Happy Fall y’all! I can’t believe that it is officially fall, especially as it is still in the 90’s here. Since it’s the beginning of fall, it’s time to start decorating with pumpkins.

There are as many ways to decorate with pumpkins as there are the different types of pumpkins themselves!

The possibilities are endless.

Today I’m going to share with you a few ways that I’m decorating with pumpkins this year, as well as a few of my favorites in the past.

Over the years, I think that I’ve used just about every pumpkin there is out there.

Here, you see a light up glitter pumpkin on my Halloween mantle.

I’ve even hung pumpkins in the trees!

I love sitting out here in the fall with these fun lanterns swinging int he breeze.

Of course, you will always find pumpkins on my front porch!

Some of my favorite pumpkins are these blue and white decoupage pumpkins!

These are super easy to make!

You all know that there will almost always be painted pumpkins here at the castle!

I can’t remember a time when my fall mantle didn’t have pumpkins of some kind on it!

These “fancy” pumpkins have a special place in my heart and I will be using them again for Halloween!

Pumpkin season here at The Castle lasts from September through mid-November.

This pumpkin was my Thanksgiving center piece a few years ago.

My hands down, all time favorite pumpkins have to be my velvet pumpkins!

As you can see my love of pumpkins is huge.

Whether the are real, faux, painted, sewn or lighted with glitter, pumpkins will always be a staple for fall here at The Castle!

So break out the pumpkins, y’all.

Fall is here!

Until next time…

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On a recent trip to my sister’s house, we decided to break out her fall decor and create a fall front porch!

For those of you who haven’t seen my sister’s front porch before, it’s an old craftsman bungalow that has a ton of charm and a lot of patina!

Actually, her house is in the neighborhood that we grew up in and has large trees, big sidewalks and quaint homes.

Before we started decorating we did a little planning ,shopping and crafting.

These cute pumpkins were made out of left over fence posts.

Believe it or not, we scored some super cute outdoor pillows at WalMart!

Both were $5.00!

Our decorating vision included corn stalks tied with beautiful ribbon to the front porch posts flanked by mums and pumpkins.

Honestly, in the heart of Oklahoma you would think that it would be easy to find corn stalks, but no!

We even sent out a plea on social media asking where we could find corn stalks?

The most common answer? In a corn field.

Well, duh!

We scored big time on these HUGE mums.

They were each $10.00

Here in North Texas these mums would easily have been $25.00 or more!

These comfy rocking chairs are a new addition to the front porch.

My sister plans on painting them white sometime in the future, however for now they fit her fall theme perfectly!

We tied orange bandanas around her summer pillows for a inexpensive fall look.

The purple asters may possibly be my favorite fall flower.

So bright and pretty!

My sister’s fall front porch just yells “It’s fall, come on over and sit for awhile!”.

Honestly, we did spend quite a bit of “sitting” time on this front porch.

In fact, it was hard to do much of anything else.

Until next time….

A few years ago this was my fall mantle. Lots of rich color, a few feathers and I loved it. However, lately I’ve been wanting to go in a different direction. More of a simple fall mantle that has lighter, brighter colors.

If you’ve been following along, you know that I’ve been adding a lot of navy and orange to my house as my fall color theme.

Since my living room was already orange, navy and white it only make since to keep that theme in the living room.

I started with these cute white faux pumpkins.

While doing a little grocery shopping, I spied these faux pumpkins at my local Kroger.

They had 4 different sizes and were the perfect size to fit on my mantle.

You can’t tell, but they are a medium size pumpkin that would normally be around $15.00 to $20.00 in most stores.

However, I scored with these as they were on sale for $5.00 and $4.00 each!

Before placing them on the mantle, I placed some fall leave stems on the mantle for a base.

Then added a few berries.

Once I had the pumpkins in place, I twisted a bittersweet vine in amongst the pumpkins.

The candle sticks were some I’ve had for years from Southern Living At Home.

At this point I loved the simplicity of the mantle, but it still seemed a little bare.

Mainly because my fireplace wall is HUGE!

So I decided to make a banner.

This was a super simple project that I will share with you later!

I had these lanterns sitting on the hearth.

They’ve been empty awhile while I was looking for something other than candle to go in them.

On a whim, I placed the blue and white vases inside of them and add a cute orange and white bow to tie in the orange and blue theme of the living room.

We are really loving a simple fall mantle!

On a side note, I found these super cute tags at Hob Lob recently.

I’m in LOVE with them.

At first, I thought about making my own, but at $3.99 less 40% I couldn’t resist picking up a set.

Aren’t they cute?

It’s like adding jewelry to a little black dress!

Who doesn’t love a pumpkin that has a little bling?

I’ve enjoyed putting out my fall stuff so much that I’ve decided to head to my sisters house and help her get her fall on!

Stay tuned for that!

Until next time…..

Remember these painted pumpkins? They were the jumping off point for my navy and orange fall porch.

I painted them to match my front door and my new doormat.

Normally, I tend to stay with black as my “neutral” color, then add all the wonderful fall colors from white to a deep orange.

But this year, I felt the need to change things up a bit.

Go with something a little unexpected.

I shared this new fall doormat with you a few weeks ago.

Have I told you how much I love it?

Sorry! But I really do!

Well, this doormat sealed the deal.

Navy and orange were officially my fall front porches colors.

I ordered a new fall garden flag to match my new colors.

Which was harder than it sounds, as not many retailers have navy as a fall color.

This picture doesn’t do this cute little flag justice.

It has lots of textures and the colors just pop off of the navy background.

I put my favorite fall sign up also.

This sign has been on our fall front porch for a few years now.

I’m debating whether or not to paint the black navy so that it will match.

What do you think?

All my fall front porch needed was a wreath on the front door.

I made few of these last month.

The Dollar Tree had these sweet happy harvest truck signs in both red and blue.

I wanted the blue, however my Dollar Tree didn’t have a blue one.

While I was disappointed, I figured that the red would still match my front porch.

Then my sweet friend Darlene called and told me that she found a blue truck for me in Dallas!

Woo hoo! That girl is just the sweetest!

My hunt for mums ended this past Saturday.

Everywhere I went I asked for mums and got “the look”.

You know the one, the one that you get a lot from guys who work at big box stores when you are wanting something outside of the box!

Yeah, that one.

Yes, I know that it’s over 100 degrees, but this girls got a blog and needs to get her mums for the front porch!

While they did not have any white ones, that’s okay.

By October, I will probably need to buy news because, yes it is 100 degrees and mums just aren’t that happy in hot weather.

My navy and orange fall porch is complete and I couldn’t be happier with it.

Until next time….

Hello! Can you believe that we are days away from September? I know not all of you are football fans, but I can’t wait for football season to start. When it’s football season it’s time to decorate for fall. At least it is here at the Castle! Going through my fall stuff I realized that my pumpkins had lost a little of their orange luster and needed an update. I decided to paint some buffalo check pumpkins!

I’ll be honest, I found this idea on one of my binge sessions on Pinterest.

Jennifer from Dimples and Tangles blog shared the cutest hot pink buffalo check pumpkins ever! She calls hers gingham check. So cute!

Step 1: Paint the pumpkins white!

To get great coverage, I did 3 light even coats of Martha Stewarts Multi-surface paint.

I loved Jennifers hot pink pumpkins, but decided that I wanted to go with blue ones.

I love how navy looks with orange!

Since you need two different colors of blue, I simply mixed white and navy together to get a lighter blue.

Step 2: Paint vertical stripes.

I would love to tell you that I mathematically figured out spacing, but we all know that my math skills are severely lacking.

Using a blue pencil, I light marked off where I thought my stripes should be, then started painting.

Once my vertical stripes had dried, I then marked where my horizontal stripes should go.

This time I did want my stripes to be the same size.

It’s hard to see, but I marked the width on a piece of plastic and used that as a guide for my spacing.

Yes, a ruler would have been my first choice, however mine seems to have gone missing!

A girls gotta do what a girls gotta do!

This is what my pumpkin looked like when I was done painting both the horizontal and the vertical stripes.

Time for step 4!

Using the navy paint, I painted the square where the horizontal and vertical lines meet.

Ta Da!!!!

My Buffalo check pumpkin was done.

Time to decorate the front porch.

I love how the navy pumpkin matches the blue of my front door.

It was so much fun painting the buffalo check that I decided to paint another one.

This time with orange polk-a-dots.

Hello pumpkin!

Now to decorate the rest of the porchlette!

On a side note, I am wondering why I always work on the porchlette after the sprinklers have run and the mortar is still wet making it look like icky mold?

I’m filing that under things to improve on!

Hope that you all have a wonderful weekend.

Until next time….

My name is Tammy and I am a throw pillow addict. Throw pillows, throw blankets and accessories are the first things I reach for when I’m decorating for a new season and holidays. This pillow started a search for all things fall this year. So stinkin’ cute! However, I needed more pillows to go with it. So began the search for affordable fall throw pillows.

Today I’m going to share a few of my favorites with you!

This pumpkin pillow from Pier 1 is so pretty! I love that it’s a mix of traditional fall colors with the cool blue tones.

The texture is perfect for fall also.

Now all I need is a fall scented candle and I’m ready for fall!

This could quite possibly be my all time favorite pillow.

Since our sweet black lab, Sadie, passed this summer this pillow is a great reminder of her.

Also from Pier 1 and a great price.

Remember I said that I had an addiction to throw pillows? So true.

So much so, that over time, I had created my own storage nightmare.

The heavenly choir sang the day that I found out about pillow covers!

Easy to change out, easy storage and great on price.

I’ve even made a few of my own!

These pillow covers are from Amazon and come in sets of two for under $15.00.

I know that navy might not be what most of you would consider a traditional fall color, but it is for me.

I love how crisp navy and orange look together.

And since my living room is basically blues and neutrals, these navy and white buffalo check pillow covers would be beautiful.

For you more traditional fall color lovers, they also come in a variety of colors, including black and white.

Halloween anyone?

Again, the come in sets of 2 and are under $15.00.

Don’t you love a little velvet in the fall and winter?

Soft and cuddly!

These navy velvet pillow covers are a perfect pairing with busier patterned pillows.

Again, I’m loving the navy!

Also available in many colors!

They also come in sets of 2 and are under $15.00 for the pair.

So, what did I end up with?

Why , the navy velvet, of course!

I couldn’t resist this happy fall y’all pillow. Especially since it matches my front door fall wreath.

Last week it was on sale for under $15 ( see a theme here?)

This week it is a little more, however it is totally worth it.

Even at full price, I still put this pillow in the category of affordable fall throw pillows.

I also snagged a new blue and white throw to tie it all together.

Bring on Fall y’all!

Until next time….

My BFF, Roxanne, went to Magnolia this past weekend. She found this wonderful basket in the dent and ding section and thought of me. Honestly, I am in love with it. It is HUGE! So huge it takes up almost the entire end of my dining table. Once I got it home, it was time to have some fun. I’ve spent the morning decorating a Magnolia basket!

Did I mention that she only paid $15.00 for this basket? Original it was $88.00.

What a steal!

I knew that I wanted to decorate my basket with fall decor.

In my mind, the basket would be decorated with lots of white pumpkins, some soft sage greenery and maybe some filler.

However, as I was unpacking my fall decor to see what I had and what I needed to buy , I saw that all of my velvet pumpkins matched my dining room chairs.

Since this basket was definitely going in the dining room, wouldn’t velvet pumpkins be a good fit?

So, I thought why not?

I could always try it out and if I didn’t like it, I would only be out my time.

I stacked the pumpkins in the basket and stepped back to see how it looked.

Right away, I noticed two things.

One, that white sweater pumpkin was too white to be with the rest of the pumpkins.

It had to go!

Two, it needed a little something else, besides pumpkins!

A little more texture, something to break up all of the velvet texture.

After digging through my stash, I found this simple berry vine.

And you know what?

I really like it!

Don’t get me wrong, I may still change it to the white pumpkins and sage greenery, but for today I’m loving all of the wonderful fall colors.

Decorating a Magnolia basket was a lot of fun!

So much fun that I see a lot more playing with my basket in my future!

Until next time…

Hey y’all! I have to say that it’s hot. I mean really, really hot. Like 111 degrees hot. Hotter than Hell’s basement hot. It’s so hot here at The Castle we’ve got a whole lot of nothin’ goin’ on! It’s even too hot to get in the pool.

Seriously, I’m so over this heat, I’m ready for fall to hurry it’s self up and get here!

Between the heat and our house being back on the market, yes, I said back on, we are hard pressed to do much of anything.

We did take a few days and head to Oklahoma for my niece, Beep’s, second birthday!

I can not believe that she’s already 2!

She loves flamingos, so that was the theme for her party.

As my Granny used to say, She’s so cute I just want to pinch her!

With the house on the market, I can’t do a whole lot of projects.

Especially those that take any amount of time, you never know when you’ll get a call to show the house.

So, I’ve been doing a little shopping.

I found these sweet Halloween pillows.

Y’all know I have an addiction!

However, the skeleton will be going to my youngest’s house, so I’m not feeling too guilty.

The skeleton came from Home Goods and the Witch Is In came from Sam’s!

My house shoes bit the dust, so I was on the hunt for something cute, light weight, with a hard sole for summer.

Tall order.

Until I found these!

I know, just what you wanted to see, pictures of my feet!

These sweet things came from Amazon!

Totally impractical, but a girls gotta have some glam once in awhile.

Did you know that Bath and Body has been having sales on their Fall products?

Last week if you ordered $25.00 worth of product, you were gifted this pumpkin wall plug in with fragrance refill!

I’m on the fence about the gold leaves, but over all it’s cute .

And the smell is divine!

So what did I order?

Bath and Body Works hand soap!

Next, this may be my favorite thing I’ve purchased this month.

This adorable Fall sign!

Not only is it cute, but….

It is reversible!

One minute it’s Fall, then it’s Boo to you!

So stinkin’ cute.

Too bad it’s not nearly time to put it out.

However, until it is time I’ll be sitting here at The Castle where we’ve got a whole lot of nothin’ goin’ on!

Until next time…

Hey all! I’m back with more of my Dollar Tree haul. Today I’m sharing a Dollar Tree pumpkin makeover! As you can see they have a ton of baby pumpkins, but some are not in the colors that most of us decorate with.

Over the years, I’ve decorated, carved and painted a lot of pumpkins, but I’ve never given a makeover to a Dollar Tree pumpkin.

Shocking, I know!

However, don’t pass those deals by just because they aren’t perfect.

It’s so easy to custom make them to fit your home!

Using chalk paint, I gave my baby boos 2 coats of chalk paint.

I left those bright green stems on to have a handle while I painted.

Trust me, those will be removed later.

Once I had two good coats of paint, I removed the green stems and added a stick from my yard.

Using a craft knife, I cut a hole out of the top of my pumpkin slightly smaller than the circumference of my stick.

Once, my stick was in the pumpkin, I added a little bit of hot glue to hold it in place.

While I was waiting on the pumpkins to dry, I made a few bows to go on the top of my pumpkins.

Each is different, as I made them to go in my sisters homes as well as mine.

One sister has more of a glam style, while the other is more stream lined.

Of course, mine is somewhere in between.

This pumpkin will go in my sisters home that loves a more stream lined look.

She lives in a craftsman bungalow and all of her colors are warm earth tones.

Sister #2 likes lots of girly glam with turquoise!

I knew she would love this ribbon and for a little added glam, I added a fun old ear ring as an embellishment.

And last, but not least, my baby boos!

I wanted a more traditional, shabby chic look.

I have to admit that this Dollar Tree pumpkin makeover was super fun, easy, and took very little time.

My kind of project!

Until next time…..

Remember last week when I shared my Dollar Tree haul? I found so many good things, I couldn’t wait to get started using them. Today I’m sharing how I made a happy harvest wreath. It’s super easy, took less than 1 hour and cost under $20.00.

Here is a list of the supplies you will need:

One 18″ wire wreath – WalMart $2.77

1 1/2 rolls Burlap ribbon – Hobby Lobby $9.99 on sale 1/2 price.

Wire – free as I already had it in my studio

Ribbon for a bow – about 3.00. I bought 2 rolls of ribbon and made 3 bows.

Happy Harvest truck sign – Dollar Tree $1.00

This burlap ribbon is perfect for my wreath for a couple of reasons.

It’s a wire ribbon, which means that it will be easy to use and keep it’s shape.

Any pesky loops going the wrong way?

Simply twist it around to where you want it!

Also, I liked the lighter, more bleached out color of this ribbon.

I won’t bore you with the actual how to on this one.

However, in case you want to know how to make one, there are a ton of how to make a burlap wreath video’s on Youtube!

I found one to refresh my memory and I was surprised to see that the lady giving the tutorial said that it took about 10 minutes to make one of these wreaths.

She must be a ton speedier than I am for sure!

Honestly, I’d estimate it took me about 25 – 30 minutes to make this wreath.

While not hard to make, it is a little time consuming.

Once my wreath was made, it was time to add the embellishments.

This Happy Harvest truck sign from the Dollar Tree is definitely the star of this wreath.

I love everything about this sign with one exception.

The super shiny silver leaf that came on it.

However, that was a super easy fix.

I simply added a few coats of Martha Stewarts Multi-Purpose metallic gold paint.

To hang my sign onto my wreath I used about 12″ of light weight wire.

To give my wreath a little more color, I added this bow that has a ton of fall color.

Honestly, I love my happy harvest wreath.

I can’t wait to hang it!

Now, if it would ever get cool enough here in North Texas to feel like fall that would be awesome.

Right now it’s 105 with no end in sight.

Come on fall!

Until next time….

Since our house is on the market, I’ve been limited on the projects that I can do. The house must be clean at all times and let’s face it, my projects can get a little messy! However, it hasn’t stopped me from a few small projects and a little shopping to get a few things from the Dollar Tree!

Dollar Tree has some of the cutest things this season.

Unfortunately, since we are planning on moving soon I had to leave quite a few of them at the store.

However, there were a few things that I knew if I didn’t pick up, they wouldn’t be there after our move.

This is my all time favorite!

So cute, right?

Especially since I had seen a similar one at Hob Lob.

This is the one from Hobby Lobby.

Is it cuter than the one from Dollar Tree?

Yes. But, it’s price is $15.99.

So, is it $14.99 cuter?

I’d say probably not.

Dollar Tree’s website shows a blue truck along with the red one, however my Dollar Tree didn’t have the blue one.

I love them so much that I bought 3.

Oh, the plans I have for them….

I snagged these super cute napkins for fall.

Tip: They are great as hand towels in the bathroom for guests. I use them there all the time!

My last buy was something that I have no idea what I will be doing with it!

But these galvanized metal words were so pretty I will definitely find a project that they will be perfect for!

All three signs came together for $1.00.

There was a ton of cuteness that stayed at the store, but sadly this girl is on buying restriction.

But you might not be. Run, run now, before they are all gone!

Until next time……

This is the story about the week that was. I certainly hope that it’s over anyway! I hate to complain because all of our issues, for the most part, were first world problems.

Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t all bad. I did have quite a few pick me ups to get me over the less than fun parts for sure!

I promised that I wouldn’t share any more pumpkins with you this fall. However, I saw some recently and thought “Hey, I could make those”. Then I thought that maybe you would like to make some too.  So today I’m sharing how to make damask pumpkins!

These mini pumpkins were super easy to make and are the perfect decoration in my dining room. 

The Queens, my 7 besties, get together and it’s a free for all. Lots of laughing, lots of sharing and lots of talking. Sometimes, one thing leads to another and one of us is compelled to share about something totally unrelated to the current subject. Which is so confusing. We have decided that when this happens we are required to shout “Random” before we introduce that subject. Today I’m shouting Random, because I’m sharing Random fall decor!

I shared my fall front porch with you last week. I had originally wanted some white mums for the front porch. However, I couldn’t find them anywhere! Until today.

It’s been raining cats and frogs here at the castle. I’m in need of some serious light therapy! Instead of therapy, during a brief respite from the rain, I chose to  clean off the summer front porch and decorate my fall front porch.

Recently, one of my favorite bloggers was a little incredulous that there are people who actually use faux pumpkins. I get where she was coming from. I do.

However,  those of us who live in the southern states totally get the faux pumpkin craze. It’s still HOT here.

Today I’m sharing with you The Great Pumpkin Part 4. It’s also the last great pumpkin post. Now, I’m not saying that I won’t post more pumpkins. I do seem to have pumpkins on my mind this year. A lot!

Today’s great pumpkin is one that anyone can do. In fact, it would be a great craft project for kids and for those scrapbookers that have a ton of paper hoarded on the craft room. Come on, you know that you do. Or is that just me?  Anyway, The Great Pumpkin part 4 is a demo on how to make paper pumpkins!

Happy September y’all! I hope that you had a fun Labor Day weekend. We had a fun weekend, however you know I fit in a little time to decorate for early fall in the dining room.

Well, lets be honest. I found time to sprinkle a little early fall here and there all over the castle! Even though it’s hot here in Texas, September definitely signals fall leaves, pumpkins, mums and hopefully cooler temperatures.

I shared a sneak peek of todays pumpkin with my sister. She said it was pretty, but wanted to know if I obsessed with pumpkins? I had to laugh. I guess she missed the part about my series of sharing how to make the perfect pumpkin for your house. The Great Pumpkin part 3!

So without further ado, let me share my latest pumpkin obsession!

If you’ve followed along with me recently, you know I’m really holding myself back on pulling out the fall pumpkins. However, next week is September. Which for me means busting out the fall decor. So today I want to show you how easy setting an early fall table is.

But before the sharing begins, I want to tell you a quick story. One of the best things about blogging is “meeting” new friends. I’ve truly made some of the best of friends, even if I’ve never met them in person.  I love reading their post, comments and the great ideas that I receive from them. One of those peeps for me is Rita at Panoply.

Today I’m sharing the great pumpkin part 2 with you. It’s still hot here, but I’m dreaming of cooler weather, fall leaves, football, dragging out the fall decor and making pumpkins.

A few weeks ago I decided that my fall decor needed a little sprucing up. So, I thought that making a few new pumpkins and sharing them with you seemed like a lot of fun!

Last week I shared with you how to paint a pumpkin. If you missed it you can go here.

This week I’m sharing how to glam your pumpkin up!

I started with this beautiful velvet teal pumpkin.

Pretty on it’s own, however a little bling never hurt any pumpkin!

My inspiration for this project came from a few pumpkins I saw at Pier 1.

I’m finally finishing up fall on the front porch. I’ve been working on my front entry for awhile, but haven’t quite felt like it was finished.

To make it prettier, I would add more pumpkins and flowers.  Done!

An hour or so later, I would be removing them because I felt like I had too many pumpkins and flowers. I tell you, some days it isn’t easy living in my head!

I’ve been trying to bring a little fall to the castle. I started on the inside and have moved out to the front entry. I started by adding a few pumpkins on the porch. With the cooler temperatures, fall is definitely in the air! 

My front porch is not easy to decorate at all! It is small and very tall. A challenge to say the least.

Ten on the 10th took the summer off, but we are back and ready to rock the fall! Ten bloggers sharing fun ideas on the tenth of the month for under $10. Today I want to show you how to make a fall throw for under $10!

It is super easy and only takes a few things to make it! My kind of project.

Earlier this week I started pulling out fall decor for the castle.  I started decorating in the dining room and have moved on to fall in the kitchen.

Do you ever look around and think you have too much stuff? As I started decorating for fall, I felt like I was on overload. Too much going on!