Red & White Christmas Finds And Having A Fresh Balsam Smell In The House

I’ve been away from home a  bit lately and it’s hard to keep up with the holidays quickly approaching.

I was at a lovely holiday open house and luncheon at a charming KY destination.  There were presentations on using live holiday plants, greenery, and florals for simple holiday décor.  I picked up this beautiful centerpiece arrangement for my Thanksgiving table.

It was done by an award-winning floral designer and I love the rustic twig vase.

She talked about all the different plant material she used, but my favorite it the Star of Bethlehem.   It’s one of my holiday favorites.

 

Have you guys seen these?  They’re Scentsicles!

Maybe I’ve been under a rock and everyone already knows about them, but I just ran across them in Lowe’s and I think they are the coolest thing.  Just hide the sticks in artificial greenery and their balsam scent fills the air.  You can also use them in fresh greens to keep the scent strong.

 

I hadn’t been antiquing or vintage shopping since I was in France in September so I did a little treasure hunting in Louisville  week before last.

I was specifically looking for red and white pieces or transferware to use in my Christmas décor.   I scored pretty good with these 3 vintage hotel ironstone pieces and the English transfer covered tureen.

I was thrilled to find these milk glass pieces.  A small vase for the mini-evergreen I picked up at Trader Joe’s and a small open-weave piece to thread ribbon thru.

Love the vintage French ribbon with the white milk glass.

I’m off to Lexington again today making last minute arrangements for Thanksgiving.

Blessings to all,

Kim

Ideas for “Be Thankful” Family Traditions At The Dining Table

It’s become a tradition for the members of my family to write down what we are thankful for after the Thanksgiving meal and then share them aloud with each other.   Each year I bring out the ones from the previous years for us to read again.

Here is what I’m using this year.  I got this idea from Pinterest.

I already had cardboard placemats that were gold-foiled with the word “Thankful” on one side.   I used the reverse side and stamped them using a wood stamp and added the lines.

I just off-set the plates to the left of the placemat.

I’m going to set out toile ink pens to write with.

I think these will be fun and be a constant reminder during the meal why we celebrate Thanksgiving.

Here are some ideas I’ve used in the past.  I have kept them so we an re-visit them each year.

One year I just used yellow cardstock and calligraphy pens to create the thankful cards and last year I ordered lovely small word press cards to use.

One of my favorite ideas was using small glass jars placed at each place setting.  Instead of having other write what they were thankful for, I typed of strips of paper with good things about each person and why we are all thankful for that person.

I began each by saying, Thank-you, NAME HERE, for ……..

Everyone seemed to enjoy these and I filled each container with candy.  They also served as name place settings, too.  Below is one I un-rolled for you to see the entire sentiment.

My family has enjoyed this tradition during Thanksgiving.  It’s just one way of focusing on the real reason we celebrate and not just about the food, parades, and football games.

Maybe you’ll try one of these ideas this year or maybe you already do something similar.

Hope your week is blessed,

Kim

French Friday Has Gone To The Dogs

I’m still trying to do something French-related every Friday and this week has got to take the cake.

Most of you already know I’m a little crazy about toile. Well….my latest find is a toile dog food container!

Hey, I was already looking for a nice container to store Murphy’s food and I couldn’t help that I found this one!!!

It’s made by the company Harry Barker and what’s really cool is that the toile scenes are actually dogs!

This is just too darn cute!

Murphy thinks I’m taking this toile thing a big too far (or either he’s just worried about his food!).

Wait until he sees his new toile collar!  I’m not kidding…

From earlier this week:

My Thanks-Living Breakfast Room Sideboard

Snow Day & Vintage Linen Wash

My Thanksgiving Dining Room Table

Hope you have a great weekend.

Blessings,

Kim

My Thanksgiving Dining Table…Blue & White Toile

I’ll be having the family Thanksgiving dinner at my house this year and my mom is helping with the cooking.  I decided to be a little unconventional in the décor and went with blue and white toile.

I added a grain sack runner down the middle.  The toile tablecloth and napkins came from Williams Sonoma a few years ago.  I also have it in red….you might see it again around Christmas!

 

 

I showed you a sneak peek of my “Thanks-Living” banner a few days ago.  I have admired the burlap banners, but didn’t want to spend the money on one so I made my own. 

It’s just brown craft paper, sticker letters and jute string.  Very easy but I get the effect I wanted without any cost.

I tried hanging it different heights above the console.  Here it is lower.

I’ve certainly gotten my use out of the hydrangea that I dried from my garden.  The sun was streaming through the window so pretty on this morning.

You can see that I have two different plate settings.  I was playing around to see which one I’ll actually use.  I like using the fresh pears with name tags placed over the stems.

 

 

I really like the pears.  I like their green color with the cobalt blue.

You’ve probably seen me use these cobalt blue vases before, too.  Well, they’re not actually vases.  They are empty Arizona Iced Tea bottles.  I got the idea from a favorite café of mine that always had them on the tables with fresh flowers.  I’m not sure Arizona even makes the blue bottles anymore.

I had fun photographing the pears.  Fruit always looks good in pics!!!

 

 

 

Now if only the cooking was already done!!!  Where’s the turkey?

Blessings,

Kim

The First Snow Of The Season And A Cleaner For Vintage Textiles

I woke up to a beautiful snowfall this morning.

I can’t remember the last time it snowed this early in November in east Kentucky.  We usually don’t get snow until December.  I took these photos through the window because it was too cold to go outside.  The temperature stayed around 30 degrees today.

 

Now I’m really getting into the holiday spirit.  A cup of hot coca and a roaring fire made for a marvelous morning!

You may recall some beautiful vintage toile curtains that I bought in Provence this past spring.

You can’t tell from this photo, but there was yellowing on the fabric in places and the lining on the back was in need of cleaning.

I purchased some Restoration wash from Amazon and decided to give it a try.  It comes highly recommended for antique/vintage textiles.

Here is one curtain panel ready for its bath.  I don’t know why my photos today make the toile look more raspberry pink than what it actually is!

And here it is soaking in the tub.  The directions said to soak it for twenty minutes then wring out the water and soak it again in a fresh batch of water.  You should have seen how yellow the water was in the first tub full!  I’ll let it soak overnight.  I can already tell a difference.  Ha…now it looks red!  Who knows what color I’ll end up with.

I’ll let you know how it goes.  If it works well, I’m going to wash all my vintage toile in  Restoration.

Here’s to more snow days.

Blessings,

Kim