Christmas Tour of Homes with the Nester

 

Joining Nester for her Christmas Tour of Homes with the Nester! Loved your video, Nester!

Holiday Linky Friday with the Inspired Room

 

Home for the Holidays with Southern Hospitality

Hooked on Holiday House Tour with Hooked on Houses

Be patient, I wanted to give this little update on one of my garlands…I decided to try to flock this one. A brief explanation of how I made FLOCK….then tour to follow.

Used the old tried & true Ivory Snow Flake flocking recipe. Except you have to buy Ivory snow soap bars and make your own flakes now. Ivory Snow stopped selling their flakes back in the late 90’s. 

 

It’s all done with a mixer, then I “painted “ snow on with a brush.

 

I’ll post new pictures with the decorations back on this garland later. Let me know if you want this FLOCK tutorial.

 

ON to the home tour….

It’s a special, happy, and joyous Christmas this year as as we thank God that we have all made it through those bleak days that began on May 11 this year. Liz and David will be home for 2 weeks from Walter Reed. They arrive in about 11 days. Son is arriving in 4 days… so HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS is such a blessed feeling this year.

I’ve changed and added a few things since 2008. If I had more time there are 2 big things I want to change….will do next year. It involves flocking!

Front door….added some zesty lime green this year.

Got these 2 fillers with stick lights on sale at the end of last years season to in my urns.

These two cascading garlands are new and if even one of them falls again, they are going back in the attic. I posted about it here and will explain more in a later post.

Liz and David's room, ready and waiting. We had to move furniture and lowered the mattress to make things easier.

While all my other garlands and trees are on timers, I bought this HOLIDIAY LIVING 3 count wireless remote system for daughter’s room. That way she can easily turn off the 2 garlands without disturbing them or causing another crash down. I put the 3rd remote outlet on one lamp at the bedside. Although all lamps in entire house have a wall switch that is hot wired to the bottom electrical outlet, this little remote should make things easier for them

I love these string or maybe straw glittered and pearled stars.

Son’s room with seashell garland. New this year and so fun!

The new little flocked tree. She is so cute!

She is perfect for this room, she’s a slim tree, only 5 1/2 feet tall and she doesn’t take up too much space.

I used brown and copper ornaments that I had. These icicles are actually plastic and have been painted many times.

Some old copper and gold bead sticks as a topper.

Love the contrast of the white flock with darker ornaments.

I’m in love with flocking and white trees now! Yes, it’s a little messy but only every time you touch it! HA HA! We'll have to keep Bailey, the BIG BLACK DOG out of here!

Glitter balls and an old garland of silver beads that I cut up.

Tree in living room. For some reason it has a bluish cast. I love the ornaments though, so next year, this tree will be FLOCKED! Wish I had time to do this year! I think that will look amazing ….a flocked white and green tree with aqua, brownish, and copper ornaments.

New cascading garland on the mantel. I made this one after Grandin Road sold out of cascading garlands. It was simple to do and looks almost as good as the 2 in Liz’s bedroom that I did buy from Grandin Road.

The green of this garland looks good, not blue like the tree next to it.

Garland in the front hall.  THIS IS THE GARLAND THAT I’M FLOCKING RIGHT NOW…..UPDATING SOON!

This will get flocked next year also, it has that bluish cast that I don’t like.

I’ll never be able to improve on this in the kitchen. I love it year after year...... winter whites, icicles, silver glittered grapes, pearl fruit…

There are at least two strands of lights out on this. Waiting and debating to decide if I should take it apart to fix.

Sink window, can’t get the camera light right on this shot.

The dining room is all different this year. Read here.

I like it! We’ll see what kids think.

One of the three light strands went out after all ornaments were up. Had to totally take it apart and redo to fix.

There are a few more things I have not finished. God willing, if nothing else falls down or burns out, I‘all be on schedule.

Painting beaded fruit a lovely shade of metallic pearl white.

Thanks for visiting, I may have a few more things accomplished in a day or two. Make sure you visit the Nester and  all the other party goers. Thanks for hosting another great Christmas party!

Looking forward to view your home tours!   Have fun decorating….

GARLAND LOVE ~ a garland disaster ~ problem solving

I use a lot of garlands at Christmas mainly because they are so versatile. You can put them just about any where and they don’t take up floor space! In my quest to to add some Christmas cheer to very room, garlands are the answer.

I feel in love with these cascading garlands, so full and lush. They are perfect to put in daughter’s room, out of the way for David as he still uses his wheelchair at night.

So this weekend, I finally added the decorations to them: PEARL WHITE, SOFT GOLD, GOLDEN STRING STARS with PEARLS. I was in love with them, just enough bling to look perfect in this room.

Then it donned on me: “What to do with cords hanging down wall?”

Why did I put those ornaments up before solving the cord issue.

Hubby’s suggestion was to run the 2 cords down the middle if the mirror. Goodness, NO! The mirror would stick out and likely fall down with all that fiddling.

After thinking about this for 4 days, I decided to make my own cascading garland, hanging off original with thus hiding cords.

My first attempt to add the long garland, the curtain rod mollies pulled right out of the wall, brought the whole thing crashing to floor, ornaments and all. I was so mad, had to walk away from it, no pictures, what a mess! The stars are glittered…. UUGGHH!

So cleaned the mess up, then used Command hooks down the wall and wired garland to them.

Working so far.

The garlands appear to be connected but they are not. Now I have to add more ornaments and lights. I’m painting old ornaments. We’ll see…

to be continued….

Garland problems

Have you ever finished or almost finished decorating a garland, loading it up as much as possible only to have the lights suddenly go out?

It just happened here, I think I might have pushed a bulb loose while sticking the pearl sticks in. Now I have to take everything off, find the bulb problem, and start all over. My worst Christmas nightmare! UUGH!