Decorating with Bottle Brush Trees

I am sure most of you are 'done' with seeing Christmas decoration but here are some I did not get time to post before Christmas.

I have a sizable collection of vintage bottle brush trees but this year I enjoy bleaching and dying the new ones. 

Pictures will speak for themselves. 

Trees inside a tree.

... in a birdcage with ironstone and silver ...

... old metal cogs anchor this tree

new bleached trees ... love how they turned out. 

antique mercury glass deer ornament 

and $ Store white trees. 

With these last two pictures, you are getting a peek at the antique, re-purposed kitchen cabinet that I put in our remodeled bathroom.

Reveal coming soon. 

This old Snowman loves his bottle brush tree and a happy snowman on the right that has just gathered a wagon load of snowballs. 

Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus took their old beat-up Tonka truck to the tree farm. 
(no cab, so now it is a convertible)

I have had these figures for years and did not realize they were knee huggers until I was stuffing them in this truck.

Looks like she is flirting with Santa. 

 

 This vintage car is about 12" long 

This had to be the worse tree on the lot.

This little car is only about four-inches long but he can carry his tiny tree in his rumble seat. 

I asked our grandsons (21 and 23) why this back seat, out in the weather, was called a 'rumble-seat'.

Both whipped out their cellphone and Goggled it.

Very interesting, at least they thought it was. 

Went back in time ... a bench/seat on the back of a carriage for footmen or servants.   

 Also, in an automobile ... called the mother-in-law seat 

or honeymoon seat.

Too long to go into details here ... 

 

This vintage, crinkle-wire-wrapped, 

mercury glass tree topper hangs upside down on the chandelier over the dining table.

 

 Happy New Year 2015 

Linking to: 

Make it Monday

Kathie with an E ... You are gonna love it Tuesday

We finally trimmed our tree.

YES, WE DID ... 

we trimmed our tree.

Last year, one-half of our small oak tree in the front yard died and we removed that limb. 

 

This year the other limb died and we trimmed it off because I wanted that perfect limb to put on our front porch to hang Christmas lights on. 
 
I climbed an 8' ladder and took seven feet of that limb up to the ceiling of the porch. I cut the end at a bevel to fit flat against the header ... mounted it with two large screws and suspended it at the middle from the ceiling. 

(this was scary, up so high)

... added 100 LED white lights ...


... and about 145 plastic icicles or prisms.

 
... to hang the icicles/prisms; we drilled tiny holes in each one and added wire to the top.

... icicles are vintage 1950 ... I suspect they were lamp prisms.
I put the same style prisms on my recycled porch chandy when I made it years ago. 

 
... now I have a tree limb loaded with icicles ... looks really cool.

... wish I had painted the limb white but thought about using it all year with other decorations ...

Thanks Donna for featuring this blog. 


 

Christmas Blessings.

Linking to: 

Make it Monday #16

Distressed Donna Down Home 

    co-host Tamara from Etcetorize

Vintage wooden tray with rope handles and feet

I love wood trays ... 

   

Especially of they have feet ... and they only cost 25¢.

 Really clever idea ... 

but ... that was not pretty enough for me. 


so ... i removed the dated decals ...

painted it turquoise ... 

... added wooden twist molding to the little side boards to tie in with the rope handles.

did a little distressing ... 

and added a French graphic from 

Karen at Graphic Fairy ... (thanks Karen) ...

also check out her methods of transfers. 





I reverse printed it with my ink-jet printer on the waxed side of freezer paper. This lets the wet ink just sit on top of the paper ... I wiped the tray with a damp cloth to slightly dampen it. If you get it too wet, the ink will just smear.

I know ... had to start over once. (quick learner) ...

Carefully lay the print face down and don't let it move. Rub the freezer paper until the ink transfers to the tray. You can use the back of a spoon to rub with. I think I just used my fingers and the back on my fingernails. I carefully checked several times to be sure the tray was accepting the ink.
 The transfer was good, but I wanted it a little darker, so I used a fine point uni-ball roller ink pen to go over the letters.

For the curly shadow around the letters, I used a Paper-Mate sharp-writer #2 pencil. 

I was surprised how well that turned out.

Makes a real pretty tray for display.  

Thanks for the visit.
Hope you will leave a note to let me know your were here.

Linking to:

Distressed Donna Downhome Make-it-Monday-#5
 


Revisionary Life ...
Thirfty Life Thursday

Thrift finds worth blogging about.

I always seem to find something useful or enjoyable every time I shop the thrift stores. I don't always get around to doing something useful with them, so most end up in my to-do section.

Here are a few things that I made time to work on the last few weeks.

 I thought this brass vase had a nice shape ... almost like a trophy. It just needed a little wire brushing and it was ready to paint. 
It was 25¢ at my favorite shopping place. 
Fabulous Finds Thrift Store

I am loving this color by Valspar that I got at Lowe's. 
If I tire of this, I could paint it silver and make believe it is a trophy.  

Looks pretty with
loosely placed  
cuts of  
 
Snow on the Mountain wild flowers and a little Sweet Annie.

Pretty handle too.













Sweet little painted chair to add to my collection. $2.00

I love to use these for displaying pictures or other objects. 

 

Beautiful antique shelf ... hang or sit. 

notice the unusual metal straps to hang it. 

 Love finding vintage stoneware and pretty little birds. 

Little oval plates are vintage Buffalo China restaurant ware. 

Beautiful bird is pottery. 

Bird was $2.00  and $15.00 for the eight plates.

From an Estate sale ... I just wanted the jade green pitcher, but just could not pass up the kitchen stuff. The measuring spoons are extra long, unusual and marked U.S. STD.

Hope you are finding some interesting stuff. 

Tomorrow Estate sales should be exciting.
Blessings,
Audrey Z. 

Please visit these interesting parties.


Revisionary Life: Thrifty Life Thursday 

Solar Chandelier for my Secret Garden

making a solar chandelier ...

Gather up a bunch of lamp parts ...

and some $1.00 solar lights ... 

stack them all together ...
... and you have this. 
(sorry I did not have a better picture)  Pic Monkey helped.

Just a short pause to thank Revi at

Revisionary Life: Thrifty Life Thursday

for the  feature and the nice compliments on this lamp.

you will need a threaded lamp-cord pipe ...
nuts and toothed (lock) washers ...
 

check rings in various sizes ...

spacers ...  

some beautiful Valspar peacock spray paint from Lowe's ...

 

charge up your solar lights in the sun and test them in a dark room to see if they work 

...  add some vintage plastic prisms 

and have Mr. Z. help you hang it in your Secret Garden. 




No secret now ... 

he knows where it is. 

 

watch the sun sparkle off the prisms and glass  

or ...

enjoy the 

soft glow

 of the 

solar lights 

after

the 

sun goes 

down.









YES ... I 
have a secret garden ... 
 the butterflies, birds and the deer know where it is ...


watch for reveal coming soon 

and 

... then you will know where it is too !!!

Grape tomatoes never make it to the house ... or 
maybe not even out the garden gate ... yummy !!!

So happy that you stopped by.

       Happy Fall ...

gonna have fresh pumpkin for Thanksgiving pies!

watch for my Secret Garden reveal ...

soon,  I hope !

Hope you will visit these fun parties.

Revisionary Life: Thrifty Life Thursday

Make it Monday