A Coronado Island Thanksgiving

Giving thanks on Turkey Day is so much more special when sharing the occasion with great friends. It was such an honor for us to host Thanksgiving Day at our home in Coronado - more importantly, having our wonderful family and friends join us to celebrate this grateful day! 

Being a floral and event designer, it is to be expected that I would set our festive dinner table like a photoshoot. Having my good friend and photographer Stacy Childers take professional photos wasn't. I am so unbelievably thankful for my friendship with Stacy and her amazing husband Dan. We have collaborated on so many wonderful projects this year with many more to come! THANK YOU Stacy for capturing our day of Thanks! 

Sunflowers, oranges, and pineapples were just a few of our favorite decorative elements to enhance our feast on Coronado Island. We love celebrating the holidays and styling for special occasions. Thank you for sharing in our special day of gratitude and we hope to share many more festivities with you!  

Photos by Stacy Childers Photography

Home for the Holidays

This is my most favorite time of year!! The holidays are HERE! While I've spent the last week planning our Friendsgiving Feast, I spent the week prior getting our home ready for Turkey Day! 

Me and my sidekick, Max (pictured above) decided to spruce up our dining and living room with a few DIY projects to refresh the house for our guests. 

First up - I wanted to reupholster these cream wood chairs. They needed a bit of an update and I had this tropical holiday color palette in mind: deep coral, rich turquoise, and fern green. I found this wonderful textured faux-leather fabric and decided to cover the seat cushions. It was my first time taking on reupholstering, but my good friend Anthony helped me smooth the fabric over the cushions and staple underneath. The coral pillows were a finishing touch and matched the seats perfectly. 

Curtains were next on my agenda for the dining room and of course, I ended up falling in love with the print on a pair of SHOWER curtains! Not to fear, this made hanging them very easy but the length did not fit my expectations. To extend, I sewed a green and coral checked fabric to the ends of the shower curtain and transitioned both prints with a corded trim. To complete the look, I draped two squares of the green/coral fabric to create a valance between the two curtains and finished with cording and a tassle for decoration. 

Because the shower curtains were so easy to work with - I decided to use the same fabric for the best seat in the house! Our built-in bench in the dining room was the perfect spot to complement the design with a matching cushion.

 I loved the way we wrapped the fabric so that the hardware from the shower curtains became a decorative element on the outer side of the cushion. To complete this "seat" I made two roll-top pillows and embellished with touches of fancy accoutrements. 

If you don't know me, once the "embellishmints" start - I can't stop. I decided to make a couple more pillows with my favorite elements for a variation on our newly upholstered chairs, utilizing the same fabric from our extended curtains. 

And since the curtains in the dining room had worked out so perfectly, I dove right into my living room. Knowing that I was planning to serve our Thanksgiving dinner in this room, I wanted to decorate the windows for the holidays with two-toned fabric. I loved the brightness of the lime green against the navy blue satin with floral motif, creating a festive and fancy look. 

With the house in order, I moved right along into the kitchen to start baking up a storm. Being that I love playing hostess, I couldn't let my guests go home empty handed. Before the bird, comes the favors! I had found the most darling green baking trays in various sizes and decided to make yummy goodies for everyone to take home after dinner. It is, after all, about the presentation! 

"Gobble Gobble Til you Wobble" - filling these sweet trays were monster peanut butter cookies, mini gingerbreads, key lime cookie bars, mini chocolate cakes with peanut butter filling topped with chocolate brittle and cardamon muffins with brown sugar crumble topping. 

Setting up for our actual feast was so exciting! We used our dining room to display all the delicious treats with dinner served in the living room! 

With the house ready for our Friendsgiving Thanksgiving - we wish you and yours a very Happy Holiday season! Stay tuned for more inspired images from our celebration!