DIY Cute Eyelash Pumpkin + 5 Free Pumpkin Carving Templates

A few years ago Casey and I both came to the conclusion that we don't really like carving pumpkins. It's a LOT of work and it's messy, yet every year we make ourselves do it because it's what you do! But then this year I realized that they make carve-able artificial pumpkins and my eyes lit up. I can carve a pumpkin without the mess and hard labor? Count me in! So today I'm going to show you how to carve one of these pumpkins (of "funkin" as some call it) with a stencil, and bonus- it's stinkin' cute. Find this template and 4 others below after the tutorial.

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To complete this project, you will need:
- A carve-able artificial pumpkin or "funkin"
- X-acto knife
- Scotch Tape
- Something with a pointy sharp end, such as a toothpick
- A cute template!

Start by taping your template/ stencil on the center of your pumpkin. My pumpkin was very slender so I had to cut my template up and move the eyes closer together. Make sure you use scotch tape because you need something gentle. You don't want the paint on your pumpkin to come off!

Take your toothpick and start poking holes around the edges of the shapes on your template.

When you pull the paper off, you should see a bunch of holes in the pumpkin that are the shape of your template.

Take your X-acto knife and start cutting out the shapes by connecting all the dots. Make sure you do this by making smaller poking motions rather than dragging the blade through the foam. I learned the hard way that the layer of paint on the pumpkin will peel off with the dragging motion.

Once you have cut out around a small section you can poke out the piece.

You will also have to cut out a section around the pumpkin stem at the top so you can open the pumpkin (just like normal) to put a candle inside.

We put the top of our pumpkin on for this photo, but when we burn the candle, we just leave the top off. I'm not sure if it's safe or not to keep the top on as it is made of foam. Check with your pumpkin manufacturer if you really want to keep the top on.

And we made a little video so you can see the steps in action!

You can buy these pumpkins online here or go to your local Target and get this exact pumpkin! I'm thinking about getting a couple more to carve because this one was way less stressful to make than all other pumpkins I've carved. Or maybe I should quit while I'm ahead?

Don't forget to grab your free pumpkin carving templates below and tag us on Instagram in your photos of your carved (real or fake) pumpkins!

If you liked this post, please share the love and pin something from the post to your Pinterest!

xo, Savannah


5 FREE PUMPKIN CARVING TEMPLATES

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    DIY Fall Garland + Doorstep With Old Time Pottery

    This is a sponsored post by Old Time Pottery, and as always, all thoughts + opinions are our own. We are so grateful to our sponsors who make it possible for us to keep bringing you great content! 

    IT'S REALLY FALL, Y'ALL! Here in Nashville, in one day the temperature went down 28 degrees. It went from blazing hot- wearing tank tops + shorts- to delightful fall temps- wearing jeans + flannels. Praise! I'm here for that. I am here for it, ok? When we decorated our front porch it was still blazing hot. No joke it was still 90 degrees, so this all felt like a lie for a second. Pumpkins in 90 degrees ain't right. We knew the weather would change and we'd be feeling fall-y soon. Today we are sharing with you how we decorated our front stoop and how we made this beautiful fall garland.
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    We were really excited to work with Old Time Pottery on this project because we love that store. There is one that's pretty close to our house and the store always has really great finds! For New Years Eve one year we bought 24 champagne glasses there for $24 which was cheaper than buying the disposal plastic ones.

    They have every kind of home thing you can think of. For this project we bought 3 pieces of the same fall garland which is great on it's own, but we wanted to take it the next level and fill it out even more. We also got a variety of silk flowers and a wreath that we are in love with!
    Your first step is going to be to attach all 3 of the garlands together. You will wrap floral wire around the ends until you feel like it is secure.

    Next, wrap floral tape around the wire so that blends in better.

    Now trim the stems on your silk flowers. Make sure to leave enough room to wrap the steps around the base of the garland.

    Next you will want to figure out where you're going to place your flowers. The easiest way to do this is to plan out where your largest flowers are going. Measure your garland and find out where the middle is. This will be your starting point and where you will place your first flower.  Then based on the length of your garland you will figure out how much distance should be between each of the large flowers. Once you have those laid out, then you can more easily figure out where to place your smaller flowers.

    Lastly, attach all of the flowers in their places using floral wire. You can also add floral tape around the wire but we found this was unnecessary because the wire was pretty hidden.

    You will likely have mess around with the flowers and bend the stems a little to make sure that you are having the flowers face forward. This take a little maneuvering.


    Now go hang your beautiful garland somewhere that you can enjoy it all season! The wreath, silk flowers, and the garland were all provided by Old Time Pottery. They have so much fall + Halloween decor, so you should definitely go check one out. Click here to find where one is near you.

    We hope you have enjoyed this DIY and are inspired to make your front door a little more jazzy for fall. Thanks for reading and if you like this idea we would love for you to share it and pin! You guys are awesome!!!



    36 Hours in Birmingham, Alabama Travel Guide

    This past week we were supposed to be camping at Grayton Beach State Park in Florida (you can read about our last GBSP trip here), but Hurricane Michael had other plans. It was a whirlwind of a week as we drove all the way to the beach, set up camp, had a run-in with Red Tide, and was evacuated from our campsite all in 24 hours. So on our way back to Nashville the next day, we made a last minute decision to stop for a couple days in Birmingham, and we are so glad we did!

    Birmingham is only 2 hours and 45 minutes from Nashville, and it's a place that neither of us have ever really had on our list. But guess what? Birmingham should be on your list. Especially if you live within a 3 hours drive. It's the perfect place for a weekend trip.

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    Since we were on our way back from camping, we had our dogs with us (they always camp with us!) and we were exhausted. So all we wanted to do was to lay down and get out of the car. So we booked a cheap Airbnb that allowed dogs and made our own dinner the first night we were there. And then we went to sleep. If you have time when you arrive to do something on the first night, there are numerous great restaurants to try. We will list some of these below!

    9 AM: Go to Big Bad Breakfast for breakfast: Casey and I both had one of their skillets, but the menu was full of a-little-over-the-top-yet-exactly-what-you-want breakfast items. Plus the service was great and that is something we both appreciate SO much.

    This restaurant, Real & Rosemary, was right by BBB and it was freakin' cute! If we had more time, we would've checked this place out.

    Another food option is Farm Bowl + Juice Co. The building design is nice and there is a fun geometrical mural on the side if you need a backdrop for a photo. They have things like acai bowls, oatmeal, and juices, etc.

    10:30 AM: Walk around the Homewood area. There was a whole strip of shops that went on and on. We spent a good part of the day here. Our first stop was Wild Things- a flower shop with a lot of other home accessories. Anywhere we go, we end up at a flower shop. (See the one we went to in Asheville that we loooooved here.)

    The interior was beautifully curated and designed, I almost forgot it was a flower shop!

    This was just a cute little alley off the strip of shops.

    Seibel's was a great store that was unlike most. We love a store that has it's own style and isn't trying to be just like everything else. This store was a home goods store, but it was all beautifully designed things that make you want to buy a cabin just so you can decorate it with things all from this store. There was a recliner (that's right! a recliner...) that we both could not pull ourselves away from. I mean we had to obviously, it was way out of our price range and someone had already bought it. But if a store can make you fall in love with a recliner, it has to be a really good store.

    It's hard to say which one of the stores we visited was our favorite, but this one is the one I wish we had in Nashville. At Home Furnishings was HUGE. And it was all good stuff. There was a massive section of dishes, vases, serving ware, etc. which we spent a lot of time in. But they also had any kind of home decor you could think of, linens, and even furniture. I had been looking for a couple plates for our other blog and actually found them here! And Casey found these little pumpkins to use for styling. AND we've already used both of these things, so I'll just go ahead and show you those pictures.

    Sugar-free PSL here.
    There was also a store called SOCA Clothing. It was your basic boutique with cute and stylish clothing and accessories. It was definitely the best place for clothing that we found.

    After the walk around Homewood, we picked up our dogs and took them to the dog park. If you aren't traveling with dogs, then there's more time for whatever else you want to do!

    12 PM: Stop by Sozo Trading Co. This was a fun little spot! It's sort of thrift store, but it's curated. There are booths so there are all kinds of things in there from brand new clothing to holiday decor and vintage dishes. I got a slouchy sweater here and we found this really cute heart mug that we had to have.

    1 PM: Head to Urban Standard for coffee and a little snack. This coffee shop is huge and has plenty of seating. They also have real food, which is always a plus in case you need some sustenance. We shared a gluten-free scone (that was a real great texture for something gluten-free) and got a little work done. Another option would be to eat a light lunch at one of the other restaurants we recommend above. Or you could go the heavier route and eat at Yo Mama's. We really considered going there because they had a ton of gluten-free options, but we didn't end up making it.

    5 PM: Head to Vulcan Trail for a hike with a nice view of the city and hopefully a nice sunset. When we were in Birmingham the sun set around 6:15. We didn't know much about the trail except that you could see the city from it. It's about a mile one way, but it is paved, so it's not an intense hiking experience. I was wearing sandals and Casey had her Birkenstocks on and we were totally fine. Apparently you can go 1 mile further into the woods, but we stayed on the pavement section only.



    The thing I realized that I love about visiting cities that you know nothing about is that you get the chance to discover something. There's no preconceived notions about what you should be doing- you just do what you want. The things that other people have done there don't shape your trip. Like this cast-iron statue for example. We had no idea it existed. It is a huge statue that you can see from across the city and people pay to go look at it up close. Apparently it's the largest cast-iron sculpture in the world. Who even knew? It's random, but it's really fun to find out little things like this about a city.

    7 PM: Head to the rainbow LED tunnel. This is another thing that we had no idea existed, so it was such a surprise to learn about it! This is actually under a bridge that you drive through, but there are two walkways on either side of the road. When you are driving through the tunnel it seems really short, but once you park and walk to it, you realize that it actually is pretty cool. And the lights change colors so it seems like the colors are moving through the tunnel. You just have to see it with your own eyes. We were not planning on taking photos of ourselves, but this place was just cool that we had to.

    We also lost a piece to our tripod, so we had to rig the camera up to take this picture AND you can see that there is a remote in my hand. Didn't see it before I said that? Oh well, it's what really happened. When we take pics like this we have about a 2 minute emotional limit to get the pic. After that we are done and what we have is what we have. So remote in hand pic is the winner of the bunch.

    8 PM: Head to dinner at Melt. A couple of our followers recommended this restaurant and Casey read about it in her search for things to do in Birmingham. It was SO delicious! They specialize in melts- go figure. Maybe I didn't realize that until I was literally ordering my meal...? Their fries were beer battered and unreal. So was the melt I had. They even have gluten-free bread!

    Since we aren't the night life type, we headed home after dinner. We actually lost electricity soon after though because the winds were so strong before the hurricane hit. Even though we were 4 hours north of the shore! But I'm sure if you wanted to keep the night going, you could find plenty to do.

    10 AM: Grab a coffe at Woodlawn Cycle Cafe for the road. Casey loved the latte she had from here and the interior was designed nicely.


    The coffee shop was in an area called Woodlawn and they had this cute mural right outside. It seemed like all the shops in the area were really new and it also seemed like they are trying to liven the area up a bit. There's a little strip of storefronts that seem new or redone and I definitely think more things will be in this area as time goes on.

    All in all, Birmingham did not disappoint. It was a shock to us, I'm not going to lie. We didn't have many expectations, but we just loved the vibe. Every place we ever go, we have a conversation about the "vibe". It's that thing that you can't put your finger on, but that either gives you a good or bad feeling about a place. The moment we drove into Birmingham, the vibe was a good one. And even though it's not a vacation at the beach, it is a nice place to spend a couple of days.

    If you liked this post, please share the love by pinning the image below!

    xo, Savannah

    Home Tour: Our DIY Boho Backyard Oasis

    Some of you may have already seen our video Backyard Tour on our YouTube channel, but this is post is going to be a little different! How, you ask? This post is going to include before photos! You'll get to see exactly what the backyard looked like when we first moved in. We will also be including links to all the things we purchased for this backyard at the end of the post. We will also link to all of our DIY projects there as well!

    If you haven't seen what the inside of our house looked like when we first moved in, we have a TON of blog posts about the renovation of each room, in detail.

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    And here she is- the very strange asphalt space in between our house and the grass. What was the strangest thing about this space is that it didn't even provide more parking. If you got more than two cars back here, no one would be able to get out. So we decided we needed to cover up all this ugly.

    Here is what that asphalt looks like today! It's totally covered up. Casey's step dad built a deck that covers almost all of the space. In the space where the stock tank pool lives, there used to be gravel. That was the immediate solution to covering up the asphalt. But the gravel was terrible for all the bare feet walking around from the lounge chairs to the pool. Eventually it was concreted over!

    It's kind of hard to tell in the photos, but this asphalt was a problem. It was cracked and crumbly all over. And also ugly. This picture is actually from when we didn't even have a fence yet!

    Now this pergola is right over that area.

    This retaining wall was also an eyesore, and we still are dealing with it's deterioration. The new deck covered up a big portion of the wall and we had garden beds built on top of it that kind of pulls the eye away from it. We've considered a million different ways to cover the wall up, but they are all extremely labor intensive and/or expensive.

    So for now... it is still here!


    This is a tiny deck that existed already, and it's right off of the space that is now the studio. This got ripped out, and once we saw how it was built, we were glad it went away!

    Here is a better view of it.

    This outdoor bar was also built by Casey's stepdad and we love it! It's perfect for entertaining.

    Now the backyard has gone through many stages, so we are going to put all the pictures here for you to see. We still love this picture and this stage of the backyard! Unfortunately the couch area would be exposed to sunlight for a majority of the day and we really needed some relief from that. It was always way too oppressive to be outside.

    So Casey's stepdad and myself built this pergola! It's way more tolerable to be outside in the Tennessee heat now.

    This picture is from when we first got our stock tank pool and still had the gravel.

    Thank goodness we did a DIY and painted those chairs! We were having a hard time making this space feel like it was our style, so this was the first step in doing so.

    Then, a year later, we got the concrete!

    And a year after that we did our DIY Stenciled Tile Concrete Floor! Which was SUCH hard work, but looks so good. People ask us all the time where our tile came from. But it's just paint!



    Casey's stepdad also built us this long picnic table where we seat 14-16 people! It's perfect for entertaining.

    Check out our video tour to get a better understanding of our outdoor space!

    Okay, here are the things you can buy:
    Hammock Chairs
    White Bar Stools
    Tiki Umbrellas
    Pool Floats
    Disco Ball
    Gas Fire Pit
    Lounge Chairs
    Globe Lights

    And here are the things you can DIY:
    DIY Stock Tank Pool
    DIY Boho Bamboo Wall

    If you stuck through this whole post, we thank you for reading! If you would like to see more posts like this, please pin an image from this post. Sharing is caring!

    xo, Savannah