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Looking for beautiful fall linens to decorate with for Thanksgiving? I was on the hunt for some a couple of years ago. I loved the look of linen, and found some beautiful (expensive) options, that I just wasn’t willing to swallow the price tag of. In the process of finding the perfect fit, I found the all time easiest hack for getting  amazing holiday linens for cheap.

I bought a couple yards of a linen blend fabric, and threw the fabric on my table. It was honestly perfect! I don’t know that I would have done it differently, even if I had the time, and an hour with a sewing machine.

The linen was a little frayed at the edges (more frayed after a wash, if you love that look like I do!), and the fabric was slightly wrinkled, perfectly imperfect. The linen blend fabric made it incredibly affordable too, I think I paid $15 (with my fabric on sale), for the whole tablecloth. I didn’t even miss the seam either, it was beautiful.

The napkins required a little more work, but not much if you own a pair of scissors, and can spend a couple minutes per napkin with a sewing machine. I used a slightly darker linen blend fabric just to add some dimension to the table, and cut 12, 18×18 inch squares. I followed with sewing a 1 inch seam straight onto the single piece of fabric.

We threw on a few candles, our nice dishes, some pretty greenery, and our Thanksgiving table was magic! The easiest Thanksgiving hack there ever was. I hope you enjoy it!

***Also, don’t feel limited to using these linens for thanksgiving, I use them year round, whenever we have a nicer dinner. They’re always amazing!

Last year I waited until two days before Halloween to make the boys their costumes. So, if you haven’t found a Halloween costume for your child yet, no worries! You have time! this easy, sweet, bat costume will take you no more than an hour to make, and is *so* inexpensive to put together.

 

The boys wanted to be bats last year! And, I love the look of a homemade costume. I found the path of least resistance to make them a quick, and easy bat costume. We started with black pants and black/grey shirts, and then added a simple pair of bat wings. Here’s how I made the bat wings:

 

What you’ll need:

hard black felt (sometimes called stiffened or craft felt)

black elastic

white thread

parchment paper

chalk marker/white crayon

scissors

sewing machine

 

How to do it:

1. Make a pattern for your bat wings. With a pencil draw a pair of bat wings on your parchment paper. Edit it and make it just the way you want it, holding it up to your child for a size reference. Once you have the perfect shape, cut the wings out of the parchment.
2. Layer the parchment paper bat wings on top of your black felt and trace it. I did this using a chalk marker, but you could also use a white crayon. Do this twice so you have two matching black bat wings.
3. Cut your bat wings out of the felt, using the markings you just made.
4. Sew the two bat wings together using a 1/2 inch seam from the edge with white thread. The white thread adds some cute/homemade dimension to these wings. But, you could use black thread if you prefer.
5. Cut two pieces of elastic to the right size to be sewed on your bat wings and fit snugly around the child’s arms.
6. Sew the elastic onto the center of the bat wings, with the loop facing toward the edge of the bat wing. Repeat for the elastic for the other arm.
7. 
8. 

 

I hope you and your little ones enjoy this costume as much as we did! Let me know if you end up making it yourself!