 Welcome to the eighth post in the Createyou86 Whimsical Holiday Blog Series. This year has been a whirlwind for us between blogging, driving / moving cross-country, and getting new jobs. We have tried to share as much as we can with all of you throughout the year. Here is a very simple round up of our year in ten sentences. 1. We started 2015 on a quiet note. 2. We decided to move across the country. 3. We planned out our cross-country trip. 4. We drove cross country in 4 days, spending only $183.00 on gas, and $300.00 on hotels. 5. We have gotten settled in Pennsylvania. 6. The holiday's have blown by us as i sit here writing this post Christmas Morning!!!! 7. We have reconnected with old friends, and we couldn't be happier. 8. We both have new jobs. 9. Well, i quit mine the other day, and got a new one Christmas Eve! 10. We wish you a very Merry Christmas, and a happy healthy New Year. So there you have it....our year in ten sentences. Look out for one last post from Createyou86 on the 31st. We hope that you are having a very Merry Christmas! We have loved blogging all year, and we can't wait to start blogging in the new year for all of you! Describe your year in one sentence. Let us know in the comments below! 
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 Welcome to the seventh post of the Createyou86 Whimsical Holiday Blog Series. We do not normally post blog series posts on Tuesday's so let me preface this post with saying that on December 10th i started a new job, and have been working pretty much non-stop. I haven't even had enough time to do my own Christmas shopping. Needless to say time has not been on my side when trying to release new content including these posts, and for that you have my sincere apology. I wanted to take this time to talk about our goals that we had as bloggers for 2015. ☆We wanted to have more visitors to our blog. We are still a very small blog, and it depends on the post, and the day of the week, but we have definitely seen growth in readers here at Createyou86, and we think you are all great! ☆ We wanted to create a FREE mastermind group which we succeeded at. Feel free to join at Createyou86 Planning & Blogging Mastermind Group . ☆ We wanted to have greater social media, and brand awareness. We greatly exceeded our expectations with Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, and YouTube. ☆We wanted to try new social media platforms. One of our favorite things to do is try new things. We really enjoyed learning all about Periscope, and trying it out this year (@Createyou86). ☆ We wanted to create a FREE Facebook group for bloggers specifically in the Northeastern U.S. We have created a home for bloggers to share their wins, questions, praises, and frustrations. Feel free to join at Northeast Bloggers Connect . We would eventually like to have blogger meet ups up, and down the East Coast. ☆We wanted to provide our readers with a ton of great product reviews. We had so much fun testing, and reviewing new products for our readers this year. We have Influenster, Brandbacker, and a bunch of other great independent companies to thank for those opportunities. We look forward to more in 2016. We have exceeded our own expectation this year, and we look forward to upping our game in 2016 for all of you. What would you look forward to seeing from the Createyou86 Blog in 2016? What was your biggest blogging goal of 2015? Let us know in the comments below!   Welcome to he sixth post in the Createyou86 Whimsical Holiday Blog Series. I have been waiting to do this post for months. We really enjoyed posting our fall vision board, and it got such a great response that we thought we would make one for winter, and the holidays. Below are some images that have really inspired me to get in the holiday spirit this year. (Considering we brought the warm weather back with us from Cali!) It is supposed to be 65 degrees on Christmas Day in Pennsylvania. Disclaimer: None of the below photos were curated by Createyou86. These photos are from Pinterest. You can click on each photo to visit the link where we found the photo, and the link is also posted as a caption below each photo.  https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/c5/2b/be/c52bbe0026346776170523e6029e54c4.png  http://aubreyandlindsay.blogspot.com/2014/11/the-penny-paper-co-holiday-2014-mood.html  http://color.romanuke.com/tsvetovaya-palitra-1768/  http://design-seeds.com/index.php/home/entry/frosted  http://design-seeds.com/index.php/home/entry/holiday-hues3?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed:+DesignSeeds+(design+seeds)  http://unskinnyboppy.com/2012/12/welcome-to-jennifer-carrolls-holiday-home/  http://vosgesparis.blogspot.com/2009/12/its-tree.html  http://megduerksen.typepad.com/photos/where_we_live/img_9531.html  https://www.facebook.com/crazydiyprojects  http://notedlist.com/pinecone-decorating-ideas/ We have found so much inspiration throughout this holiday season, and we love sharing our inspiration with all of you. We hope that you are enjoying this series so far! What is your greatest source of inspiration during the holidays? Let us know in the comments below!   Welcome to the fifth post in the Createyou86 Whimsical Holiday Blog Series. Here at Createyou86 we LOVE the holidays, and what is one of the best part of the holidays? FOOD! We love to eat, and we love to eat GREAT FOOD! This post is very simple. It is a recipe that i found which can replace those plain old grocery store dinner rolls for your holiday meals with a fresh new biscuit that everyone will love. (Just click on the photo below, and print to have your very own copy of this timeless recipe FOR FREE!)  We hope that you are enjoying the Whimsical Holiday Blog Series here at Createyou86, and that you are having tons of fun planning your holiday season with us as well. What is your favorite holiday recipe that you will hand down? Let us know in the comments below!   Welcome to the fourth post in the Createyou86 Whimsical Holiday December Blog Series. Decorating our home (my parents home) for the holidays is one of my favorite activities of the year. We make it a special family event. From bringing everything up from the basement, to actually placing all of the decor around the house, it just makes the house feel more ready for the holidays. I love looking at all of the shiny decor, and lights do you? Below is a tour of our decor for the holiday's this year. (The only thing missing is our big tree because we don't get that until about a week before Christmas). *All photos in this post are the property of Createyou86 unless otherwise stated, and should not be copied or reproduced in any way under penalty of law.  The Bathroom Tree (photo credit: Createyou86).  The Family Room Window Tree  Bird Tree  Fish Tree  The Kitchen Sink  The Mantle  Behind the couch Table Decor  My mom hand blew this glass bowl, so it is really special for her to be able to put some christmas ornaments in it, and sit it on the book shelf.  Regardless of the season, the house is always full of flowers. The serenity prayer in the background was hand made by my grandmother (who i never met).  Emily & James helping my sister put the lights on her tree....her helper Reindeer! We sincerely hope that you are enjoying this series, and this little sneak peek into our home, as well as how we get ready for the holidays, and that you are looking forward to more awesome holiday posts in this series. Wishing you a very Whimsical Holiday season! What is your favorite decoration to put up during the holidays? Let us know in the comments below!   Welcome to the third post in the Createyou86 Whimsical Holiday December Blog Series. We are so happy that you are joining us for this series. We are truly enjoying sharing these holiday posts with you. One of the most important parts of the holidays are traditions. It is very important to have your own traditions. This can become especially difficult when you get married, and have a family, or are engaged, and family expects you to split time between families. It is all well, and good that you do the things that your family passed down to you, or that your family WANTS you to do, but you should also create you own traditions that you can one day pass on as well. This post will share our current family traditions as well as some traditions that we have started as a couple that we will pass down one day. Thanksgiving: Current
Christmas Day is much like Thanksgving Day in that we have the same schedule except for:
In the future we hope to pass these new traditions that we start on our own down to our children.
What are some of your favorite family traditions? Let us know in the comments below!   Check out these posts every Welcome to another Week In Review here at Createyou86. Our solution to weekly journaling. As the holidays are revving up so are our posts. Lets take a look at what has happened behind the scenes, and what is coming up for you to look forward to. 1. This week we released our Whimsical Holiday Blog Series. This is a series that we have been waiting to release since the beginning of 2015! We love the holidays, and we hope that you are enjoying this series. If you missed the first two posts you can find them here, and here. Check out these posts every Monday, and Thursday throughout December.  2. We have a number of new reviews coming up. We have been invited to participate in two Voxboxes from Influenster that we will be posting about very soon. One of the boxes is so secret that we can't even post about it until January because it hasn't been released to the public yet. Stay tuned for these posts, and check out our social media page above for any updates. 3. Our Holiday shopping, and planning is in full effect here at Createyou86. We hope that you have been able to get some awesome deals this holiday season. We also sent out our Christmas Cards this week. Check out our Transformation Tuesday post about Staying Calm During The Holidays if you are starting to feel stressed. What is your favorite part of the holidays? Let us know in the comments below!   Welcome to the second post in the Whimsical Holiday Blog Series here at Createyou86. Fall, and Winter are our favorite seasons here. We know, we know.... winter doesn't start until later in the month, but we love it so much that we just couldn't wait to share our favorites with you so start scrolling! 1. Christmas Cookies Who doesn't love cookies? Baking cookies is so much fun, and it is a great activity to do as a family. From rolling out the fresh dough to picking out which design to make the cookies, and cookie cutters, sprinkles, and other cookie decor.This is also a great activity for kids to help with learning colors (sprinkles), and shapes (cookie cutters).  2. Holiday Decorations Holiday decorations evoke the spirit of holiday's past and present with dated decorations, and some even have photos on them. Putting out the decor helps the home feel more homey, and hands down a tradition to younger members of the family, and children.  3. Cold Weather Clothing One of our favorite things about winter are winter clothes. From big chunky sweaters, to Ugg boots, to awesome knit hats, and gloves. I love being comfy, and winter is the perfect time for comfy warm clothes (warm fleece blankets, and sometimes snuggies!) I love wearing sweats, and sitting in front of the fire watching TV or reading.  4. Snow Being in California for the past few years we have missed the snow. Growing up in Northeast Pennsylvania you see snow....you just do....weather it is a few inches or a few feet. You know about digging out the car, and defrosting the windshield. Snow is so beautiful, If you have never seen snow in person before.  5. Homemade Soup On a bitter cold day of shoveling snow, or just bustling around, soup warms the soul. Soup is so easy to make, and one of our favorites is Chicken Corn Chowder. In fact, i made Chicken Corn Chowder last week for my family and they loved it! It only took an hour to completely cook. So, make yourself some soup to warm the soul!  Thanks for checking out our five winter favorites. We hope that you are enjoying this blog series, and that you are having a very Whimsical Holiday. What are some of your winter favorites? Let us know in the comments below!   Welcome to another Transformation Tuesday here at Createyou86. Can you believe that Thanksgiving is already over? You're probably getting all of your other holiday decorations out right about now, and getting ready for Christmas, Hanukkah, or whatever holiday you celebrate. We all know how hectic the holiday's can be, and that it can cause more than a headache. This post will be all about reminding you of ways to stay calm during the holidays. 1. Start Early! I always think....ohhhh Christmas is (insert number here) days/weeks away, i'll have plenty of time to do all of my shopping, and everything else. Guess what....it never ends up that way....it never fails that i am still wrapping presents on Christmas Eve before or after our other festivities, and i always think to myself "I'll do better planning next year." START EARLY! Save yourself the headache of hurrying to wrap or buy presents. There are several great days to make very cheap purchases such as: Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday/Cyber Week. If you order online it takes away the hurry, and rush, and you can buy at your own pace. Also if you order on these days or even before these days you should receive the products way before Christmas, and be able to wrap them, and have them done, and be able to forget about them until you put your presents under the tree. 2. Keep A List Do you stress about what to buy for people around the holidays? Keeping a small notebook with list of gifts for people in your family or things that you might like throughout the year (while your in the store looking at them) in your handbag or on your person is an easy way to not stress about presents. That way when the time comes to purchase you can simply pull out your notebook, and check off presents that you have purchased. You can also keep a checklist of other activities such as creating holiday cards, recipes, and anything else essential to making your holiday great! 3. Keep It Simple The holiday's are all about "It's the thought that counts" right? So why not keep it simple. If you are still stressing about presents consider this simple plan for friends, yourself, or even your entire family. Something they want Something they need Something to wear Something to read. 4. Calendar Sit down before December (probably toward the end of October), and create a calendar of events for the month. You could plan out when to get your tree, decorating the tree, decorating the rest of the house, when you need to have cards written by, when to send them out, when sales will be at certain stores, when to cook food, when to wrap presents, and any other events which you will be attending. We hope that this short list helps to take some of the stress out of your holiday season. What do you think is the most stressful part of the holiday season? Let us know in the comments below!  |
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Photos used under Creative Commons from jeffdjevdet, spinster cardigan, One Way Stock, regan76, M. Dolly, Thomas Rousing Photography, Post-Software, kevin dooley, Alan Stanton, Photoshoparama - Dan, campbelj45ca
