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Decorating

All Things Home

more of the Christmas kitchen 2023

I am finally rounding the Christmas decorating corner and the finish line is in sight.  I have had the dining room covered in bins, ornaments, garlands, and ribbon and I’ve been using it as a staging area for the rest of the decorating.  Slowly, I’ve been using the decorations and the dining room is getting cleaner in the process.  I’m just about ready to put away anything leftover and make the dining room table look pretty.  But first, here is a little corner of the kitchen I dressed for the season… With all of the beautiful things happening in the kitchen, this antique wooden shelf from Dreamy Whites is a favorite.  Maria’s pieces are always a splurge, but they are also some of my most prized pieces.  It’s one of those unique finishing touches that makes this space mine.  I’ve also always wanted a place to display my antique ironstone

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Crochet & Knitting Patterns

easy crochet bauble garland tutorial (two ways)

I spotted some crochet garlands when I fell down an internet rabbit hole a few years ago, but I never got around to making them and I then got sidetracked by other things.  Then this year, I saw my friend Cheri from This Cottage Life making and selling some and I got the itch to make them.  I looked at a few different tutorials to get me started and then played around with techniques, designs, yarns, and hook sizes until I found a couple I liked.  So, in this post, I’ll share two different crochet bauble garland tutorials (a printed pattern and a video tutorial.) bauble crochet garland tutorial no. one – chunky bauble For this version of the bauble garland, you’ll need Lion WoolEase Thick & Quick yarn (or a similarly chunky yarn), scissors (THESE forged scissors are my favorite), and a 6.5mm crochet hook.  THESE are the ones

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All Things Home

Christmas Kitchen Window

When it came to decorating for Christmas this year, I was, of course, most excited about decorating the kitchen.  If you missed it, we renovated our 1970 kitchen this year and completely transformed a chopped-up, dated space into an Edwardian-inspired modern classic kitchen.  You can catch up on the details of the renovation HERE.  But today, I want to show how I decorated our new kitchen window for the holidays… First of all, I made a garland swag with two pine garlands and two cedar garlands.  I then tucked in some juniper sprigs, homemade orange slices, and dried limes. I also used some velvet ribbon in the center of the swag.  Sadly, almost everything is sold out this season, but I imagine most of it will be available again in 2024. To hang the garland, I tapped in nails in the top of the trim so the holes wouldn’t be

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Decorating

creative candle trick | Christmas decorating ideas

Christmas decorating for me this year has been a slow process and that’s okay.  Sometimes, I race ahead and get it all done in a couple of days.  In other cases, I make things and add new touches right up until Christmas Eve.  It’s just done when I feel ready to stop.  I think this year’s decorating has been slow because it’s my first time decorating these rooms.  Even though we had these same rooms last year, the kitchen has been renovated and many other spaces have been painted and altered to fit our style.  They all feel different and I need to take some time to decide where I want to put the decor.  Even though I like to play and make adjustments each year, I think next year will go much quicker because I’ll have a better sense of what I liked where. Anyway, I have found that

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All Things Home

the card room green living room

Last week, I shared about the fireplace mantel we built for our living room fireplace and you can read about that HERE.  While the room is still in the works and I’m in the middle of decorating the house for Christmas, I wanted to show a bit more of the room.  I made the big push to get it painted before Christmas and I’m so glad I did.  I love the color and how it plays off the brick, the floors, and the furniture.  And it’s always nice to have a freshly painted room, anyway! Here is how the “sofa wall” looks… (HERE is the link to the handspun jute rug for those interested.) As I shared through the process, I knew I wanted to paint the walls and beams green, but I had to think about the door frames, the built-ins, the mantel, and the window frames.  I made

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All Things Home

how to make a dried orange slice garland

For the past few years, I have used dried orange slices in my Christmas decorating in various ways.  I’ve tucked them into garlands, swags, and wreaths and made them into ornaments to hang from the tree.  This year, I decided to make them into a garland to hang in my kitchen and, I love them so much, that I’m making more to hang on our tree this year.  I have used two different methods of making the garlands and I thought I would share both of them along with some tips I learned in the process of making them. You can find a tutorial on making the dried orange slices HERE and in THIS POST, you can find details and materials for making the wreath hanging on the range hood. The first method I used (shown above strung along the pot rail) was made with jute twine and hot glue. 

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All Things Home

Kitchen Christmas wreath

I have been gathering materials to make a wreath to hang on our kitchen range hood since October in the hopes that I could make a tutorial and share all of the exact materials for those who would like to make one as well.  As I shared in the post about the Christmas race last week, almost all of those materials are now sold out!  But, I’m going to share it anyway so those interested can tuck it away for next year or put together a wreath with similar elements.  Perhaps you already have some of these components or can use live greenery.  It’s nice to have the exact items if you’re trying to replicate a look, but it’s certainly not necessary. I haven’t hung anything on the range hood since we built and installed it (you can read about that HERE), but I envisioned a wreath on it for

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1970 home renovation

antique-style fireplace mantel reveal

Earlier this week, I shared about the antique-style fireplace mantel we built to replace the simple mantel shelf.  You can find more details about how we built that mantel in THIS POST.  I really liked the foundation of this room, but I envisioned the fireplace with a more traditional mantel.  The shelf, to me, felt more modern and the room as a whole felt more traditional.  I felt like building out the mantel would give the fireplace more presence and make the room more cohesive.  Here is how the fireplace and surrounding built-ins looked when we moved in… …and here is how it looks now with the room painted in Card Room Green and the mantel we built! Of course, it’s a little hidden because it’s all decorated for Christmas.  In fact, as soon as the paint on the mantel was dry, I started decorating it!  I realized after the

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I’m Marian, a painter, writer, and lover of all things creative. From art and antiques to home projects and everyday life, I share my journey in hopes of inspiring you to embrace your own creativity and make beauty in the spaces you live.

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