Okay, I'll cut to the chase--the Evergleam Christmas tree is up! Yes, it's true. Trust me, I didn't plan this, one thing led to another and it is up.
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| Vintage ornaments on my Evergleam: Shiny Brite, Czechoslovakian, Bavarian, Coby and a wonderful mushroom from Sears! |
Since our thrift stores have started to stock Christmas decorations, we have been aggressive in getting out there early in hopes of finding some much wanted treasures. I plan to make a wreath out of mercury glass bulbs this year and so I've been scouring every thrift store. I needed to go through all my ornaments and decide what I wanted to use exclusively for the tree, what could go to crafting and what I still needed. The only way to do that was to put up the tree and decorate it.
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| My cart of ornaments for crafting. |
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I also need to unpack my putz and ceramics to see what all I have as some of the things I packed are vintage felt and plastic ornaments. Here's a picture of finds from last week of miscellaneous Christmas vintage. Doesn't include any glass ornaments, but in the previous picture you can see part of the haul of pink vintage teardrops I got. They were priced very high, so I kept passing them up. I figured if they were still there when it was 50% off, I would get them. I also got tinsel, plastic wreaths (for foliage) and bottle brush trees and wreaths.
I was thrilled to find some vintage hard plastic Santas, a Gurley candle choir boy and ceramics made in Japan. The vintage garland unlike today's garland is made out of metal. The yellow box contains a 1970s mobile with silver bells and red ribbons which have faded to pink but still super cute! I've been wanting a vintage mobile, I have fond memories of the one I had as a kid.
Another vintage item that we are on the look out for are blow molds. Unfortunately, I think we have too many now--but to hubby there is no 'too many'. We get them for two to three bucks on average, they are always nice and nasty having been outside and in the garage so I have been doing A LOT of cleaning! Most of these will be displayed (and stored) in the house as I'm not going to clean these every year!
We got this big Santa and two of the Noel candles last week and also some other smaller ones not shown.
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| Santa blow mold |
Figuring out where to put all these light up characters is no small task. I'm a stickler for organization and have to have the house clutter free--so no help from hubby when it comes to decorating!! Not "working" doesn't mean I get a break around here. I have spoiled my husband with pretty neat Christmas decorating in past years, so he knows I have it in me and starts early with his not so subtle (he thinks they are) comments. And of course, I give in--sigh.
I was thrilled to find some vintage hard plastic Santas, a Gurley candle choir boy and ceramics made in Japan. The vintage garland unlike today's garland is made out of metal. The yellow box contains a 1970s mobile with silver bells and red ribbons which have faded to pink but still super cute! I've been wanting a vintage mobile, I have fond memories of the one I had as a kid.
I'm on the hunt for a blow mold Santa as well. I never found a Halloween pumpkin, much to my chagrin.
ReplyDeleteMy theme for Christmas this year is Our Epic Sock Monkey Christmas (I even have a blog all about it by the same name) so anything I find this year will be for next year, which I have already decided will be Our Epic Vintage Christmas. I've found a few pretty glass ornaments already. My mom has committed to giving me the ornaments she got in Germany in the early 70s. And, she's also giving me her ceramic mini tress with the little lights…her and my grandmother made them before I was born, so I am very excited about that! I feel kind of bad that I am already planning for 2014 but as I learned planning for this year's sock monkey theme, you have to start early. Now I;m double hunting, for this year and next.
There is never planning too early! You have a head start with the wonderful treasures from you mom and grandmother! I like those light up ceramic trees, I've been seeing them, but I want just the right one!
DeleteI've decided I have to move ;) I never see any vintage Christmas items in any of our thrift stores. Well, we actually only have two-Value Village and Salvation Army. Thank goodness for yard sales, occasionally I will find something if I am lucky.
ReplyDeleteCan you tell I am jealous??? Oh, I did find a very similar Santa face blow mold this summer at a garage sale, and I am excited to use that. I love that you already have a tree up, why not extend your enjoyment of the holiday season??
Your thrift stores need to step it up! We do have 4 particular stores we begrudgingly go to, not every time we make the rounds though, only if we are desperate and have the energy. They tend to stock a lot of junk and rarely rotate.
DeleteOh yes, it's so much work--doing the decorating just to pull it all down so quickly isn't worth it for me. We enjoy the warmth from the lights and color during those cold dark rainy fall/winter months!
I want to make a wreath with ornaments too, I'm not sure if I have enough picked up yet or not!!!
ReplyDeleteLove blowmolds - we had to move ours up to the attic for storage - they take up so much space!!
I read it takes about 100 ornaments to make one wreath, I want to make at least 3. It's fun buying all the different color bulbs and hoping to find some unusual ones!
ReplyDeleteYes, the blow molds do take up a lot storage space! I need to start looking for some old pillowcases now to put the smaller ones in--come time to put them away.