It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

My Christmas decor is like everything else in my house: simple, natural, and vintage. I keep Christmas decorating in the back of my mind all year as I visit thrift stores and yard sales and antiques shops. That's where my little primitive Santa and Father Christmas collection started this past year. I adore those primitive figurines.

I also like to use things I already own and incorporate them into my Holiday decor, especially vessels like old silver, cast iron, wood boxes, jars, etc. etc.

I always start with a trip into the woods for any and all kinds of natural things. My driftwood fits into the nature category; I picked that up while we were vacationing on the North Carolina Outer Banks this past summer. I only which I'd picked up more of it! I made my own two front door wreaths and went with simple gold bows instead of my usual red.

I'm loving a stripped down, neutral and natural look this year, too. I usually like red; and I used a lot of red and gold on our tree (which I haven't pictured yet) but in my office/studio my theme was green and white, and I used things from my bird collecting - figurines and nests and such.

On my newly re finished stair case, I went with fir boughs instead of my usual hand-crafted garland, because I didn't feel like covering it up so completely. And I used my big red and gold bows there. :)

Things that really inspired me this Christmas:

Primitive Santas
Vintage bottle brush trees
Deer
Birds
Vintage mittens (Not shown here)
Vintage greeting cards (Shown in the wood box in the photos above)
Vintage flower frogs (stick some of the greeting cards in them)
Vintage wood boxes
Vintage "Shiny Brite" glass ornaments. (I have tons, but I'm afraid to get them all out and use them!)

 As well as:
Twigs, moss, feathers, tree slices,evergreen branches, pine cones, berries, rosemary sprigs, boxwood, ivy, holly, driftwood, magnolia, rocks, odd pieces of wood, and fruit - which are all pretty much free.

What inspires your Christmas decor?

Burlap Bunting Banners For Christmas!

This past October (ish) I made some sample burlap banners and put them in my shop. They quickly sold, and the requests poured in, and I have been making and selling large numbers of them ever since. Most evenings find me at a make shift craft table in my living room, cutting, painting, sewing and packing up the banners.
I had no idea burlap was such a huge trend this year; this was something I originally did for my own decor, and added to my shop as a "test".
Well the test turned out great and I have done photo prop banners, custom banners, wedding banners, nursery decor banners.... any and all kinds of banners.

You can view the banners in my shop by clicking here. 

If burlap sales keep up after Christmas, I'm going to have to think about opening  a third shop on Etsy just for the banners - and some other  burlap items I have started doing samples of. :)

Christmas Post Script

Here is some more of my farmhouse Christmas decor this year.


The (real) tree. We got s short one; about 6 feet.








Burlap was my thing this year... I cut it into strips and used it as ribbon on some of my gifts. I even made bows with it.









I went with a all white (and no red) theme in my dining room mantle decor this year. I also used bird-y things.











I think I am going to stick with this white theme in there... it's clean, fresh, and perfectly wintery.

See you next year, Christmas!

After Christmas

- I did not take one photo over the Christmas weekend. Not one. Wow.

- I always have to mess up at least one recipe for every holiday, so in keeping this this tradition, I made a chocolate Kahlua bundt cake - turns out, you really canNOT trust PAM. From now on I will always take a minute to butter and flour my bundt pan.

- I got all three of the first Star Wars flims on DVD from my sister; and from my other sister, "Th Help" DVD. Yay!

- My momma bought me a steam cleaner so I can clean my vintage coats and gowns at home. Awesome!

- I did not bake a single sugar cookie this Christmas. Not one. On the other hand, I did make about 10 pounds of fudge, butter toffee, peppermint bark, and peanut butter buckeyes. Mmmmm

- I've been working on my resolutions for 2012. The list looks something like this: Waste less. Stay organized. Manage time better. Save more money. Eat out less. Do some strength training......... more to come probably.

- I had my first International blog feature - on this Spanish blog, featuring red lingerie! Wearing red lingerie for the New Year is good luck in Spain - I never knew that.

I have an unexpected 2 additional days off - yesterday I rode with my husband for his job, today I've been catching up on laundry, dishes, kitchen cleaning, refrigerator cleaning and organizing, pantry sorting, list making, and putting away of all the stuff that piles up everywhere.... later, I am off to town to buy some plastic totes for my Christmas decorations. I think it is time they had a plastic tote home, instead of a cruddy old cardboard box home. Plus I want to stock up on Holiday decor clearance sales - woot, woot!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas holiday and I want to thank you all for reading my ramblings on this blog this last year.

onwards to 2012!

Crochet Lace Snowflakes

This year, I made rag ball ornaments, burlap ornaments, and crochet snowflakes to my "homespun", old-fashioned themed Christmas tree.

I showed how to make the rag ball ornaments in this post. The ones I made for the tree, however, I made with the 3 inch styrofoam balls instead of the 4 inch size. Plus I did them in a dark red and tan small check fabric.



The crochet lace snowflakes look like this:



(Cruddy photo; sorry.)

I cut approx. 5 inch lengths of 2 inch wide ecru colored crochet lace trim....



.... and sewed the ends together using a whip stitch to secure all the little ends. Then I made loose, wide stitches (about 1/2 inch) all around the bottom part of the lace, and gave it a gentle pull to gather it up into a round shape, knotting off the thread to hold it in place. I added a vintage shell shank button and a loop of cotton thread for hanging. They take less than 5 minutes each. And they look great on my tree; I love them!



I haven't gotten any pics of the burlap ornaments and how I made those yet; sorry.

I love the way the textiles look on the tree - burlap, lace, and rag strips alongside my rustic, nature-themed ornaments.

Christmastime At My House

I am one of those people that put away all my regular decor at Christmas time and re-do everything in the house Christmas-ey.


The hutch in my "back porch"




I decided to forgo the traditional wreath in favor of a simple fur branch with a burlap bow. I am irritated, though, because the wreath hanger rubbed the paint off my door.... grrrrr


In the kitchen









Pics of my tree, mantle decor, gift wrap, and this year's home made ornaments. Hint: I'm into burlap this year. :)

Shabby Chic Rag Ball Ornaments

I've been busy making little home decor accessories in my spare time; which is abundant of late.







The white ones are made from a vintage infant gown that was too tattered to save.
All may be purchased at my Etsy Shop; and as usual, a portion of all sales from my Etsy shop go to help save young women and girls in Napal and India from human trafficking via L*PIDA and the Napali Rescue Project.

Antique Jelly Mold Votive Holders

I love to use stuff I collect in my Christmas decor. Using these old Jell-O molds as votive holders is perfectly "shabby chic" and most certainly farm-housey. I only have two, but will be on the lookout for more.

Mini Snowglobes

Happy December!



You readers are going to be subject to a barrage of Christmas crafting and decor posts this month, as well as other randomness....

My job has changed a bit recently and my schedule has changed a lot also, so I am working from home much less. For a little while, anyway. It's not permanent. This means I am looking for things to amuse myself (sitting with the elderly does not afford a lot of mental stimulation) while I'm at work. Which means crafts and randomness and more time for blogging about crafts and randomness. Haha!

So I read this post on Casey's blog
showing snow globes.

Of course I had to try it. The author mentioned that the snow globes were inspired by a Martha Stewart book and I have that book.... but I had never tried this project before now.

After I got done with work in the afternoon yesterday, I took myself thrifting (more on that later) and unwound from a beast of a day at the craft super store. Where I picked up the items for making snow globes.





I didn't have time to harvest little pine cones or tree branches at home, so I settled for these adorable mini snow-tipped Christmas trees. So cute. I love little bitty stuff.



I had a few empty old baby food jars in my jar stash; ones I found in boxes in the barns here. I usually store spices in them. So one snow globe totally smells like cloves right now.



Fake snow, baby! It's awesome!





I didn't put water in mine. Too risky. They look neat anyway, I think. Martha Stewart suggests putting glycerine in the water and using glitter for the "snow". I like the idea but think I prefer this way.

Of course I add bows and ribbons to everything, so for these I used some vintage basting tape (I think that's what it's called) from a tin of vintage sewing supplies I bought at a yard sale a few weeks ago. I knew I would figure out ways to use that stuff.

This would be a great thing to do with older kids, and get fun stuff to put in the jars. I will probably do some larger ones with different natural stuff, or I may scavenge the ornament department at the craft store for neat little minis to put in them as well. The possibilities are endless.....