Cheerful Christmas Decorating

The amaryllis that was just planted in my last post has come and gone.  It was in bloom on Thanksgiving and sure was pretty while it lasted.

The cactus that was loaded with buds has also done it's thing for the year.  I now know it is a Thanksgiving cactus.  It, too, added beauty to the house as we celebrated Thanksgiving.

Now they shall both be treated as houseplants until spring when I will move them outside.

I hope you are all doing well and enjoying these days leading up to Christmas.  Are you busy decking the halls or have you already finished?

Mine has become scaled down to a very manageable process.  I must say I am really enjoying it now.  Everything has been decorated for a week.  I do have fun tweaking things here and there.  

The little oil painting above was a recent thrift store find.  It was in a very dated frame and was tossed into a bin with a very low price tag.  I'm sure it had been cast aside in favor of modern pictures found at places like Hobby Lobby.  

The little boy pulling his fresh cut Christmas tree up the lane to the farmhouse transported me to days gone by.  The rolling hills covered in snow provided such a peaceful setting.  When I turned the painting over there was an address label the artist had placed there many years ago.  I don't know why her beautiful work wound up in the thrift store bin, but I wasn't about to let it remain there.

I did set it free from the dated frame and then added it to my hutch.

It's small size makes it an ideal piece to use in little vignettes around the house.

Another thrift shop visit yielded this DECEMBER frame.

Actually it was in a box with 11 more frames.  One for every month of the year and boy are they ever pretty.  

I spent some time last night going through my photo albums in search of a suitable picture for December.  It seems I stopped having pictures printed in 2010.  It sure was a trip down memory lane to look through all of those albums.  I then looked through the albums on my phone and still couldn't find a photo of all of my (small) family together at Christmas.  So, I settled for one of my son and his girlfriend with a snowman they built on one of the only Christmases that we had snow.

At the top of my to do list this year:

Get one nice photo of the whole family together for Christmas.

My Christmas decorating doesn't change much from year to year.

I kind of use the same elements in slightly different configurations.

This year I was craving the comforts of Christmas past in my kitchen.  Grouping select pieces of my vintage treasures with a bottle brush tree seemed to work on the countertops.

Christmas Cheer next to the stove.

Another little corner and a place to enjoy my favorite ornaments up close.

The view from the kitchen sink.

Couldn't resist these cheerful tea towels.

And it wouldn't be Christmas without the sweet little toy stove.

On a recent phone call with my eight year old grandson, he told me that the two things he wanted to do when he comes for Christmas are:

1:  Make blueberry pancakes with grandpa.

2:  Decorate cookies with lots and lots of sprinkles.

I can see I need to add something else to my to do list:

Purchase lots and lots of sprinkles :)