Holiday Home Tour

Today I'm taking part in the 2009 Holiday Home Tour hosted by the lovely Tracey of Notes from a Cottage Industry. Please be sure to visit Tracey as she has posted links to many other bloggers who are sharing their Christmas decor! Thank you, Tracey!!

(click any photos to enlarge)

We took advantage of our daughters being home for Thanksgiving to trim the tree. It's definitely more fun when everybody is here to decorate... We bit the bullet a few years ago and bought an artificial tree (I'm not sure either girl has quite gotten over this yet, but when the last 'real' tree we had dropped every needle the day after Christmas, which meant we were still vacuuming up remnants of it the following summer, we decided it was time to go artificial.)


I wasn't able to download all of my photos, so I'm just going to share a bit of the living room for now... In future posts I'll show you the fireplace & mantel, the vintage birdcage all decked out for the holidays, the dining room, and much, much more.


Our living room is quite small so every year, in order to make room for the tree, the furniture has to be rearranged.


The tree definitely takes up quite a bit of the room, but it's well worth it - especially at night when the room is illuminated by just the tree lights...


In a future post I'll share the sentiment behind this year's window decorations.


I'll also show you more of my "Night Before Christmas" collection (I never get tired of looking at the beautiful illustrations in these books... The artwork is amazing, with each individual artist depicting this Christmas classic in a style that is unique to them)...

I often take advantage of after-Christmas sales to pick up heavily discounted bottlebrush trees in all styles and sizes. I've used them in several of my groupings around the house this year...

...including on the pie safe, where I plunked them down on top of my small collection of button vases. The glitter reindeer are from Target last year - can you ever have too much sparkle at Christmastime? I don't think so!

Now I'm off to finish downloading more Christmas photos! Thank you for stopping by to see the first of my holiday decorating posts! I wish you all a joyous holiday season...

Donna

Summer Garden Tour

Welcome to my little summer garden tour, being hosted by the lovely Tracey of Notes from a Cottage Industry. Tracey, who also hosted last year's garden tour, thought it might be fun this year to "focus on one specific idea, or spot, or project in your outdoor area."

So, with that in mind, I thought I'd focus on a specific idea, mine being using things for purposes other than what they were intended for.

This little birdbath planter rusted so badly that I didn't dare use it as a birdbath any longer for fear of poisoning the birds...

So for the past several years I've been using it in various spots around the yard as a plant pedestal. I usually buy a nice hanging plant, remove the hanger, and plunk it right down on the rusty basin.

This idea works just as well for inexpensive plastic birdbaths that don't hold water anymore...

...due to cracked basins.

This is the cracked birdbath last year, up on the deck...

...but this year it's down on the patio, sporting a hanging fuschia to attract little hummingbirds (oops - still need to removed the hanger!)...

I have no idea what this is, but I call it "the white cage thingy." It's all enclosed so you can't even put anything inside of it - not even a little votive candle. I found it at the dump last year in the "free recycling" area. It consisted of this cage type structure, a long white chain, and a hanger. Conversation that day:

Hubby: Why are you taking that?

Me: I like it.

Hubby: What are you going to do with it?

Me: I don't know.

Hubby: That's why we have so much junk. You're always bringing things home that we don't need.

Me: I know, but it will be fabulous when I figure out what to do with it!

Introducing fabulous #1: The hanger thingy, which has a hook at the top, is perfect for hanging this petunia plant from the girls' old tree house! (See, hubby? I told you I'd figure out something!)

Introducing fabulous #2: I hung the white cage thingy and chain from a mulberry tree branch and then hung a plant from it. I think it looks kind of neat - and you sure can't beat free!!


Speaking of the tree house, I love using old windows around the yard. This one was the perfect size to dress up the "window" area of the old tree house. With a flower box hung underneath, it's a nice little focal point in this corner of our yard.

I also like to hang old windows on our stockade fence...

... with flowerboxes mounted underneath...

It's better than looking at a plain old fence as you go through the garden gate into the backyard, don't you think?

This is the screen feeder outside our dining room window...

We love to feed the birds during the long....

...COLD....

...snowy....


...New England winters...

But for the summer, I thought I'd put the screen feeder to work as a "planter" box (after all, there's plenty of natural food for the birds during the summer months!)... So I set some impatiens flats right on the screen (which should be fine because they're very light weight). As long as I water them daily I'm hoping they'll do just fine!

The same view taken just a few months ago in March 2009... I like the view now soooooooooo much better!!!

Speaking of long, cold New England winters, we lost a major portion of a couple of our trees during an ice storm this past winter... Before the trees were cut up and removed, I told hubby I wanted to keep some branches because I had a project in mind for the summer... (Hubby: Oh no, here we go again)...

So this past weekend we built a very rustic obelisk...

...out of four branches to support a honeysuckle vine we bought a couple of weeks ago (gotta keep those little hummers happy!)....

Right now it looks like a giant unfinished teepee, but hopefully within a few years it will be covered with that beautiful honeysuckle vine!

We staked each of the four branches to the ground with long spikes so it will withstand the strong winds we get sometimes!

And as I've posted about recently, this is the birdcage planter I put together for our deck. If you've read my blog before, you know I have a big thing for birdcages (it goes back to wonderful memories from the 50's of my beautiful Nana and her parakeets)...

So last month, when I spotted this birdcage on the roadside at a yard sale that was just closing down, I knew I'd found the perfect cage for my outdoor garden project! (if you'd like to learn how to make one of your own - and avoid making some of the mistakes I made along the way - click here)...

I love finding fun uses for things, other than what they were intended for! I hope you enjoyed your visit to our little cottage and "garden in the making." It's always a work-in-progress around here!

Now be sure to visit Tracey's garden and all the bloggers giving "garden tours" today!

Happy summer everyone!!!

Donna

Welcome to my Holiday Home Tour!

(click on any photos to enlarge them)


Thank you, Tracey (Notes from a Cottage Industry), for hosting this Virtual Holiday Home Tour! As you probably already know, Tracey's blog is filled with beautiful photographs, inspiring quotations, project how-to's, gorgeous home decor, amazing transformations, as well as a list of all bloggers participating in today's "Holiday Home Tours." So grab a cup of hot chocolate, get comfy, and have fun visiting everybody's homes!

(Our family had planned to decorate this past weekend but Spotty, our 15 year old kitty who often makes appearances on my blog, has been quite sick so we didn't decorate; therefore, I'll share pictures from last Christmas with you.)


I'm a total product of the 50's, as are these angels and reindeer. (I have a thing for vintage Christmas decorations.) Behind them is my mother's crystal candy dish, filled with small glass ornaments.


Last year we bought our first artificial tree, and it's amazing how realistic it is. Fake trees have come a long way since the 70's.


Another photo of last year's tree. A lot of the decorations are ornaments made by the girls during their nursery school, kindergarten, and elementary school years (in many ways it seems like yesterday!) There are also lots of photo ornaments of our family, pets, and loved ones mixed in with the store bought decorations.


"The stockings were hung by the chimney with care..." Even though I now have two pink stockings on the fireplace, we still hang the girls old teddy bear stockings on Christmas Eve for Santa to fill!


I got this cute silver feather tree from Lori at Katie's Rose Cottage last year. She always has the neatest things in her shop!

My good friend, Jill, gave me this adorable sheep a few years ago. Don't you think it has the sweetest little face?

This is the dining room last year. Every year I try to do something a bit different for table coverings, but the centerpieces never vary.

Small button-filled vases sport little sparkly boughs...

The Christmas cactus in bloom last year.

The CD chest and mirror at the end of the hallway decked out with garland and a pink Christmas tree.

And finally, a little arrangement of trees and vintage feather angels. (Can you tell I love to use pink, white, and silver for Christmas?)

Thank you so much for stopping by during the Holiday Home Tour. I hope you enjoyed yourself, and I know you will enjoy visiting all the other participating bloggers! Have fun making the rounds!

Note: (Instructions for the glitter "Christmas card ornaments" in the first photo can be found here if you are interested.)

Donna