Thanksgiving Table and Mantel Decorations

Before my house goes fully Christmas, I wanted to show you my fall mantel and dinner table. I went with chocolate, green and silver for the most part. I love those colors together.

I love the way my mantel worked out this fall. And I would just leave it like this for Christmas, but then where would I put my stocking holders? So I might go back to this after Christmas.

I love the chocolate, green and silver in my dining room. I am planning on sticking with these colors in here for Christmas, too.

We eat in this room every day. So I just leave the table set like this all the time. The silver chargers are silverplate trays I have been picking up at Bonne Volonte over time.

I have one more of these nickel-plated candelabras that I am going to list on my website this week.

I filled my tiered tray with some gilded fruit, wood fruit and some sparkly picks.

In a couple of days I will put up another post from the Holiday Tables event I attended. Beautifully decorated tables for Christmas! So please come back soon for some wonderful ideas.

Shannon

Holiday Tables - Thanksgiving & a Christmas Sideboard

Reflection of Thanks

This first table has a very traditional Thanksgiving look. I love the arrangement they made for the centerpiece - traditional Thanksgiving colors and filling the vase with nuts. It looked really pretty on the table.

This table was called "Reflection of Thanks." It was a theme of family. They had some old family photos on the wall, and some small photos in frames on the table.
And at each place setting they had used an old family photo under a glass plate. I thought this was a neat idea.

Blitz, Glitz and Fun

This next "room" was not a dinner table. They had decorated a long, narrow table that could be a sideboard or buffet, or an entry hall table. I love the way they decorated the spiral topiaries. And, of course, I love all the shine and glitter! That gold arrangement up front is just gold-glittered sticks. Easy, but so effective!

I love this old cabinet door made into a tray!
Some of my favorite Holiday Tables from this event are still to come! So check back in next week for more!

Thanks for stopping by!

Shannon

Holiday Tables

Today I have three more tablescapes to show you from the "Holiday Tables" event I attended. The first two are autumn-inspired. The third is more Christmas-y.

Autumn Supper in the Colorado Forest

Isn't this outdoorsy tablescape fun? I like the way they mixed the stemware.

Three Generations

This table setting is so traditional and elegant. Never out of style. I love it. And the harvest topiary is nice for this time of year. It would not be very hard to make!

Toasting the Season
This next tablescape would be a great way to set up a serving table or buffet for the drinks for your party, or maybe for the dessert bar. A great floral piece on the back of the table with some glittery reindeer or some other glittery elements. And use the front half for glasses and drinks, or plates and desserts.

The way they decorated the chairs was nice - very simple to do, but it really dressed them up.
I am linking this post to today's Tablescape Thursday. If you click below you will find so many more beautiful tablescapes!
And be sure to come back early next week - I have some incredible tables to show you that are completely decked out for Christmas! Some of my favorites are still to come!

Shannon

Decorating with Pumpkins

I found these two pictures on Better Homes and Gardens. Sooo cute!
This first idea could be done with real pumpkins and fresh flowers. Or you could buy a pumpkin from the craft store and glue silk flowers onto it - then you could re-use it every year! Which is what I would do.

And this next picture is just so clever. Cinderella's coach - made out of junk and a pumpkin! How cute is that? This would be an adorable centerpiece for your dinner table.

Shannon

Guest Post On Decorating

My name is Peter. I’m a freshman in high school. I’ve been homeschooled all my life. I’m writing a guest post on my mom’s blog. I take a few classes a year in a homeschool co-op and one of them is writing composition. I have to write a ‘human interest story’ for my assignment. So I have decided to write a guest post about ways my mom likes to make her house beautiful. I figured since her blog is about decorating, I should go into decorating here.

My mom loves to decorate. Especially at Christmas time. That’s her favorite time of the year. She starts listening to Christmas music in September! Sometimes even earlier than that! There are lots of things my mom decorates with that are beautiful. Like her three-tiered tray that she sets on a small old table, which she has currently decorated for fall.
My mom loves to stain furniture to a dark brown color and she likes to put old books, keys, jewelry and so forth on the furniture. One of her oddest decorations is the feather trees that she puts around the house. My family always teases her about her weird feather trees.

My mom also loves to decorate her dress form which I call a ‘crash dummy.’ She writes posts and takes picture after picture after picture about her dress form! I just think to myself, “What is so interesting about a limbless, body-shaped crash dummy that you can put clothes on?”

She gets various ideas from decorating shows, decorating magazines, other blogs and so on for new ideas to decorate with. Some of her ideas I think are plain weird, but they always turn out good in the end. Even if I do think they’re weird.

Well, writing this post was a lot easier than I thought because I didn’t have to worry about formal writing rules, such as sentence fragments or run-on sentences. Writing conversationally is a lot easier than the paper I now have to write about blogging for my co-op teacher. Who, I might add, is a groovy teacher.

Peter

How to Make A Feather Wreath - Cheap!

I absolutely LOVE feather wreaths. But they are really expensive! I have an adorable little red feather wreath that is usually on my wreath hanger on the mantel. But this year I was trying to decorate my fall mantel in chocolate, green and silver. So I realllly wanted a brown feather wreath. Cheap.

So I thought I would try to use a cheap feather boa from Hobby Lobby. And one of these wire wreath frames from Hobby Lobby.

I just cut lengths of wire and wired the feather boa to the wreath frame - put a wire about every 2 to 3" so that it stays in a nice full circle shape.

I wired all the way around the outside wire of the wreath frame, then wired all the way around the inside-middle of the wreath frame.

One feather boa was the perfect length to go around twice on the 12" wreath frame from Hobby Lobby. The frame was $1.99. The feather boa was $6.99 (I think) - and you could use a 40% off coupon on the feathers!

It was a little tedious. So you might not want to do this on a day that people have been getting on your last nerve like I did. But even on a day when I had used up all my patience at work, this only took me about 30 minutes.

And then I had a great, cheap, chocolate-colored feather wreath for my fall mantel. It looks great!

I'm going to make a black one sometime soon! Because every room needs a little touch of black!

Shannon

An All Natural Christmas

I just bought the Better Homes and Gardens Special Interest Publication called Christmas Ideas. It has a lot of great stuff in it. But these pages just took my breath away!

Natural materials are added to the home's regular decor. The collections of old books and creamware on the mantel take on a whole new level with all of the nature-y items added. Lots of pinecones and feathers in the "wreath" above the mantel, and on the garland that is hanging from the mantel. I LOVE that garland!!! Little pinecone topiary trees, pomander balls, rust colored bows, a sprinkling of snow.

I think this might be my ALL-TIME favorite mantel. It. is. PERFECT! (Well, minus the deer head.)

I am thinking about doing my fall mantel similar to this. Then I can do a little changing around after Thanksgiving - like adding my stocking holders (which are cast iron fleur de lis shapes - so they would go great with this look) and stockings. Then I can have this look from now through the end of the year!

These pictures came from the magazine shown below. It's got some other good stuff in it, too.

I can't find my box of fall decorations. I think it is buried way, way back behind all my Christmas boxes. I think today I will have to empty that storage closet and unearth my fall and Christmas greenery. I will show you my mantel when I get it done. Soon. Not today. I don't know when. But soon.

Shannon

More Fall Porch Decorating

bh&g

I love the pumpkins and mums on the porch above. So easy, but so pretty. You could do this in an afternoon. Most grocery stores have mums already in a decorative pot - just purchase and place! And they have their pumpkins now, too.

And if you are a little more ambitious, how about scooping out your pumpkin and using it as the planter for your mums! This is so cute on the stone ledge. It would be cute along a deck railing or on your patio table, too.

bh&g

Or add some ornamental kale to the mix!

bh&g

Ok, so my front porch doesn't look as good as the inspirational pictures above.

Remember this little boxwood I planted for my front porch re-do in the summer? It was supposed to turn into this . . . Well, now it looks like this. Yeah, I killed it. So you see why I needed the inspirational pictures from Better Homes and Gardens.

Shannon

Fall Porch Decorating

bh&g

I am hoping this weekend to do a little fall spruce-up of my front porch. I love the urn above - just get a big pumpkin from the grocery store and stick some fall foliage around it - either real from your trees, or silk from your Hobby Lobby.

And I love the chair below - a tumble of pumpkins and gourds. Doesn't that look great? The pumpkins stacked in the urn are cute, too. Or you could stack pumpkins in a bird bath. bh&g

I am so glad fall is finally here. Fall and winter are my favorite seasons!

Shannon

Glittery Fall

I recently gilded some wooden fruit that I have collected over time. I still have some pieces that I have not finished yet. But the ones that are finished are piled on my silver tiered tray with some glittery picks from Hobby Lobby. Now this is my kind of fruit!

Shannon

A "Pretty Up Your Pumpkin" Party!

Sanctuary Arts at Home is hosting a "Pretty Up Your Pumpkin" party today. My first pumpkin (or rather, gourd) is my favorite! I looks like a giant apple! It is 7 INCHES tall! And it's real - this is not a faux gourd! It's just so cute. And all I did was hang some glittery leaf Christmas ornaments on silver chains, and hang these from the stem.
My copper glittered pumpkin is faux. I glittered this little pumpkin, and then made little necklaces from vintage jewelry. I love all things glittery, and am addicted to vintage jewelry - so this, to me, is pumpkin-alicious.And my outside pumpkin topiary - I am still looking for a dark green medium-size gourd to make a middle layer for this topiary.To see more pretty pumpkins, click below.

Thanks for visiting. Have a Pretty Pumpkin Day!

Shannon