A Way With Words

I'm afraid I got a little sidetracked from Christmas decorating yesterday.  It's not unusual for me to be sidetracked, of course, but I really needed to stick to a schedule if I'm ever to be ready for the big day!


It all went awry when I walked past a pair of framed engravings that I've been meaning to have re framed for ages.  The engravings were from the 1800's and had been professionally framed (I'm guessing in the 80's) with a gold, metal frame and green matt.  The price on the back of each one is $150.  I think I picked the pair up, at auction, for $10. ~

Thrift, gift, reworked and found does not include custom framing so I've tried to ignore everything but the lovely etchings of the ruins of Fort Ticonderoga and Mount Tom & The Connecticut River.

I was, at the same time, trying to bring myself to get rid of a newspaper from 1916 that was so brittle it crumbled at a touch.  But how do you just throw out all those wonderful words?  In 1916, the Great War is raging and society is changing at breakneck speed.  Britain has a shortage of men for home work and the success of women driving buses has made them decide to have women police officers.  On the same day,  Wriggly's Spearmint Gum is being marketed as calming to women's nerves.  I hope Britain has a good supply of gum for all those female bus drivers and police officers or the streets will be mayhem! 


Something started to gel in my mind and I started cutting and fitting ~

Out came the Modpodg and I started glueing, leaving only the darker green inner matt showing.  You could use a spray adhesive for this but I didn't have any so went the messier route.  Because of the brittleness of the newspaper I also gave it a coat to seal it.  A spray sealer would have dried much faster but, again, none was to be had.

I love (REALLY LOVE) the final result ~

Remember how dark green the inner matt was?  Surrounded by sepia tone and black ink, it appears gray.  The mind reads colour based on light conditions and surrounding colours.  That is why you never want to choose a wall colour without testing it in your home first.

I did do another play on words that is for my Christmas decorating.  I had a badly water damaged, vintage book, titled How We Got The Bible, that belonged to my dad.  He considered entering the ministry before he decided to become an educator.  I hand tore some of the pages, curled the pieces and popped them inside some clear glass ornaments.

How perfect is this for the tree in my library? ~

 
I think I've found a way of getting rid of things AND keeping them too!

~I'm leaving the last word to you ~

Show And Tell Fridays

Let's Decorate The Mantel!

The Christmas Blogger Block Party is in full swing and Day 2 is all about mantels. Kristin from My Uncommon Slice Of Suburbia is hosting this party and the competition is fierce!

I don't actually have a mantel so I have to fudge this a bit and pretend I'm not using a lovely William IV sideboard.  If I make myself stay within a 9" depth, typical of a mantel, it seems fair enough doesn't it?  Please say yes!  I really wanted to do this challenge because so many of my decorating clients seems to get stumped on this one.  I'm sticking with my thrift, gift and reworked commitment for this year and had to do a bit of scrounging to replace my pre-lit garland that I sold to a client, at cost, before I realized I couldn't find another at that price.

Here is my make believe mantel ~

I'm starting with a a raggedy old fake garland and draping it from the floor so I can hide electrical cords ~

I know it looks awful but hang in there with me!  There is enough garland length to double it.

Add a string of lights and some gold netting that I picked up at the Salvation Army for $1.99 ~ 

Tuck in some glittery rose stems and leaves and a string of gold beads that I already had ~

 

Add some little feather wreaths I picked up on sale last January and some tiny dollar store birds ~

Start filling in with pine cones, pheasants and birch stars that I also bought in the January sales ~ 

I accessorized with my beloved Georgian Era copper candlestick set in a pine cone wreath (the kind that are supposed to go around pillar candles) and two leaf trees that I picked up for $1.00 and coated in glitter.  A Raku pottery bowl holds balls that I bought at Dollarama for $1.00 for the bag.  They were quite hideous until I gave them the glitter treatment!  I set the bowl on top of a feather wreath and tucked a couple of pinecones behind.  There is room within the 9" to fit a decanter and vintage sherry glasses. ~

Pop in a rustic rocking horse ornament and a picture of a canine buddy that is sorely missed and the mantel is done! ~

The mirror is dressed up with a feather wreath tucked inside a pinecone wreath, hanging by a piece of ribbon ~

Done! ~

I hope this makes it a little less daunting when you tackle your mantel!


I'm off to the Blogger Block Party!

Victoria Magazine Christmas Style!

I've been known to go a leetle beet over the top on bling at Christmas!  This is a time of year when I think more is more and give myself full licence to add as much glitter, colour and sparkle to a room as any eight year old girl could desire.  And, we all know they never think you can have too much glitz.

This year, though, I'm craving decorations that are simpler and more natural.  I'm leaning toward traditional colours and decorations with a hand made, homey feel.  Nothing says tradition more than Victoria Magazine and I fell in love with a little vignette on one of the Christmas issue pages.  You know if I love it, I'll copy it!

Here's the inspiration ~

I have three solid lead, antique farm animals that usually sit on high shelf in my dining room.  At Christmas they kind of get buried under decorations. ~

The inspiration photo had so many elements that appealed to me.  I adore vintage books and, since I was sixteen, I've been the caretaker of the family Bible with records dating back to the 1800's.  Perfect for this display.  They have put candy canes in a white, vintage pitcher and you all know I love my white ironstone!  

Here's my version of a Victoria Magazine style Christmas! ~

  

Now, that's what I call a family Bible! ~

Well, I couldn't resist a leetle bit of bling on the burlap bow I dressed Miss Piggy up with! ~ 

Since I'm spending so much time at my daughter's farm right now, I really appreciate these darling lead animals that never need to be fed, watered or shovelled up after!

Their & My Versions ~

This project is off  to~

 

Oh, look!  While I was busy decorating, a Polar Bear was whispering in Maeve's ear.  Whatever could the secret be? ~

Maybe they were just wondering when I would finish decorating and clear up all this mess.  I was wondering what the cat was doing on the dining room table!

Have a secretly naughty day!

A Challenge Is A Red Flag To Me

When Donna from Funky Junk Interiors posted about this challenge I really had to put my thinking cap on!

http://thegreenhousediaries.blogspot.com/2011/11/great-poinsettia-decorating-challenge.html

I've never been particularly fond of Poinsettias.  That's probably because any I had were sad, little grocery store things that started to drop their leaves before they made it through my front door.  

When I'm decorating client homes for Christmas, I steer away from something as common as red Poinsettias.  I'll use white ones in a pinch but usually opt for floral arrangements that use non-traditional flowers and greenery as an element of surprise.

Still, a challenge is a challenge and I love to rise to one!  Unfortunately, this is the year I'm trying to spend as little money as possible on decorating.  The answer presented itself at the floral shop in my local grocery store. I spotted this large, but forlorn, specimen marked down to half price. ~

It was lopsided, bedraggled, leggy and had an awful planter but $7.00 was a price I could handle.  Let's just pretend I didn't want any of the lush, healthy ones because it is so much more Christmasy to give this one a second chance.

To cover up the leaf blemishes, I dabbed on a bit of ModPodg and sprinkled on some glitter. ~ 

I discarded the pot and put the Poinsettia in a rusty bucket I made with the vinegar technique.  I figured this was all about celebrating the colour red.  A $2 roll of red sheer fabric from Dollarama was tied around the plant in a big bow to stabilize the leggy stems and fill in the bare lower section. Then I was on the hunt for more red!

I like to do some kind of toy display at the base of my Christmas tree. A vintage child's wagon, with red lettering was perfect!  A teddy from the Salvation Army ($1.99) got a red bow as well.

Add some candy canes in a vintage sealer jar ~

This is verry red!

I was still a little bothered by the skimpy side of the plant and decided to balance it with a couple of pieces of white birch. ~

I do like Poinsettias!  Who knew?  This makes me feel happy and warm and cozy!  When the tree is up, I'll roll the wagon underneath and feel like a little kid all over again.

By way of apology to all the fine Canadian Poinsettia growers out there, I urge you all to run out and buy yourself one this very day!

Pshawww - Who Needs Ralph Lauren!

To be honest, I love everything Ralph Lauren does.  It's just wayyyy too expensive for me! While I was staying at my daughter's farm this week, I was dying to inject some of his equestrian style into her Christmas decorating.  I mean we do have actual horses and riding gear there.  It just happens to, oddly enough, be in the barn!

On our way home from her doctor appointment, we just happened to pass a small town Salvation Army store. She asked if I minded stopping there to see if they had any vintage tea cups.  Me, mind stopping at a thrift store? I have VIP status at the one closest to me!


This place was a gold mine!  I found an entire shelf of vintage sealer jars with zinc/glass lids.  They were kind of embarrassed that they were asking 25 cents each.  Ummm, okay.  I took all I could carry and I'll be going back there next week!  I also found six vintage music books and can finally make a music page wreath for my pianist grandson!

I also found this wreath ~

I ripped all the fakey greenery off before I thought to take a picture.  You can see a few bits lying around.

The beard was straw and the cap was real wool.  The wreath itself is a typical grapevine type.  Luckily, I don't travel without my glue gun and burlap these days.  I tied a burlap bow onto the wreath and glued the pine cones from the fakey greenery onto the centre of the bow.  Total cost for this project is under $5.

Here she is done ~

Don't you just love the patina on my daughter's harvest table?  She bought that with her very first pay cheque and won't buy a house if the table won't fit in the kitchen.

Off I went to do barn chores with a wreath over my arm.  My daughter thought it was pretty funny that decorator Mom can't even leave the barn alone!

Now, I had no time to stage this for a beauty shot.  I just plunked it onto an existing nail near the riding gear. It would have taken way too long to sweep all those cobwebs down anyway!

 Ralph Lauren eat your heart out! ~

Sigh. Life on the farm is so wonderful!

Then we trudged back to the house, in the wind and rain, to find the sump pump had quit and the basement was seriously flooded.  A brief attempt with buckets led to a panicked call to the neighbours for a submersible pump and hoses.  Within ten minutes two guys showed up with a submersible and a new sump pump.  They asked if I lived in the city.  I proudly told them I did not and could handle sloshing around in a couple of feet of water.  They handed me a shovel and sent me outside to dig a trench in the pouring, freezing rain.  Why oh why did I not say I lived in a condo in Miami?

Life on the farm is not wonderful!

Neighbours that drop everything to help for an afternoon are wonderful.

I hope the boys from the group homes, who snuck in under cover of darkness to clean the barn one day last week,  like the bit of Christmas cheer I added to the barn.

Next week I'll gussy up the horse stalls!


This week I'm linking up with the folks at:

www.uncommondesignsonline.com

Kiddie Christmas Craft!

I'm home from helping my daughter at her farm for a few days and catching up with all of you!  Of course, caring for her six kids, two dogs, cats, pigs, goats, horses, ducks and chickens has taken all the elegance out of me!

It has, however, given me lots of ideas for Christmas decorating that are doable for moms with small kids.  When I arrived on Sunday evening we got in the Christmas mood by watching The Polar Express.  The youngest two had never seen the movie and it's so magical watching their earnest faces as they declare they would get on the train!

The craft we made was simple, not too time consuming and educational.  I had cut out pennants from a leftover piece of painters cloth.  The kids chose Merry Christmas as the words they wanted to display.  I had alphabet stencils from the dollar store and magic markers.  The kids had to count how many letters we needed and find the stencil letters to spell the words.  This was a pretty big accomplishment for grades SK to four. Christmas is a tough word!

Then they taped the stencils on the pennants and coloured them in with the magic marker. ~

Don't I have this wonderfully under control?  No matter how many times they say, "Grandma is this - can I - I need - he took my, etc.", I am completely calm and relaxed!  They jiggle and jump and squeeze in closely to watch me hot glue gun the pennants to the hay binder twine we brought in from the barn.  We proudly show my daughter the first word and can't understand her confusion until I turn it around. ~

YRREM?  Okay, so it's a little harder to concentrate when you are working with very young children!

I reheat the glue to melt it and start again.  More jiggling, jumping and squeezing and we have a banner to hang in the sun porch to greet Daddy when he gets home from his conference in a few days.  He says it is the best Christmas decoration they have and the kids were thrilled!

I'm not even going to apologize for the photography!  Between meals, lunches, laundry, homework, baths, racing for school buses, doctor appointments and barn work, it's a miracle I picked up a camera at all!

Have a simply wonderful day!