Monthly Archives: December 2012

Decor – Christmas Home Decorations

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CHRISTMAS… the weather has turned a little frosty and there might even be snow on the ground. (if you are lucky!)  If you live in a warmer climate, don’t worry about it because as soon as you put on some Christmas music to set the mood and start to unpack those Christmas decoration boxes you will definitely get into the holiday spirit!

After Thanksgiving, I pack up all the fall decorations and the boxes are stored down in the basement. Then, my husband brings up the Christmas decorations and it can take awhile because I have several boxes!  The process of decorating our house for Christmas can take several days but I enjoy every minute of it!  The interior house Christmas decorations I have collected over the years are not specific to a certain room and I can be creative with the different accessories, so I’m not limited to the same decorations in the same place every year and this keeps things interesting and fun!  I have fewer exterior house decorations and generally they are the same every year.  For the last couple of years we have decided not to decorate the outside of the house with lights to save both time and money – please don’t call us Scrooge!!

Like most holidays when I start the decorating process for the holiday season, I begin with setting up the Christmas decorations outside on the front porch.  Living in the Midwest the weather conditions can get very harsh and I usually keep all my exterior decorations under the roof of the porch to keep everything safe from the elements.  I start with a couple of pre-lite artificial Christmas trees and for the last couple of years I have added a pre-lite snowman bought at a Target after holiday sale.  I liked the size of the snowman but embellished him a little by gluing on larger black buttons, topped it off with an old black winter hat and this year I’m going to change the wire nose and add a large artificial carrot instead!  To complete the front porch, I hang a Christmas wreath on the front door.  I have three different wreaths that I rotate from year to year. One is a large pine wreath decorated with pinecones and red berry sprays, another is a wreath covered completely in velvet holly leaves and the third one is a pine cone wreath accented with holly leaves and red berries.

With the outside of the house done I can now start decorating the inside of the house.  In the entry hall I set up a whimsical 24” Santa displayed with two elves hanging onto the branches of a small Christmas tree.  Nearby I have a pair of black ice skates hanging from an antique sled with a Boyd’s moose named Mortimer.  Whenever I am shopping in the antique stores, I always look for holiday items – on my wish list is a set of old skis and poles and hopefully I will be able to find it before next year.  This year I have added a Christmas Kissing Ball and I think it will be fun for our guests’ arrival and departures this holiday season!  (Please look for the December Craft post for instructions on how to make your own Christmas Kissing Ball)

    

The next room of the house is our library; this is the room where all our books and vacation memorabilia are in bookshelves that fill up an entire wall.  On the other side of the room, I keep my Boyd’s Bear collection year-round in a small lawyer’s bookcase.  I add my Boyd’s Christmas figurines and I decorate the two shelves with pine branches to give it a festive Christmas look.  The bottom shelf holds the Boyd’s Bear Village and I decorate the display with winter trees and tiny snowflakes.  I also add a Boyd’s Bear Santa to one of the ivory chairs in the library.  On another side of the room, I have displayed for the last a couple of years our Fontanini Nativity set on an antique table that my husband’s Grandmother kindly gave us.  This heirloom table is very special to us because it has been in the family for a very long time. (Please see a previous December Décor post for more detailed information on the Fontanini Nativity Display)

The next room to decorate is the family room.  One wall of the room has a fireplace and mantel flanked by two bookcases/cabinets.  For the past few years I have displayed our Department 56 North Pole Village in the bookshelf but this year I will be doing something new and it will be displayed across the fireplace mantel.  The fireplace mantel is also the place where we traditionally hang our Christmas stockings.  Next, to complete the family room, I will set-up a display on the fireplace hearth with a traditional 29” Santa, his two reindeers and a small Christmas tree. (Please check out my previous December Décor posts for more detailed information on the Department 56 North Pole Village display and the Christmas stockings and Fireplace Mantel decorations) 

In the dining room, the Memory Tree set out for Thanksgiving will be moved to the family room.  (Please refer to last month’s Craft post for ideas and tips on how to create your own family Memory Tree)  In November I had displayed in the china cabinet three Currier and Ives porcelain houses I purchased at a local craft store a few years ago.  Our china cabinet has a mirrored back so you are able to see both the back and the front of the display of the houses.  I add a few small pine trees and additional figurines and these are set-up on a beautiful elongated mirror and silver stand.    This display is an example of a decoration that works for both Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons – I love when that happens!  This year I have added two new Craft projects to our dining room decorations – a Victorian inspired fruit arrangement that I made last month for our Thanksgiving table and a Cranberry topiary inspired by one I had seen in a past HGTV White House Christmas shows.  I think they are great additions to our traditional dining room design.  (Please look for full instructions on making both projects – the Fall Victorian Centerpiece is a November Craft post and the Cranberry Topiary is a December Craft post)

The last room on the main floor of the house to decorate for the holidays is the kitchen.  Now, this can get a little tricky because the room needs to function as a full service kitchen, so the counters need to stay clear of decorations because food and meals are being prepared and eaten at the table on a daily basis.  We have a fairly large kitchen that is open to the family room and these two rooms of the house are where we spend most of our time.

Several years ago I found the perfect Christmas theme for the holiday decorations in the kitchen – gingerbread and candy canes!!  Since there are several areas in the kitchen that I decorate for Christmas, I start with an area that has a long chair height counter with upper and lower cabinets.  This is the area my daughter does her homework and the counter needs to stay free of clutter.  So, in the space above the upper cabinets I usually set-up a Department 56 gingerbread train that is displayed with pine boughs, red berry sprays and this year I have added “white icing” snowflakes to give it a different look.  I also hang two holly wreaths with red berries and gingerbread snowflakes on the cabinet doors.

    

The last area that needs some Christmas attention is the area by the stove and oven.  Please be careful with the holiday decorations in this area because with the extreme heat from cooking you don’t want anything that is flammable or a fire hazard.  I have a basket of artificial vegetables on the counter and I add a cute “North Pole Candy Canes” container that holds some wooden candy canes and pine sprays.  I also hang some Santa towels from the oven bar handle.

I hope you enjoyed the tour of our house decorated for the holiday season and I try to create decorations that are classic and traditional but fun and interesting.  Please let me know your comments or suggestions; I would love to hear what you think.

Travel – Bronner’s Christmas Store

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Living in California, I had heard about the world famous Bronner’s Christmas store in Frankenmuth, Michigan.  After we moved to the Midwest, I knew it was my chance to visit and planned an easy weekend trip to Michigan in October 2009.  Their busiest weekend is after Thanksgiving with over 50.000 visitors.    So, we knew we wanted to visit before the Christmas season started to avoid the crowds of holiday shoppers.

During that weekend trip we stopped in Detroit to visit the Ford Company Manufacturing Plant and the wonderful Henry Ford Museum.  My husband and son loved visiting the assembly plant (OK, it’s a guy thing) The Ford Museum turned out to be a very interesting museum and had an extensive collection of historical memorabilia.  Since I want to concentrate on Bronner’s in this post, please look for a separate Travel post in January 2013 with detailed information on those two destinations.

Before the holiday season got too busy, I knew I wanted to visit the “World’s Largest Christmas Store”.  I had my wish list of the ornaments I wanted and I was ready to shop!!

Located in Michigan’s “Little Bavaria”, the store is in the charming town of Frankenmuth.  Founded in 1945, this large retail store has over 90,000 square feet of space and over two million visitors annually.  Walking into the store the sights, sounds and feelings of Christmas can be almost overwhelming.  It is a huge store and can take a couple of hours to walk and shop all the various departments.  The store inventory includes a large assortment of Christmas ornaments, Nativity sets, Christmas lights, Christmas decorations and collectible Christmas items such as Fontanini, Department 56 and Precious Moments.

My husband, son and daughter were not interest in shopping and after looking around the store for a short time, they decided to go into town.  I was left alone for a few hours and the shopping experience was wonderful and not rushed.  Of course, when I was picked up at the prearranged time, I still wasn’t ready to leave!!

For more information or store hours for Bronner’s Christmas Store see their website at www.bronners.com

    

After lunch in Frankenmuth, we found an amazing sausage store called Willi’s Sausage Company.  Since my husband has lived in Berlin, Germany for several years during grammar school and high school, he considers himself a sausage expert.  He always complains that he can’t find really good sausage here at home.  I remember when we visited Germany a few years ago, our first stop after landing in Berlin was to find a sausage cart and my husband was right – the sausage was delicious!  Well, my husband was very pleased with the selection of over 100 different kinds of sausages at Willi’s.   After taste testing several kinds of sausage, we made our selection and were ready to check out.  The store packaged everything very nicely in a cold pack for our trip back home the next day.  They also shipped their sausage to anywhere in the United Sates, so check out their website, www.willissausages.com

We would definitely like to go back to Frankenmuth because it was such a quick weekend trip and there was so much more to see and many more places to visit.  The atmosphere of Michigan’s “Little Bavaria” was very reminiscent of the charming little Danish town of Solvang, California.  Both places have great stores to shop and wonderful restaurants to eat.   Maybe on a future trip up to Mackinac Island, we can plan to spend an extra couple of days in Frankenmuth.

Craft – Cranberry Topiary

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Depending on the current First Lady’s Christmas theme and decorative style for the White House, some variation of a cranberry covered decoration is always in the Red Room. Some years it can be a cranberry wreath or another variation but I have long admired the cranberry topiary.  I always thought that it was one of those perfect decorations for Christmas with the red color of the cranberries and the green color of the pine.

For years now I’ve always keep a silver bowl of artificial cranberries in our dining room during the holiday season.  This year I wanted to do something different and decided that I was finally going to use those cranberries to make a topiary for our dining room.

Listed below are the materials and instructions to make a cranberry topiary.

Cranberry Topiary – supplies

  • 1     Styrofoam come
  • 1     Styrofoam circle, a couple of inches wider than the base of the Styrofoam cone
  • 1     Container, as wide as the bottom of the Styrofoam cone
  • Cranberries, artificial
  • Pine boughs or other type of greenery for base
  • Small Pinecones, several
  • Hot glue gun/ glue sticks
  • Sheet moss, to cover the Styrofoam cone (optional)
  • Foam adhesive spray, to attach the sheet moss to the Styrofoam cone (optional)
  • Hot glue gun /glue sticks

Cranberry Topiary – instructions

Center the Styrofoam cone on the Styrofoam circle; attach the cone securely to the circle with hot glue. This will create one piece that you can set a silver bowl or I used a silver pedestal base.

Option #1 – Use spray adhesive to attach sheet moss onto the Styrofoam, this covers any empty spaces left between the cranberries and gives a finished look.

Option #2 – Paint the Styrofoam cone a burgundy shade to match the cranberries so the empty spaces between are not noticeable.  (Even though it is not pictured, this is the option I used for my cranberry topiary)

  1. Insert the pine boughs or greenery into the Styrofoam circle at the base of the Styrofoam cone.
  2. Hot glue small pinecones at the base of the Styrofoam circle.  Be sure to save one for the top of the Styrofoam cone
  3. Using a small amount of hot glue, attach each individual cranberry to the cone.  Starting at the bottom, work in rows until the cone is completely filled to the top.  Try to leave as little space as possible between cranberries.
  4. Hot glue a small pinecone to the top of the Styrofoam cone to complete the topiary.

    

    

As you can see from the photo at the top of the post, the cranberry topiary looks wonderful on the tea cart in our dining room.  Additional ideas for places for a topiary: on a side table in the family room, placed into the corner of the kitchen counter or two topiaries on a buffet table for a Christmas luncheon.

Celebration – The White House Christmas

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Decorating the White House can be a very challenging project.  It has 132 rooms, 28 fireplace mantels, 412 doors and 147 windows which all need to be decorated.  For example, in 2000 the White House was decorated with 1,120 feet of garland, 50,000 lights, 220 poinsettias and 34 Christmas trees.  This is the reason that planning for the White House Christmas decorations can start as early as July.  At that time, the First Lady will pick the theme for the upcoming Christmas.

Jackie Kennedy is considered to be the first person to decide on a specific theme to decorate the White House for the holiday season.  That theme was the “Nutcracker” and it has been used two additional times over the last 30 years – in 1990 by Nancy Reagan and 1996 by Hilary Clinton. For more details of the White House Christmas themes from 1961 to present, visit the White House Historical Association website at www.whitehousehistory.org

The main focus of the decorations is the official White House Christmas tree and it holds a prominent place in the center of the Blue Room.  The tree usually stands nearly 20 feet tall and the crystal chandelier has to be removed.  The Chief Usher usually selects the tree and it is donated every year since 1966 by the National Christmas Tree Association.  Once the tree is delivered to the White House, the National Park service members will bring the tree into the Blue Room.  The White House Floral Department staff and season volunteers decorate the tree and the various rooms on the first floor of the White House.

       

Those other rooms include:  The East Colonnade which has a distinctive set of windows that are usually decorated with several wreaths or poinsettias.  The Grand Foyer and adjacent the Cross Hall are such a large space that it can be sometimes difficult to decorate because this area needs to remain open to accommodate the many holiday festivities.  This area usually has several Christmas trees and garlands decorated in the style to fit the theme for the year.  The Green Room’s color scheme is perfect for the holiday season.  It is usually decorated with topiaries, floral arrangements and pine garlands draped across the mantel and fall all the way to the floor.  The Red Room’s bold color makes it one of the easiest rooms to decorate for the holidays.  Traditionally this room will have a cranberry topiary.  The State Dining Room is used for various holiday special events such as elaborate luncheons and dinner parties.  It can hold any number of tables beautifully decorated with floral centerpieces, place cards and menu cards for the honored guests.

One of the things I like to do every year is watch the HGTV White House Christmas Special.  I love to see how the staff and volunteers decorate the various rooms.  There are always great ideas which inspire me to create something on a much smaller scale for my home.  This year I finally made the cranberry topiary for our dining room.  (Please see this week’s Craft post for photos and directions on how I made my own cranberry topiary – it’s so easy!)

Watch for the White House Christmas Special on HGTV –
check the HGTV website for your local television listing for the channel, date and time it will be on in your area. www.HGTV.com

Decor – Fontanini Nativity Display

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When decorating our home at Christmas it is never complete until we set up the nativity set.  When I was a child my mother had a beautiful nativity set with hundreds of pieces that she always set up under our Christmas tree every year.  I remember lying on the floor just looking at that display and sometimes when my mother wasn’t looking, I played with the pieces. Unfortunately, after my mother passed away this year, I don’t know what happened to her nativity set.  It would have been nice to have one or two pieces for remembrance!

1971 Christmas - Mom and Barbara

When I first got married and started decorating my own home, I knew I wanted a nativity set and I took my time looking for the right one.  There is a wonderful Christmas store in Solvang, California that has been there since 1967 called Jule Hus. (solvangschristmasstore.com)  They sell beautiful Old European glass ornaments, German Nutcrackers, Christmas Angels, and Fontanini Nativity sets.  We loved going to the store whenever we visited Solvang and it didn’t matter what time of year because as soon as we walked through the doors it was always Christmas!

After years of searching I finally found the perfect nativity set that I wanted at Jule Hus.  I bought a beautiful Fontanini set that included a stable, Gloria the angel, Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus in a manger.  Over the years I added more pieces; the three wise Men and their camels, shepherds and their flock of sheep, also a set of ox, donkeys and goats, palm trees and a star that hangs suspended over the nativity set.  It will never be as big as my mother’s nativity set, but it is small enough to display anywhere in the house.  We have display it in an oak cabinet in our California house.  Now that we have moved to the Midwest, I have displayed the nativity set in several different places, such as: in the library on top of an old piano from Germany and last year I had displayed the nativity set on a lovely heirloom table that we received from my husband’s Grandmother.

One thing remains the same no matter wherever it is displayed, traditionally the manger stays empty until Christmas Eve.  On that evening we read from a beautifully illustrated book that tells the story of the birth of Jesus.  After we are done reading, my daughter will put baby Jesus in the manger and we say a prayer.  It is a lovely moment to remind us of the true meaning of Christmas and a family tradition that we love to celebrate every year.

    

Tradition of the Nativity scene or crèche

A nativity scene or crèche depicts the birth of Jesus.  The main figures are the infant Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.  Other figures include angels, shepherds and the three wise men known as the Magi.  Usually the scene takes place in a barn or stable with Mary and Joseph and a manger for Jesus.  Usually displayed with nativity are various animals such as a donkey, ox and the camels belonging to the three wise men.  Sometimes, more elaborate nativities will display different scenes from the village, such as: the Inn and the Innkeeper and the other village merchants and craftsmen.

During the Christmas season, the tradition of the nativity scene is created all around the world.  There are many different types of nativities that represent the various countries and the cultures of the native people.  Known as the Szopka, the traditional Polish nativity dates back to the 13th century and was originally carried from door to door by performance groups that told the story of the birth of Jesus. There is a famous annual competition held in Krakow’s main square and prizes are awarded for the most elaborately decorated nativity scenes. The construction of these modern nativity scenes often use the design elements found in Krakow’s historic architecture and include Gothic spires, Renaissance facades and Baroque domes.

Mass produced nativity sets are now available worldwide in all different types of materials and every price range.  One of the most successful companies is Fontanini.  The House of Fontanini was founded in 1908 in Bagni di Lucca, Italy.  They produce and hand paint cast resin figures in several different sizes that range from 2.5″ to 50″ tall.  The most popular sizes are the 5″ and 7″ figurines and are currently distributed by the Roman Inc. since 1973.  They are usually sold by Christmas ornament suppliers such as Bronner’s. (www.bronners.com)  These treasured nativity pieces are very collectible and would make a great family heirloom to pass onto future generations.

If you also display a Nativity Set, I would love to see your photos!