Happy Tuesday!

Just five days until Valentine's! I know some of you are VERY excited, and I'm trying a little harder to be excited too! Not gonna lie-mostly I'm just excited for the chance to make crafty things and decorate my apartment.

And that's what today's post is all about! Crafty cute decor and treats to make your Valentine's Day a little bit sweeter, whether it's with your boo, your gals, or just with you. :) 

The goal of today's post was to only use what I already had in my house, with a maximum purchase budget of $20 for outside pieces. Keep in mind that I'm a person who buys a LOT of craft supplies and promptly never uses them again--so only $20 may not be realistic for everyone, but I made sure everything created would be inexpensive to replicate for the average non-craft buyer. 

So, first up...DECOR!

First up is a REALLY adorable initial, which is perfect to either display on your mantle or hang on your front door! This is a super simple craft project. It takes less than half an hour in total and you can play with prints, patterns, and words--you could even make multiple letters to spell out some "love"-ly things ;)

Here's what you need:

-Wooden initial 

-pink paint

-paintbrush 

-Sharpies (I used gold and red)

-ribbon (optional-for hanging)

(Yes, that's it!)

Here's what you do:

1. Paint the initial pink. You can paint just the top, or you can paint the top and the edges. You could also be edgy and paint the edges a different color (like black or red) to make it pop. 

2. Once it's dry, draw whatever designs you want! I went simple with gold hearts and a red edge, but you could conceivably go bananas and use as many colors/designs as you wanted.

And now...TREATS!

I had the great fortune of getting to bake for the Women's Bar Association bake sale this week, so I have some delicious treats to share! I will give full credit to the original bakers below, but just revel in how delicious these things look. 

First up...how about some red velvet donuts? 

I love donuts. Donuts are in my top five foods (somewhere in there with pizza, mac and cheese, and cupcakes--and yes I have a mature palate), but you know what's great about these? They're baked instead of fried! That means I can pretend they're super healthy for me and eat as many as I want. ;) 

The bonus thing is that even if you do something silly, like forget to put in the vanilla (cough cough), the powdered sugar will cover that right up for you! It's generous like that. 

I found this recipe on Pinterest, but the original post can be found here! 

Next...maybe some Oreo cheesecake cookies?!

The fun thing about these cookies is that they're pink. The cookies are delicious, don't get me wrong (I mean, they're REALLY delicious), but these the fact that they're pink makes them perfect for any Valentine's related celebration! And also, there's Oreos in there. A lot of Oreos. And that makes everything just beautiful in my mind. 

If you wanted to do these for another holiday, you could! I think they'd be adorable in green for St. Patty's Day or orange for Halloween. 

Recipe for these cuties can be found here.

How are you celebrating Valentine's? Wanna try any of my crafty ideas? Show me your photos if you do!

xoxo

Carisa