Celebrating milestones

Getting from Easter to Flag Day takes a long time. We get sick of cute little chicks and baby bunnies, no matter how carefully we avoid tackiness. Our house is not allowed to look like a grade school classroom. Until last year, I didn’t know how to bridge that gap. Since we got married and graduated high school and college in May, why not get out the stuff from those milestone events in May? So I did.

This is our cake topper. My aunt and uncle used it, then my parents. When it came my turn, the couple was a little battered. I cleaned the topper and touched up its paint. I enjoyed using this precious connection to my heritage. The rose on lace is one of our pew decorations and the candles — but not the candlesticks — are from our wedding also. The silver tray, which is out all the time, was a wedding gift from our jeweler.

This table decoration is our unity candle set.

I was required to buy my first college graduation regalia — mortarboard, gown, hood and tassel — and I kept them. My hood hangs behind its degree. I used a half hitch to tie the associated tassel onto the diploma frame’s hangar. Unfortunately, Hubby has lost his college graduation tassel. He hung it on his rear view mirror and it disintegrated. Hubby’s picture with his parents at his graduation stands on the shelf. The back of his high school diploma is shown on the room divider above his college degree.

Dad graduated from college the same weekend I graduated kindergarten. He had gotten a three-year diploma the year before. My mother preserved his tassels and honor cords, while I kept my tassel, which she had made. She made my graduation gown and mortarboard, but those have long since been lost. I printed a copy of our picture together and matted it for the center of the shadowbox, then arranged the cords and tassels around the picture, using straight pins to hold them. I wish I could have made the picture an 8X10, but the slide was too degraded for that.

My high school diploma, tassel and senior picture stand on the room divider opposite Hubby’s. Unfortunately, we do not have his senior picture. I hung each tassel on the pillar next to the diploma. Each girl in my senior class received a real and crocheted rose at graduation. My crocheted rose sits next to my senior picture.

My mortarboards sit atop our china cabinet. Displaying an even number of objects is not good design, but I could not think what I should place between the mortarboards. I had to buy both high school and college mortarboards, but Hubby never had to buy any. Lucky him! Too bad we didn’t preserve my handmade kindergarten mortarboard, but one can’t have everything in this life!

March decorating

For years, I have bemoaned the lack of quality St. Patrick’s Day decorations. So many of them can only be described as tacky, items fit only for grade school display. I had been complaining about all our empty decorating slots when I picked up a book about planning theme parties. The book listed various centerpiece ideas. It recommended using items a person already had instead of newly-purchased items. The light licked on. We have items downstairs that we don’t often get to enjoy. Why not display them in March?

I brought up various small collections that have been gathering dust for some time. We have these three ViewMasters, the box and plastic circle full of various slides. The jars of marbles belonged to our grandparents. I treasure these items and I’m enjoying them.

	Hubby has had this treasure chest for years. We filled it with mini gold Hershey bars. This is probably the closest we’ll ever get to that mysterious leprechaun at rainbow’s end.
	I had gathered these geodes and the chunk of (low-grade) amethyst several years ago. I had displayed them a few times, then got out of the habit of bringing them up. It’s nice to enjoy them again.
	Since we spring forward in March now, why not enjoy our pocket watches and clocks? Watches belonged to Hubby’s grandfather.
	My great uncle Bill made both clocks. Uncle Bill loved working with exotic woods. Unfortunately, he didn’t tell me which woods he used for these. Both clocks’s movements have broken. The stand clock’s movement, a wedding present, lasted just a few months. He apparently didn’t use a very good quality movement. The burl clock’s second hand greatly fascinated one of my cats. Tuxedo Kitty pawed at that second hand until it fell off. Burl clock was a college graduation present.

I am so pleased with our “new” March decorations. When it’s time to change to spring/Easter dècor, we’ll pack these items with St. Patrick’s Day items to ensure we see them annually. Something else to look forward to.

January tree

Di at Mamma B’s Attic bemoaned the dreariness of January after the beauty of the Christmas season.

Hubby and I resolved that problem a few years ago. We were tired of a dull, dreary home after our gorgeous Christmas decorations were put away. The bare house was depressing.

Then Hubby brought home a lighted snowman and woman he’d purchased at a post-Christmas sale. We knew what to do in January. January’s dècor is all about snow. Snowmen and snowflakes bedeck the house.

When we began doing this, we transferred any Christmas decoration that was a straight winter theme into the winter boxes. We even decorate our little tree with snow-themed ornaments. Our Christmas village goes onto a coffee table and an end table. I place it on towels my sister-in-love embroidered for me.

Our snow theme and the “January tree” have one large disadvantage: People visiting us for the first time often think we haven’t gotten around to taking down Christmas decorations. Oh well. Maybe we’ll inspire someone else to decorate for January.

Recycling decorations

Some years ago, we received this basket as part of a holiday food package. I loved the basket, but wasn’t sure what to do with it. It was too pretty to throw out, so I kept it in storage, waiting for inspiration.

A couple years later, someone gave us a rosemary plant as a hostess gift. It was decorated with these fun picks. I kept them as being too pretty to throw out, but didn’t know what to do with them, either. They, too waited for inspiration.

Last year, the light dawned at last.

The basket even had gold-wrapped florist’s foam in the bottom. All I had to do was cut apart silk poinsettia and holly bushes and shove them and the pics into the foam. Voila! Instant flower arrangement!

And I got to enjoy the virtuous feeling of having recycled something beautiful, and we get to look at something beautiful.

12 Days of Christmas plates

Several years ago, I ordered a set of miniature plates featuring the Twelve Days of Christmas. When they arrived, I got out hammer and finishing nails and was about to pound 12 nails into the woodwork above the arch separating dining room from living room. My mother was appalled. “You are not going to put all those nails in your beautiful woodwork, are you?” “Why? Do you have a better idea?” “No, but I bet I can think of one.” So off we went to the craft store.

She bought four little fences, some silk holly, red ribbon and a glue gun. In about 15 minutes, she had made these decorations. I was impressed. Every year, I unpack them gingerly and carefully check each plate before hanging each fence. Each year, at least one must be reglued. Once the plates are all secure, I check the string, fluff up the ribbons and hang them. I always breathe a sigh of relief when all is back together and on the wall.

Angel on the tree

This angel is the first tree-topper I remember. I have a picture of it from Christmas 1968. I remember Dad lifting me so I could place Angel on the tree. Since I have black hair, I always had a special affinity for that angel. And, of course, I was always such a perfect little angel! (Please ignore the horns holding up the halo.)

I always looked forward to placing it on the tree. My angel made the tree mine.

As the years passed, Angel began looking rather shabby. Her face had a large smudge on one side. Her robe became increasingly dingy. Her wings were dirty.

Finally, my mother had had enough of her rather pathetic appearance. I helped her put up and decorate her Christmas tree that year. When we pulled Angel out of the box, she told me to throw her away.

“She’s worn out,” Mother said. “Get rid of her.”

Mother wasn’t very sentimental about such items.

But I am.

I was horrified. I didn’t want to throw away my angel! “Do you mind if I take her home? I think I can clean her up and use her to top my little tree.” I didn’t have a good tree topper for that tree anyway and what topper could be better than Angel?

I brought her home, carefully washed her robe and gently scrubbed her face and wings. Angel was as good as new. I was thrilled to place her atop my tree. She now presides over our dining room every Christmas, our angel we have seen on high. Now if I could just get her to sing “Gloria in excelsis Deo!”

Stockings hung on the door frame with care

I love vintage fabrics and lace and I love Christmas decorations. When I saw stockings made from old quilts and lace at a craft fair years ago, I had to buy two of them. They fit so beautifully in our old house (built in 1929). When my parents came to visit us that year, my mother noticed the stockings. I saw the wheels churning in her head as she examined them. I took one down for her and she traced around it.

When we came home for Christmas the next year, we saw her version of those stockings, one for each of us. She had quilted long strips of fabric, then cut stockings out of them. Note how careful she was to originate a strip right on the heel curve. My mother loved such details. She embroidered each name on green fabric, then stitched it to the cuff. Dad gave me the stockings last year. He didn’t think he’d be hanging them and thought I would enjoy them. I get a huge lump in my throat every time I hang them. My mother’s legacy.

Check out A Very Mary Design’s Adorable Packaging Giveaway Contest.

Boo and the Christmas trees

Mr. Boo Kitty loves Christmas. Or maybe he just loves the Christmas trees!

As soon as we put up the trees and cover the base with a tree skirt, Boo has to curl up underneath them. He seems to favor the little tree during the day and the big tree at night. He doesn’t climb the tree or swat the ornaments as he did when he was a kitten. I do tie the little tree onto the sideboard so he can’t knock it off and we hang fragile ornaments out of the kitty’s reach, just in case.

When we began putting the Christmas village under the big tree last year, I thought Boo would no longer be able to curl up underneath that tree.

I thought wrong.

He daintily between the houses and curls up around the tree pole. I think of Azrael chasing the Smurfs. “Papa Smurf! Papa Smurf! Azrael is looking in the window! What are we going to do?”

Azrael/Boo Kitty doesn’t seem to notice any village dwellers. He just snoozes amid the buildings.

Unfortunately, Boo’s black fur shows up rather too well on our little tree’s white skirt. The big tree’s skirt is red and green, so the fur isn’t as obvious.

The white skirt is the first tree skirt I remember. It was originally just a piece of white felt cut to size. My brother and I received the stockings as Christmas gifts a couple years apart. (Mine is visible at far left.) For several years, our mother hung them from the door between our living and dining rooms.

I remember her standing in the doorway examining them. I wondered why. A few days later, she bought red and green felt. She cut out red felt bells, felt holly leaves and berries. She top-stitched the stockings, bells and holly to the skirt, then added Christmas ribbon around the skirt edges.

Several years later, she decided to make quilted tree skirts for herself, my brother and me. She stitched red and green Christmas fabric triangles for the top, then added a red ruffle around the edges. Bottom is the red fabric. Skirt ties in back. Since she would no longer be using the original tree skirt, I asked for and received it.

Boo Kitty loves them. And so do I.

The Gift of Christmas Is Jesus

My friend Martha is amazingly creative. To decorate five of our church’s windows for Christmas, she found a theme, then asked me to design each window using that theme.

The local lumber yard cut foam insulation sheeting to size for her, then she affixed 1x1 boards to each end for hooks. She wrapped the boards in Christmas wrapping paper. Once I emailed her the designs, she printed them on transparencies, projected them on the wall and cut out the silhouettes from a different roll of wrapping paper. She and Kim glued them on according to my design.

Martha bought white contact paper for the letters. I cut the letters with a Cricut machine and placed them on the wrapped board. Even using a yardstick, I couldn’t lay them exactly straight. I was frustrated. Hubby asked, “Do you want them to look handmade or as if some machine had made those posters?” I felt better.

We hung them with a chain from hooks in the ceiling.

Wendy had made beautiful, lighted flower arrangements for the entryway. Our church building is still under construction and the ugly construction materials were visible behind those arrangements. So Martha brought backdrops and hung fabric on them to hide the ugliness.

Our tree looked ready for the landfill, but she rescued it, too. Winding garland between the branches filled in the tree, vastly improving its appearance.

I love her ideas.

We are conveying the true message of Christmas to passers-by in a beautiful fashion. Jesus is the true Gift of Christmas. All other gifts are shadows of His great Gift to save us all. We only have to accept that gift, the gift of eternal life.

Decking the halls

Our entire long Thanksgiving weekend is prescheduled. All I get done is to help make/eat Thanksgiving dinner and decorate for Christmas. Everything else takes a back seat. Laundry and dishes stack up because I’m too busy taking down and putting up the décor. Who wants to wash when she can decorate?

By tradition, no Christmas decorating can start in our house until Thanksgiving Friday morning. But, after that, our house looks as if we’re getting ready to move.

Dad was surprised at the extent of our seasonal decorating efforts. “You even change the pictures?”

Who wants to look at the same pictures all year? Not us!

We used to have floor furnaces. When they died, we installed a natural gas stove downstairs. Floor furnace grates are now our vents. The vent just visible in lower right corner became our “hatch”. It sits right above our storage rooms where nearly all our decorations are stored. I carry the boxes up a ladder and hand them to Hubby.

Passing boxes through the hatch is much easier on my knees than going up and down our spiral staircase. I’d hurt for days afterwards. And I had several nasty falls.

By the time we erect and decorate two trees and nearly every horizontal surface in our dining and living rooms, I am very ready to collapse into my recliner and enjoy our handiwork.

The decorator's best friend

As I finished our October decorating today, I decided I’d like two more fall dresser scarves, one for our antique secretary and another for our stemware rack. I had already made two small tablecloths and an occasional pillow case out of this fabric, so I knew I couldn’t have much more of it.

I wanted nothing fancy, just some pretty fabric instead of the doilies that are usually covering those furniture tops. When I looked through my very modest fabric stash, I found two pieces of this fabric. To my delight, they were just the right sizes for the surfaces I had in mind.

A few minutes with the White 534 serger and, voila!, I had my dresser scarves. Having this serger enables me to whip out decorative pieces in a short time without the trouble of hemming and I didn’t have to cut off that annoying white strip listing the manufacturer’s brand name. Lovely serger’s cutter nipped that ugly piece right off.

It’s hard to believe that I was afraid of that machine when I first inherited it from my mother. I knew I wanted the serger; I’d seen her work magic with it. My mother was an excellent seamstress, but I was just hoping to be able to make simple projects with this machine. However, looking at that tangle of threads was very intimidating. How did a person thread that thing?

I took along the serger on a business trip and attended “open sewing night” at a quilting shop I called upon. The ladies there instructed me in the machine’s use. That night I whipped out a table runner, a fall tablecloth and a bunch of napkins. I was delighted.

I still use my mother’s old Pfaff 1222 for regular sewing. I adore that old machine on which I learned to sew, but I would never want to be without that serger, either.