulling in the gaps probably more than I should have.

When you are satisfied with how it looks, do the same for the next eye and try to make it as even looking as possible.

Last step is the ear tufts on top of the pumpkin on the upper outer corners of the eyes. I failed to take photos of this step because I got side-tracked with my kids begging for me to feed them, I'm sorry :( But its pretty simple, use two seeds as the base placing them in a "V" shape and put a huge glop of hot glue directly onto the pumpkin and stick the seeds on and hold for a few seconds until the glue is hard enough to hold the seeds without assistance. Repeat the step with two more seeds on top of the first row, then top it off with a single seed placed in the middle of the "V" on top.
For the "claws," just hot glue a group of 3 seeds (2 pointing outward in an upside down "v" and a single seed in the middle of the "v" also pointing down).

Here is my finished product! Since this is a craft pumpkin, I'm pretty sure I can't use a real flame candle on the inside to light it up, so I used a cheapie LED tea-light candle that sadly is supposed to be lighting it up in the photo, but that's as bright as it could get. So I would recommend a better, stronger LED tea-light to illuminate this guy. Do you have any creative ideas for decorating pumpkins in unusual ways? I would love to hear some of your ideas in the comments below! 

Ready for fall and a few of my favorite recent finds

I told myself I wouldn't do it this year.. I did it last year and it was too soon. I was doing well until I saw some lovely "fall PINsperation," and I succumbed. I went into the garage and pulled out all my fall decor and meant to only put up one or two things for now to ease the transition to fall.. I was supposed to gradually add one thing here and there each week until all my things were up but that didn't end up happening. Ya, its ALL up, every last piece. I think I do this subconsciously as sort of a "rain dance," in hopes that it will bring the cool weather faster. Today was 101 degrees.. my rain dance has failed. So I thought I would share some of my favorite fall decor with you out there in blogger land.

 Pictured above is my fireplace mantle. I LOVE burlap and have some here and there all year but I especially love to incorporate it into my fall decor. I also love owls and what better time to year to bring them out!

 I made this wreath last fall and I was quite proud of it :)

 Mason jars + feathers = my new favorite fall decoration!!!! I switch from my summer hues of seafoam and aquas to more deeper hues like teals and browns.

 All white craft pumpkins..decorated the last two last fall and the big one is my newest edition.. I am working on what I want to do with it.. keep it plain white or decorate.. what do you all think?

 The peacock feather has really made its way into my fall decorating.. the hues are amazing and are just the right pop of non-traditional fall colors I need.


And now, here are a few great finds I have found the last few weeks!

 A chevron tank top on clearance at Ross for 10 bucks, mmmhhhmmm (insert the happy dance)!! I loved the way it fit and the colors are PERFECT to transition into fall. To the right, a navy peplum top I found at target and it is ADORABLE!!! If you have not given this huge trend (especially for fall) a try yet, it is so incredibly flattering and forgiving!

 Special edition Ball Mason jars in vintage blue for their 100th anniversary, oh the possibilities!!

 Ok, many of you should be familiar with the Gigi Hill brand handbag and accessories sold by independent  consultants, right? If you have you know the unfortunate news that they closed shop and many of their consultants sold their remaining stock at amazing discounts! I had my eye on this pattern for a long time and jumped at the opportunity to grab it! This one pictured above is called the mileah and it is a makeup/accessory bag, I also purchased the Annalise in the same pattern which is a duffel bag (I have yet to receive in the mail but I am anxiously staring out my window everyday keeping an eye out for the UPS man!).



So those are some of the things I was so happy to find lately! What are some of your favorite finds that you may have gotten a great deal for? I would also LOVE to hear some of your favorite fall decorating tips! Do you stick to traditional? Or are you creative or like to be a little non-traditional?

S

Here is a selfie I took on a windy evening on one of my walk/runs. It was nice and cool that day, also putting me in the mood for Autumn! What is your favorite season?