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The Christmas Haus 2013

December 15, 2013 by Cynthia Leave a Comment

Fresh Greens in an Enamel Pitcher

I make a promise to myself every year: I pick a weekend to do my decorating, inside and out and what doesn’t get done on that weekend, doesn’t get done. This was the first year I kept that promise and it is largely because I kept things simple: fresh greens tucked here and there, a smattering of twinkly lights, my favorite Trapp Holiday candles and a few groupings of my favorite vintage ornaments. I found it refreshingly stress free…and that really was the point of the plan. Now I can coast and focus on baking!

When the weather improves, I’ll share photos of the exterior. For now, here are some vignettes from inside my home.

I hope your find some inspiration.

Always,

Cindy

xoxo

Winter quilts on the linen press are yummy!

The Christmas Mantle

Samantha’s toy Lamb Chop

Quilts with pillow covers from Ikea wrapped like presents with green velvet ribbon.

Plain cedar wreath with candle light.

Lovely Samantha

Guest room washstand ready for guests and ready for Christmas.

The Christmas Kitchen

Christmas Centerpiece

Antiques, ironstone, vintage glass and fresh greens

Lab beaker with thick glass that diffuses the candle flicker

A well used antique candle snuffer.

Evergreens in old urns.

Filed Under: Holiday and Seasonal, My Home, Uncategorized Tagged With: antique, candle light, candles, christmas, cottage, fresh, holiday, house, lights, merry, tree, twinkle, white, wreath

The Stars Come Out at Christmas

November 29, 2013 by Cynthia Leave a Comment

Distressed red is right at home for the holidays.

Stars are apparently my shape this year for Christmas. I found some furring strip stars at a local antique shop for my holiday kitchen. (see post here). I found some wood stars on my trip to the Round Top Antique show (see post here) that I will use to decorate. Lastly, I found some wood star shaped trays in graduated sizes that I thought would be great for a Christmas project.

My project for this week is a tiered, star shaped tray. I imagine using it for every day display of seasonal fruits in my holiday kitchen or holding sweet treats and cookies for entertaining or perhaps holding silverware and napkin roll ups for a Christmas buffet. At any rate, a number of uses for the holiday and incredibly easy to make. It took less than fifteen minutes to make and that included the time needed for the epoxy to cure.

What you need:

medium and large star shaped trays from Joann.com

red, wood candle stick from Joann.com

five vintage glass knobs (optional)

epoxy

From Joanns.com

The assembly is pretty straight forward. I attached the candlestick to the smaller tray first and once the epoxy set, I attached the other end of the candlestick to the bottom, (or larger) tray and the vintage knobs for legs. I found that weighting everything down with a brick helps created a strong seal with the adhesive.

A vintage glass container helps top of the display with cheery candy canes.

Sweets are a natural choice to fill the Christmas Star Tiered tray.

Although optional, the vintage glass knobs are a great way to finish and refine the project.

This easy project can be used a number of ways while entertaining for Christmas.

Filed Under: Holiday and Seasonal, Projects Tagged With: antique, candies, candle, christmas, cookies, cottage, country, lights, project, red, snow, stars, stick, tray, tree, wood

Sparkly, White Snow for Christmas

December 26, 2012 by Cynthia Leave a Comment

White Christmas.

Peppermints covered in snow.

Fresh Snow.

Nature’s red, green and white.

Twinkle in the night.

Filed Under: Holiday and Seasonal, Uncategorized Tagged With: 25, christmas, december, lanterns, lights, snow, trees, white, winter

Candy Cane Sidewalk Lanterns

December 12, 2012 by Cynthia Leave a Comment

Eternally Christmas.

I can never have enough twinkling light. Period. End of story. These Candy Cane lanterns were fun and fairly easy. With some modification, they would be a great addition to summer outdoor decor, too.

Here is what we used:

48″ Garden Shepherds Hooks (Lowe’s)
Red Paint (Lowe’s)
Vintage Mason Jars w/lids (GOOD LOOK, Inc.)
20 Gauge Anealed Wire (Lowe’s)
Mica Flakes
Battery Operated, Remotely Controlled Votive Candles w/timer option

The key to this festive project is two fold: these particular shepherds hooks were essential because of their shape, reminiscent of a candy cane and secondly, the battery operated votives with the timer option. Since the mason jars are lidded to protect the contents from the weather, it is important to have a way for the candles to turn on/off automatically.

I hope you find some inspiration.

Always,

Cindy

Battery Operated Votives with remote control and timer option.

Assembling the lanterns.

Mica flakes added.

Hand Made Annealed Wire Harness for a rustic touch and Jar Lids

Assembled and ready to go.

Painted red, remeniscent of a Candy Cane.

Lighting the pathway in succession.

This project would not have been possible without the help and support of our sponsors. Thank them by stopping by. Merry Christmas.

GOOD LOOK, Inc.

Filed Under: Holiday and Seasonal, Projects, Uncategorized Tagged With: battery, candy, cane, christmas, cottage, good, good look, holiday, hook, lantern, lights, look, lowes, mason jars, mica, operated, pathway, shepherds, snow, twinkling, vintage, votives, walkway

Floating Holiday Centerpiece

October 21, 2012 by Cynthia 2 Comments

A recurring theme in my blog is always about making things easier. Around the holidays, I try to work with what I have so I got the idea to hang mercury glass ornaments of varying sizes from my dining room chandelier with vintage seam binding. Cut at different lengths, the vintage seam binding helps hold the ornaments at different heights and gives the “floating” centerpiece great visual interest.

The light itself is an oversized single burlap drum shade from Potter Barn. It has this great fabric ledge on the inside that turned out to be a great place to tuck twinkling string lights that show through the burlap to give this great softened twinkling holiday light effect. To make this happen, I found a screw in lightbulb socket with a plug and just screwed it into the extisting bulb socket, added the normal lightbulb and plugged in the twinkle lights.

The result is this great floating centerpiece with a soft, holiday lighting effect. A simple project that has maximum impact to the entire room.

I hope you find some inspirtation for your house for the holidays!

Always,

xoxo

Cindy

German Glass Glitter and Mercury Ornaments.

Pretty Twinkling Lights tucked on the fabric ledge.

Lightbulb Socket found at any home store.

Filed Under: Holiday and Seasonal, My Home, Projects, Uncategorized Tagged With: binding, burlap, centerpiece, christmas, cottage, glass, holiday, lighting, lights, mercury, ornaments, seam, twinkling, vintage

DIY Pendant Lights

April 16, 2012 by Cynthia 6 Comments

: Completed Lamp.

Completed Lamp.

Lighting had always been an issue in my kitchen but since the renovation had a strict budget…I had to be very creative. I needed some lighting over the new peninsula and the solution seemed to be to swag the lighting over from the only ceiling junction box in the kitchen.

All the pendant lights that I looked at, even the simpler designs were budget busters…so I resorted to making my own when I came upon some hurricane globes at Michael’s. The shape of the globes really spoke to me and I already had an idea to use some rustic, vintage, scalloped tart pans as an embellishment to hide the wiring.

Including the globe, lamp parts and wiring, each of these lamps came in at about $11 each. I also spent $10 on a special drill bit that was used to drill the hole in the bottom of the globe.

If you want to try a project like this on your own, one thing to look for are glass vessels that don’t have super thick bases. Thicker bases can take 30 minutes or so to drill through and they can fry your glass drill bits. If you find a beautiful glass vase or vessel that has a thick base that you simply must use…take it to the closest glass shop. They will usually drill the hole for you at a cost of $15 – $25 per hole. It can get a bit pricey…so just a fair warning from the voice of experience!

xoxo.

Cindy, Samantha and Lillie.

As a post script, I am submitting this article for consideration for a feature in Cottages & Bungalos. Stop by the blog when you have some time, there are some terrific entries already:

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