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At The Picket Fence with Vanessa Hunt

Where Ideas for your Home Meet Inspiration for your Heart

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February 8, 2017

Budget Friendly Valentine’s Day

Does anyone else feel like Valentine’s Day was created just to help break up the dreary winter? I always think of it as a mile marker along the way to Spring and today I have some fantastic Budget Friendly Valentine’s Day ideas to help make the holiday extra special for the ones you love.

If you are planning on staying in, why not make something sweet for your sweetheart. These recipes are so easy!

Nutella and Blackberry Hand Pies

Nutella and Blackberry Valentine's Day Hand Pies

 Decadent Chocolate Bark 

Decadent Valentine's Day Chocolate Bark from At The Picket Fence

 Chocolate and Pink Salt Dipping Spoons

Chocolate and Pink Salt Dipping Spoons and Mug from At The Picket Fence

 

Homemade gifts are the best, don’t you think? Here are some budget friendly ideas for showing your loved ones you care without breaking the bank.

Faux Wood Valentine’s Day Candles

Faux Wood Valentine's Day Candles from At The Picket Fence

DIY Love Mug

DIY Love Mug from At The Picket Fence

Chalkboard Love Word Search Puzzle

Valentine's Day chalkboard word search atthepicketfence.com

 

And of course we can’t leave out the kiddos! Here are some super cute and super thrifty ideas for making Valentine’s Day special for them.

Valentine’s Day Poppers

diy valentine's day poppers

Heart Applique Shirts

hanging heart shirts resized

Clay Heart Tags

Clay Heart Tag2 At the Picket Fence

And because you can never have enough thrifty inspiration, here are some more fabulous ideas from the Thrifty Style Team!

thrifty style team logo_namesREVISED

Every month we’re bringing you some of our favorite thrifty and budget friendly ideas and we hope you enjoy them.

An InLinkz Link-up

Thanks so much for meeting me at the fence today friends,

Vanessa signature

7 Comments Filed Under: Crafts, Decorating, Desserts, Good Ideas, Holidays, Kids, Valentine's Day Tagged With: Valentine's Day, Valentines Day crafts

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Shirley@Housepitality Designs says

    February 8, 2017 at 5:03 AM

    Great Valentine’s projects and recipe!….I love the felted heart shirts!!!

    Reply
  2. Bliss says

    February 8, 2017 at 5:48 AM

    I need some Valentines ideas. This year I was so thrifty that instead of buying chocolates in a cute heart I bought them in their regular white box because I got more candy for less money. I think I’ll at least go to the dollar store and buy a heart shaped plate!

    Reply
  3. laura says

    February 8, 2017 at 1:32 PM

    vanessa, you had me at chocolate bark! xoxo

    Reply
  4. Julie says

    February 8, 2017 at 4:03 PM

    Thank goodness for Valentine’s Day…I really do love decorating for it. I also enjoy the day because Rick is extra nice to me that day and I love watching him bring the girls their chocolate heart. These are are all such cute ideas, Vanessa…I want that pie. Thanks so much for being a part of our sweet team!

    Reply
  5. Mary Beth says

    February 8, 2017 at 4:14 PM

    I love your ideas….all of them! I saw your TV spot with those poppers and I think that is the cutest idea. So nice to be “hopping” with you. xo

    Reply
  6. kristi@ishouldbemoppingthefloor says

    February 8, 2017 at 6:55 PM

    So many fantastic ideas, Vanessa! Love the clay heart the best…so simple but so sweet. Happy Valentine’s Day to my favorite friends at the fence! 😉

    Reply
  7. Chanele says

    February 10, 2017 at 12:07 PM

    I totally agree. I feel like Valentine’s Day is the perfect Day to add some red and cheer to the gloomy winter days! Your Bark looks delicious!

    Reply

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Happy Friday!! I’m working on a blog post to sha Happy Friday!! I’m working on a blog post to share all of the details of our family room shelving makeover but I’m super impatient and just had to give you all a sneak peek!! We are SO happy with how they turned out and it finally looks like I’ve always envisioned. Our quick fix years ago (scroll to see the before photo) never felt quite right but now? Soooo much better!! 🙌🏻 Big shoutout to our amazingly talented friend Matt @redemptive_woodworx for bringing our vision to life and doing such impeccable work.

I hope you all have a great start to the 4th of July weekend and make sure to check my stories later for Friday Funnies!
The month of June is coming to a close and it has The month of June is coming to a close and it has been JAM packed! The highlight by far though was my son's graduation from high school. When I started blogging, he was only 6 years old and some of you have been apart of my community here for that entire time. Now, he's 19 and there is a reason parents are told not to blink because the years truly do go faster than I ever could have imagined. He has become such an incredible young man we are so excited to see how God is going to unfold the next chapter of his life. We celebrated with parties galore (SO many open houses to attend!) and made memories we'll forever cherish. My mama heart was filled to bursting with the joy of it all! Now we're taking some time to just enjoy these warm, summer days making even more memories because, when you’re at this stage of parenting, you know all too well how much you need to grasp every opportunity to spend time together.

I hope your summer is off to a great start too dear friends! 🪴
“And so with the sunshine and the great bursts o “And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.” F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Happy first day of summer dear friends!! I can’t believe it’s been so long since I posted something new here but life has been crazy. I’ll have some new photos of house projects and life events to share with you soon but, got now, I’m just going to enjoy this gorgeous first day of summer after our ridiculously long, wet spring. ☀️
“It was June, and the world smelled of roses. Th “It was June, and the world smelled of roses. The sunshine was like powdered gold over the grassy hillside.” (Maud Hart Lovelace) 

Welcome June!
“No man is entitled to the blessings of freedom “No man is entitled to the blessings of freedom unless he be vigilant in its preservation.”
General Douglas MacArthur

Grateful today and every day for those who were vigilant to the point of death in the preservation of our freedom. May we honor their sacrifice by being vigilant too. #memorialday
“Those who know your name trust in you, for you, “Those who know your name trust in you, for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.” Psalm 9:10
This is one of my most favorite projects from my b This is one of my most favorite projects from my book Life in Season! 

Because, if heaven has a fragrance, I’m fairly certain it smells like lilacs.

I think that somewhere along the way the verse in the Bible that said, ‘heaven will smell like lilacs’ just got lost in translation. But it HAD to have been in there at some point, right?

When I bury my head in the blossoms (which I absolutely MUST do every single time I walk past them), I immediately feel a stirring in my soul.

It seems like I wait forever for my lilac tree to bloom. Every year I anxiously watch as the buds begin to form on the branches and then when the blossoms finally burst forth I begin that agonizing process of deciding the absolute perfect moment to snip them and bring them inside.

And then, after all of that waiting and watching it’s just over…done. Because, unlike heaven, lilacs don’t last for an eternity. So, making my own lilac room spray seemed like the perfect way to enjoy their fragrance long after the blossoms have faded.

Here’s how to make it! Ingredients: Water, Vodka, Lilac fragrance oil. Directions: Fill spray bottle with 50/50 ratio of water to vodka. Add 12 drops of lilac oil. Give it a shake, spray and if the scent isn’t strong enough, simply add a few more drops of lilac oil.

Once you’ve made this lilac scented room spray you will be very tempted to spray it in every room in your house. And someone may want to use it in the bathroom to cover up other less…ummmm….pleasing aromas.

But, do not, I repeat do NOT, let them.

You’ve captured the fragrance of heaven in a bottle and you wouldn’t want to go and tarnish it now would you? 😉
We had two back to back days of sunshine (the most We had two back to back days of sunshine (the most we’ve had in a LONG time) and now we are back to pouring rain. This has officially confirmed what I’ve know to be true for awhile now.

I’m a MUCH better version of myself when the sun is shining! 🤪 So I’ll just be over here today plotting and planning how my husband and I can be snowbirds someday when the kids are out of the house.

If you could spend your winters (and apparently most of spring too!) in any part of the country, where would it be?
Happy weekend sweet friends!! We’ve had a LOT of Happy weekend sweet friends!! We’ve had a LOT of rain lately (which is saying something when you live in Oregon) and I’ll admit that it’s affecting my moods a bit. I feel like I’m dragging and struggling to find the energy to get stuff done. So don’t mind me if I’m over here looking at photos of my garden in the summertime and finding that it keeps me hopeful about those days to come. They will come, right?! 🤪. 

What are your favorite plants that you look forward to seeing in the summer?
We’re going to be giving our laundry room a make We’re going to be giving our laundry room a makeover soon. It’s LONG overdue! In fact, the folks from the counter company were just here taking measurements. While we have made some simple, inexpensive updates over the years, it still has many of the original elements from when the house was built in 1992.

Two of our bathrooms are also in need of major makeovers. And we’ve saved up enough money over the years to tackle those projects. But, for the most part, we made the decision to use the bulk of that money in another way. While we knew that it was financially wise to invest in our house, we also knew that the greatest investment we could make was in our children. 

I’ll admit, there are times where I see other people doing massive overhauls of their entire home in a matter of months and I feel a prick of envy. But, we decided that if our choice was between waiting a bit longer to enjoy a renovated bathroom or going on adventures as a family, we would choose adventures every time. And we don’t regret that decision for a single second. It’s not that we haven’t tackled home projects (we’ve done a lot!). It’s just that it’s been a slow and steady process. 

Most recently, we let our son pick where we would travel for spring break since this is his senior year of high school and we are trying to make up for lost time. With so much of life ‘paused’ for two years, we have appreciated these moments more than ever. And, since he’ll be heading to college in the fall, we are very aware of how important it is to spend this time together while we still have a modicum of control over everyone’s schedules.

We have many years left to remodel our home but only so much time left to make memories with our children.

And, while I’m always happy to look around my home and see rooms that are updated and more reflecting of our style, it doesn’t compare to the joy I feel when I look around my home and see the people I love the most who have been shaped by the many adventures we’ve experienced together.
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