the holidays at home

Like most of you, I spent a number of hours... OK days, decorating for the Christmas holiday this year.  My main living space took up quite a bit of time since I had a number of additions and made some changes this year.  My decorating in each room usually coordinates with the existing colors or theme so that I can leave some everyday items out and just incorporate my holiday decorations... and if I'm totally honest it's more than just here and there that I'm incorporating!

Today I'm sharing my living room which isn't just our main living space, it's our only living space!  No TV or family room in this 95 year old farmhouse.  My favorite spot turned out to be this little vignette on top of my salvaged cabinet.  My grandfather's pipe cabinet and the wood file card cabinet on the right side usually stay up here all year with globes on top.  To accommodate my fabulous, vintage aluminum tree the file cabinet is turned on it's side.  I used an old market basket to hold the aluminum tree and to keep it tighter to the wall I didn't add all of the branches to the center post.  My "have yourself a merry little christmas" sign was something I won on a blog contest a number of years ago.  Being large it too stays here all year but I hang an old world map on the front.

To pull it all together I added pastel balls to the tree from Ikea, my new favorite decorating item... a galvanized windmill... expect to see that AFTER the holidays too, a pair of vintage child sized woolen socks and a string of lights to bring a glow to the corner.

And a bit closer at the tree base you can see a Santa I've had for years, galvanized numbers... 25 of course, vintage aqua mason jars and tons of aqua & silver clusters of shiny brite style ornaments.  The little bit of wood that Santa is on says "Spintites" and is actually a socket holder with various sized holes on top... perhaps a bit of candle making is in my future for this to hold?

On the other side of the room I didn't forget about my vintage garden gate.  It, once again, holds my take on an advent calendar that I made last year as one of my "holiday projects".

This picture was taken before the 1st so the calendar didn't have any little bits and bobs on it yet.

This little bowl at the base is full of the ornaments and goodies I will hand over each tag, day by day... and yes I'm now up to number 9!

At the bottom left of my gate is a cluster of my mercury glass trees and this little trio of vintage love... 3 little paper angels, one aqua and two silver.

My vintage refrigerator cabinet holds treasured items behind glass just in case little fingers are here and busy.  I added a vintage looking paper mache tree to my grouping of aqua and green pottery on the top shelf and the coolest ever ceramic tree on the bottom.  This tree was given to me a couple of years ago my a close friend of our family.  She's had it for a long time and when she gave it to me I ordered these aqua and gold little pegs on etsy.  This year I put it on top of an old USA pottery bowl to give it more height.

Picture day was sunny and it was hard to get a shot of this little area on the left side of my cabinet.  This is a Pottery Barn shadow box that I like to change up a bit every so often.  The little black and white photo is an actual vintage Christmas tree picture I picked up a number of years back at a flea market.  The typeset blocks are the initials of my loved ones that are kept up year round.

A cute little galvanized tree is tucked among a champagne gold picture frame (also Pottery Barn) and a fun aqua flower frog.

This year I wasn't able to attend the local thrift store's annual Christmas sale in November but I did pick these two putz style churches up last year.  I added them to my vintage bike basket that usually holds games and puzzles.

A couple of tinsel-y trees were added to my coffee table display... a gift from my daughter when she was in college.

Of course the little desk in the corner has it's share of additions.  Another ceramic tree is on the bottom along with a cute vintage Christmas box and the chair holds my Pottery Barn poinsettia pillow... I purchased this one after my family gave me a bit of teasing over my home made ones.

On top you see my anagram and scrabble letters spell out a seasonal sing along of "fa la la la la, la la la la"  barely enough room to fit it all in!  A new to me, vintage little roll-y poll-y Santa is on a spool of velvet ribbon and my little chalkboard is still awaiting a holiday message!  I'd better get busy!

A close up of a favorite little tree I found at a local antique store a few years back.  It actually still works and holds a C-battery to light it.

I should have edited this photo as the lighting isn't the best... this end table holds a fun Santa and the cutest little putz style mailbox I found this year... hard to see next to Santa.

The other end table is used daily, to keep the clutter down I just added a small gold tree in a vintage silver sugar bowl and a vintage looking ornament that looks like a putz style church inside a cloche.

Adding metal houses to the top of our gas fireplace means I don't have to move them when it's on!!  Bonus!  The basket on the wall holds the remaining aluminum tree branches and the child size rocker, my husband and sister-in-laws when the were small, holds one of my holiday projects from last year... my latest take on Pottery Barn pillows.  A rocker just waiting for a certain little miss to visit!

The final end table got to keep it's globe and I just added this new garland at the bottom, perfect for me in gold, aluminum, mercury glass beads and wire-y tinsel!

And I couldn't resist adding an old cake topper to the top of my globe... so fitting in my mind.

Hoping to share holiday projects and other rooms soon,

linking up to

Elizabeth & Co

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