Wednesday, December 14, 2011

MacKenzie-Childs Christmas Ornaments: These are a few of my favorite things

One of my favorite things about Christmas is being able to unpack & display my collection of MacKenzie-Childs ornaments.  I love the company’s whimsical, hand-painted products & gifts and I’m especially drawn to their black and white patterned items.

via
It was love at first sight when I first encountered MacKenzie-Childs products more than 15 years ago at my neighbor’s house.  She owned several pieces of their tableware and pottery and her huge Christmas tree was entirely decorated with MC ornaments.  I was in complete awe - and so my love affair began.

via
via

via
When I lived on the East coast, I would travel into NYC several times a year and make a beeline for their shop in Manhattan.  Their products and displays always sparked my imagination and I would leave feeling completely inspired.  In fact, that inspiration motivated me to design and hand-paint several furniture pieces that I then sold in the shop I owned (a furniture, home accessories & antiques shop in Pennsylvania.) Several years later, I even visited the MacKenzie-Childs Victorian Farm in Aurora, New York and toured their production studio, shop, beautiful farm buildings & surroundings. It’s an amazing spot overlooking Cayuga Lake.  I especially loved the gorgeous chicken coop (actually, they call it the Chicken Palace) that would give Martha Stewart a run for her money.
via
Over the years I have managed to collect some MacKenzie-Childs items: canisters,  tableware, dog bowls, decorative vases, and fun knobs. But my favorite items remain their ornaments.  Since they are a bit pricey, my collection is growing slowly. However, I have learned that if you can wait until after the holidays, you can find some good values during their after Christmas sale. A couple of years ago, I got several ornaments and a tree topper at ½ price – Score!

If you love creativity, whimsy and unique, funky items, then you’ll enjoy perusing the Mackenzie-Childs website.  Who knows, you may even be inspired to create a few of your own handmade treasures.


Saturday, December 3, 2011

Tis the Season... for Holiday Decorating Malfunctions

Yup, it’s that time of year again for crawling around in the attic and basement, trying to find all those boxes of holiday “magic.”  Last weekend I decided to get my holiday cheer on and I unpacked all of the lights and decorations to trim the tree. After the holidays last year, we had packed everything neatly away for easy access and decorating the next time around - each ornament wrapped in tissue, the strings of garland packed in their own individual bags, and each set of lights were tested, wrapped, and carefully placed in their own storage container.

So why, when I unpacked the lights this year, did more than half of the light sets, several of which were new last year, have many burned out bulbs and/or only partially worked or were completely dead? It was an extremely annoying discovery but at least I tested them BEFORE putting them on the tree - a hard lesson learned from past experience (my definition of holiday madness: to have a fully decorated tree that took hours to finish only to find out there are entire sections of lights that aren’t working!)

Instead of giving in and driving to the store to purchase new lights, I wanted to get to the bottom of this mystery. I'm someone who just likes to know why things happen and how to fix them - plus I’m not keen on contributing to our “throw away” society.  I thought I’d share my findings with those of you who have also had this problem or those who find themselves trimming the tree at midnight and have no other options except DIY.

So off to the Internet I went in search of answers.  I was able to find these websites that gave me some great insights:

Holiday Decorating:  Half the lights in a string are out
How to Troubleshoot Christmas lights:  Half of the string is out
Storing Christmas Lights

After reading the advice, I spent a couple of hours checking every single bulb on each light set, fixing or replacing bulbs, CAREFULLY removing, reusing & storing for future use the old light bulbs from sets that were not useable.  I was eventually able to piece together about 3 sets out of 8 that were broken.  I'm not sure all that work was worth it for $2.99 light sets - but I just had to try.  And after all of that, I read on the Storing Christmas Lights webpage:  "Christmas lights generally are only meant to be used for no more than 90 days.  Chances are if your lights are more than three seasons old, they may need to be replaced next year anyway."  So you’ll have to decide for yourself if all the extra work is worth the effort but hopefully you’ll gain 1 or 2 more seasonal uses from them and therefore delay their trip to the landfill.

Regardless, I felt empowered by taking on those pesky lights, showing them who was boss, and, eventually, creating a little holiday magic  :)
Here is the tree with the lights finally completed – I love lots of lights on a tree and feel it’s the most important part of the decorating process.  This tree we “rescued” from a tree farm where it was marked as “trash,” destined to be cut up into pieces for wreaths.  After looking at every tree on the farm (my annual obsession), I decided that I wanted this tree to fulfill its Christmas tree destiny.  I love trees that aren’t perfect – i.e. a crooked trunk, double top, large spaces between branches and my favorite thing but the hardest to find: one that’s untrimmed and natural.  I don’t enjoy having the stereotypical “perfect tree” since most people just assume it’s artificial anyway but more importantly, I think there’s beauty in so-called imperfection.

  
Finally the “bling” was added.  I use as many glass balls/ornaments as possible because I love the way they bounce the light around.  I try to collect at least one ornament every year that represents something memorable from that year.  I also date them and try to write a little history somewhere on the ornament.  It becomes a walk down memory lane every year when decorating.  I’m also not into “themed trees” because I love the eclectic uniqueness of telling my own story through my ornaments.  However, it does take me HOURS to organize & decorate the tree – by color, ornament size, placement & the spacing done to my liking.  But regardless of your holiday decorating style, in the end, if it makes you happy, then that’s real holiday magic.








Finding Color Inspiration From Artwork


Let's face it, sometimes we're just stuck or even afraid when it comes to choosing color - sometimes, it even paralyzes us so much that we end up doing nothing - for years.  One possible solution to help you get "unstuck" is to look around your home and see if you have a piece of artwork that you enjoy.  Think about what inspires you about the art: is it the subject matter, the memories it invokes, the color - or maybe all of the above?  If you love the color or even the feeling you get from the color palate, then you have a starting point.  Below are examples of how to take a piece of artwork and use it for color inspiration.

Once you've found your own color inspiration, then you can start small with a throw pillow or accessory or maybe go big and paint the walls.  Remember, if you don't like it - you can always change it.  But wait a week or so - it just may grow on you.



via

via

via