Now….it’s beginning to look like Christmas at my house!

For those of you who have been following my slow slide into the season of Christmas, you’ll be pleased to finally see something here!  I am over-the-top happy to have the mantel done.  Oh, that’s right, I don’t have a mantel.  I do have a sideboard thanks to my wonderful friend.  And I recently splashed it up with that ever-popular Annie Sloan Chalk Paint which I recently talked about.

Do you ever notice that when someone says it’s confession time, heads turn from tables clear at the other end of the restaurant?  You might as well say E. F. Hutton is speaking.  Is there even an E. F. Hutton anymore?  Was that a person or a business?  But, I digress.   I do have a confession to make.  (I know, your antenna just went up!) This wreath took me the better part of the day to accomplish.  I know, it doesn’t make any sense.  Somehow I’ve gone from being Speedy Gonzales to Slow Mo.  This is NOT a good thing.

Did the fancy lettering on the wreath catch your eye?  I’m privileged to have access to a Silhouette Cameo (affiliate link)  For those of you not in the know, it’s a die cutting machine that sings while it cuts out designs which you program from your computer.  I had no idea what I was doing, though everyone (really who is everyone?) says it’s easy peasy.    But, I had a vision for what I wanted and in the end did figure it out pretty quickly (meaning a couple of hours), after doing a little online research.  I wanted my letters to be connected and that was the challenge.  Of course, once I made sense of the terminology and a few of those icons on the program screen, I was good to go.  This machine would be helpful for creating the next space shuttle if NASA ever does that again.  I think it can do anything.

I had not planned on glitterizing my new pretty words.  But, calling me from my stash was some beautiful Martha Stewart Antique Silver Glitter I picked up several years ago.  Shhhh…don’t tell, but I’m in love with the Antique Silver.  Good thing I don’t have a very large container of it or my whole house might become very sparkly and I’m not a very sparkly person.  Anyway, you can see that I’ve already increased my time on this project by a fair amount.   Those fancy cutouts and glitter.  They make the wreath.  And I love a beautiful wreath.  Wish I had a better technique for decorating them.  Maybe there’s a class.

Last year I ripped and laundered strips of osnaburg fabric to make garlands for my tree and window greens. As I’m planning on using the osnaburg garland again this year on the tree I thought a little repetition of it on the wreath would be a good idea.  Repetition always helps pull things together.  And since this wreath and “mantle” are very sparkly and dressy, I thought that a bit of shabby would tone things down just a bit.  Was it a good call?

The ornaments are vintage ones from my parents.  Maybe some are from their parents.  I chose those that were in the silver and gold family.  There aren’t many and it would have been nice to have added more, but in the end it worked.   The glittery words show best against the greens anyway.  Now we can say, it’s a good thing.  If you were wondering about the choice of words on the wreath…they were chosen to complement the nativity scene with “Noel” thrown in because it is a short word for Christmas.

This nativity is large.  Originally we thought that we would put it under the tree.  But the figurines didn’t stand up well on our carpet and I felt like I couldn’t really see the nativity under the tree.  As lovely as it is, its size does make it a bit challenging to find a spot for it in the room.  We used to place it on the piano, but I’m grateful for sideboard, it works much better there.

You might be wondering what that golden glow is around the Mary, Joseph, Jesus, and the others.  It’s finely shredded gold ribbon, a purchase I made back when I lived in Michigan at a place called Flowers of the Field. They have since gone out of business, but wow, did they ever have the most inspiring displays and lovely items.  I use the gold ribbon strands every Christmas in several nativities as it catches the light and creates a glowing effect.   It also works well to cover up the single strand of white lights that wind around the feet of the figurines.

There you have it….my nativity mantel.  Um… sideboard.  And a joyful Christmas wreath in all its glittery glory.

 

Do you have a favorite nativity in your Christmas decor?

 

As we go through the season, I’ll share a few more nativities with you.  And because everything I have or do has a story…that too.

Celebrating the Reason for the season,

Diane

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