Vintage Christmas Monday!

Update: Sharing this post from November 2009 with:

http://www.songbirdblog.com/2012/11/the-countdown-has-begun-christmas-inspiration-linky-party/

Hello again dear readers and blogging friends and welcome (back) to Boxwood Cottage in Germany.

Today I join Joan @  http://thepottingshed-anythinggoeshere.blogspot.com/in her Vintage Christmas Party (if you wanna join in too, just grab the "Vintage Christmas Monday" button in my sidebar and let Joan know that you wanna play along)

Seeing that I love Christmas and Vintage items it is the perfect blog party theme for me.

I have just rearranged some parts of my living room to make space for a vintage french brocante mirror that I had outside on my deck for the last 4 years and wanted to save from decay now and an old iron window I recently got from a good family friend.I hung the old mirror on the door to my basement and decorated it in spirit of the season with my soldered nostalgic Christmas ornaments, a silver glitter star, some silver tinsel and a white satin stocking.

I think it fits so well with the old iron window that I have decorated for the season too with snowflakes and vintage inspired paper ornaments as well as a Merry Christmas sign and four white letters spelling NOEL:

I also hung a very old little bird cage, a wire basket and a little toile de jouy covered inspiration board on the shutter and I decorated the little white shelf in the corner with silhouettes and bottle brush trees and I further hung up an old cream colored iron chandelier, decorated with some of my favorite Christmas glass baubles above the table that I decorated with my vintage putz houses and more bottle brush trees. Some pinecones in the wire basket sitting on the vintage cream colored chair complete the arrangement.

I have to say that this is my fave corner at the moment. Vis-à-vis is my white wooden mantle with the golden mirror that reflects the old iron window. Of course the mantle is decorated in the spirit of the vintage Christmas theme too with two old sauce boats that I filled with moos and fir tree peaks, decorated with olive green glass baubles ( an idea I got from the Christmas book "Merry and Bright" btw.)

I took one picture without the candles lit and one with candles lit to see which one brings the sparkle out more, I'm still not sure, are you?

The white paper lace on the edge of my mantle is old vintage stock too and I also have an old black iron stove standing in my faux mantle piece. The wonderful silver glass glitter garland spelling ~WINTER ~ MAGIC~ is a friendship gift from my friend Madai over at Wren Cottage http://forgetmenotsfromwrencottage.blogspot.com . She makes these beautiful vintage inspired glitter creations and also sells them in her etsy shop, in case you want one too ;-)

On the table beside of my mantle stands an iron chandelier that I decorated with some of my vintage glass baubles.

Close ups of the decorated sauce boats (gravy boats)

Another gorgeous gift from Madai is the vintage inspired ivory bottle brush tree that I hung in the corner between my white plate shelf and the old dark framed mirror so that it reflects in the mirror too. Can you tell that I love mirrors and reflections?

On the knobs of my glass cabinet which is filled with vintage rose china I hung a fabric toile heart made by my friend Anita and a cute frame with a picture of a vintage girl with her cat, another sweet gift from Madai.

The chandelier above my sofa table is decorated with lot of vintage inspired glass diamonds. Our 5 month old tom cat Riley is always watching me from his bowl on the window sil while I decorate the living room.

Some more close ups from the toile de jouy inspiration board, a friendship gift from my German friend Anita, decorated with little silver Christmas items I love, like the vintage glass bauble picks, or the very old silver trumpet:

The gorgeous silver cone is made my Madai and is from last years friendship parcel exchange.

I also love the vintage bird cage a gift from another family friend.

And I can't finish up this post without showing you some more treasures from my dear friend Madai's latest friendship parcel.

That sweet girl knows so well how to make me happy :)

The picture below is from my latest order from http://Brandywineboutique.blogspot.com, Brandy also creates and sells the most beautiful vintage inspired Christmas ornaments:

In case you would like to get one of my soldered nostalgic Christmas ornaments 2009 that you can see in the next photo please go to http://boxwoodcottageshop.blogspot.com

Of course they are not vintage, but vintage inspired and soldered with real silver gleem solder (lead free) that will tarnish as time goes by and gives them a very vintage look (you can always polish them with silver or metall polish if you want them to shine again). I chose the sweetest vintage postcard images with winter children in the snow and sprinkeled mica flakes over the pictures for a faux snow effect. Don't they look splendid hanging from the wire basket?

As always you can right click on all  the pictures to enlarge them and see more details!

Well that is it for today but if you like to see more Vintage Christmas inspirations please go to Joan's blog  Anythinggoeshere http://thepottingshed-anythinggoeshere.blogspot.com/

There you'll find a list with all the participants in here blog's side bar!

I would be happy if you'd leave me a little comment so that I know you stopped by and I hope you liked my Vintage Christmas Monday pictures.

I'll hopefully see you again next Monday with photos from my mum's Vintage Christmas decorated home and until then I wish you all lots of fun with your Christmas decorations!

xoxo Carola

From rearrangements, tinsel trees and swaps

Welcome back to Boxwood Cottage! I'd like to share you with you my latest crafts, swaps and some rearrangements in the living rooom which I just finished. Of course it is also getting Christmassy at Boxwood Cottage at this time of the year!

Above is my hallway if I can call it like this because my living room is one open space now, but in the other cottages of our row the walls are still in and this part is originally the hallway. The white door is leading down to my basement. At the right side of the door was my book shelf which my mum and I moved to the other side of my livingroom yesterday afternoon beside of the patio door and my old cupboard. My cottage is quite small, so I always have to think how I can rearrange things to fit better and still let the room look bright and wide enough.

Well this is how the book shelf looks on this side of my living rom and I like it much better there! Following I show you some pictures from the other side of the room starting with the white shelf over my couch, which I decorated with star lights and pressed glass plates and some other favorites:

Last week I made this mini tinsel tree, isn't it cute? On the left side is the other part of the white shelf and on the right side the shutter that I moved from beside of the window over here for a new look:

Following  is an overview of the right side of my living room. I also have a new old window, of which you can catch a glimpse on the right in these photos, I'll show you some more photos of that window in my next post, because the decoration of this part is not yet finished.

This is my fave corner to sit relax and read:

One of the table decorations are these papier mâché pine cones, that I wrapped in thin alu chocolate paper to give them a festive look. You can get these pinecones over in my little shop: http://www.boxwoodcottageshop.blogspot.com/

I found this sweet little putz village on etsy lately and together with my bottle brush trees it makes such a beautiful wintery scene: 

Now I like to share with you my new tinsel tree. Do you remember the wooden tree my dad build for me last year? Here is a picture:  farm4.static.flickr.com/3056/3054847777_f4bcb29b0a_o.jpg  I painted it white and than I wrapped tinsel garlands around the branches. I wanted a tinsel tree since I first saw some in the beautiful Merry & Bright book 2 years ago and so I started collecting tinsel garlands. The most beautiful tarnished looking ones I got from my friend Madai in last years swap:

The best part was of course decoating the tinsel tree! I love the whimsy look it gets with the vintage silk top hat on top. I also used the soldered ornaments I made last season as well as a Charlotte doll head, my dads old pocket watch and the felt girl I created last season as well as some silver leaves ans other white and silver ornaments and I'm really happy with the outcome :)

Madai's cute little lamb and the sweet girl ornament from Nelda Ream made it on my tree along with icy glass birds from Thuringia

My vintage mannequin got some wintery treatment with white skates and my granddads old silk to hat, so the studio is all ready for Christmas now:

And lastly I'd like to share with you the latest swap parcels I got. My dear friend Anita of My country cottage garden spoiled me with two of her beautiful cushions. Maybe you already spotted them in my pictures above. The rose cushion sits now on my white chair in the neutral colored cushion on my willow couch. Anita not only sewed new cushions and birdies for me but also treated me with some treasures from Paris, a vintage french bulletin, a pressed glass plate, sweet doll house paper and an Atelier sign. If you are interested I posted more pictures of Anit's parcel on flickr:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/boxwoodcottage/4080566912/
Thank you so much Anita a swap parcel from you is always a feast! :)



The last picture of this post is a swap from my new friend Julia. I first met Julia through an e-mail she sent me with a question on where to find bottle brush trees. We stayed in touch and meanwhile Julia opened her own blog http://www.vintagewithlaces.blogspot.com/ where she shares her lovely creations. A few days ago she kindly offered to send me a set of 3 bottle brush trees she found in a local store (they are really hard to find here in Germany) and was so nice to send me some beautiful surprise gifts along, all very creatively wrapped:

I especially love the old laces, the vintage book with silhouette pictures and the little bag with my initial letter. Thanks bunches for your lovely surprises dear Julia!

Sweet & Sinister swap reveal, Halloween decorations and more!

Update: I'm linking this post from last year up today with Joanne of Anything goes here for her Vintage Halloween Blog Party! So welcome party people! Grab yourself a drink and stay awhile!
xoxo~ Carola

Welcome back to Boxwood Cottage dear readers and fellow bloggers and to my first time of decorating for Halloween here ( it is no tradition in Germany to celebrate Halloween as you might know) and also to my first Halloween swap, as well as to some other news that I'll reveal at the very end of this post, so I hope you'll stay with me until the end, because I have around 20 photos to share with you ( which is also to make up for my long blogging absence again).

The orange candle light in the picture above is the only orange you'll find in my Halloween/Autumn decoration, this year, because firstly it is not one of my favorite colors and secondly it is all about black, white & cream, which pleases me much better, as you will see in the photo below which was my sneek peak photo for my Sweet & Sinister 2009 Halloween swap partner Heather Rowley of Speckeled egg:

I had a tremendous fun in creating pretty Halloweenish items like a goody filled fire cracker, a cone, a black masque, black birds, tags and a soldered pendant etc. for my swap partner and decorated everything that I finished on my vintage mannequin in my attic studio:

I loved the Halloweenish look of my dress form so much that I started making things not only for Heather, but for me too.

And I also decorated one of my vintage silk top hats in Hallween style. Maybe this will attract my favorite vampire Edward? ;-)) Just rightclick on the pictures to enlarge them if you want to see more details.

And closer:

After I finished gathering and creating Halloweenish items for Heather I wrapped it all as sweet & sinister as possible. Heather also wished for some thick German crepe paper and German decorating magazines.

I love silhouette pictures and recently found some pretty old fairytale silhouettes and silhouette postcards at our local flea market so I incorporated them in Heathers swap parcel too.

Below are most of the goodies before the wrapping. I also found a vintage enamel night light candle holder for Heather at our flea market which has a bit orange color around the edges which I found so suitable for Halloween and I thought a tiny bit of orange couldn't hurt he he:

Two weeks after Heather and I had sent off our swap parcels over the big ocean, they arrived at our homes, whoohoo I am so happy with all the great goodies Heather has found and made for me :)

Above you can see the whole lot (click on pic to enlarge) and below some close ups. Sweet Heather has got me everything I wished for, like a cute white feather tree and a beautiful cream colored pumpkin as well as a frozen Charlotte doll. Just look at the sweet little owls the pretty frame and cameo and the gorgeous bracelet with a black rose that Heather made for me:

And I also got one of these fabulous black crows that I just couldn't find here in Germany, but I so wanted one and she didn't even know this, but still send me one, this must have been telepathy :) Thank you so much dear Heather!

In the photo above I have already incorporated some of the goodies in the Fall & Halloween decoration around the mantle in my living room. I love the speckeled egg that she embellished for me with a gorgeous black velvet flower and a fabulous rhinestone button. The girl silhouette that I framed is a scan from a real cut out silhouette from my daughter, made when she was 4 years old.

Lastly the gorgeous white feather tree found the right spot on the left corner of my mantle. I looks almost a bit Christmassy already and I think this photo looks so pretty when enlarged:

And the wonderful cream colored porcelain pumpkin box from Heather got a space on the right side of the mantle:

Following I show you some more photos of my autumn decorations around the mantle:

As you can see it is all about silhouettes and neutral colors:

The mantle is lit by the afternoon sunlight and candles only in these photos:

The day I took these photos the light was so beautiful that I had to take some more photos like the one below of my white glass cabinet:

Here is also a picture of an autmnal vignette on one of my iron tables on the patio, which I created after a walk in the woods:

And now I like to show you something else, we change from Halloween to Christmas decorations. The Christmas ornaments in the photo below are made from paper maché containers from Thuringa in Germany. If you love these nostalgic paper maché Christmas containers as much as I do, I can offer them to you here now: http://boxwoodcottageshop.blogspot.com/ Just in time for Christmas 2009!

These are just a few paper maché ornaments that I embellished to show you what you can make out of them. You'll find many more examples and shapes here:http://boxwoodcottageshop.blogspot.com/ I'd be happy to see you there!

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Lastly I wish you all a great countdown to Halloween week and of course a very fun Halloween day and I'd be glad if you could find some inspirations in todays post and if you'll let me know what you think of it and leave me a comment.

xoxo Carola

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