Ready for Christmas

 I have been taking my good sweet time to get ready for the holidays this year.  On Tuesday of this week it was 41F and sunny.  I decided it would be a good day to go out and dig horseradish for my popular home made cocktail sauce.  Several times the New Year has found me out in the snow with a bucket of water (to thaw the ground) and a muddy shovel looking for roots while snowflakes drifted down my collar and into my ears.  

Digging this year was pleasantly dry and I found a couple of perfect roots.  I got my tools cleaned up and wrapped the still muddy roots in a plastic bag and stored them in the hydrator for later.  And it was a good thing I got it done.

Because Wednesday afternoon it did this.

I finally got around to making my Christmas wreaths.  I did this out in the heated garage on a table where I could scatter fir needles everywhere.  The one for the roadside fence is about 15 pounds.  Last year I foraged for my greens but this year when I got into the mood to make wreaths there was two feet of heavy snow on the ground and I couldn't imagine trying to find enough greens under those conditions so I bought some instead.  This has the added benefit of being able to include berries and textures I can't always find on our property.

My husband's father grew up in this house and we still have his runner sled.  I retrieved it from the chicken coop and plonked it down in the still soggy planting bed where it can freeze into place.  This wreath is made on a simple coat hanger base.  Behind the wreath there is one of his vintage wool scarves that buttons instead of tying.  

I always manage to have a touch of Christmas in every room, but it seems like we spend a lot of time together at the dining room table so the tree goes there.  I actually got the Christmas Tree up on Black Friday.  I keep several boxes of Winter/Christmas items in the basement now mixed in with my other seasonal decor so I began exchanging summer items for winter around the first of November.  

This table centerpiece gets changed several time throughout the year.  I made candle rings for each season and I change from Apple Blossoms to Summer Berries to Ivy and Acorns so the Winter Evergreens are ready to go and just needed some color added.  I only had to get two boxes down from the attic:  the tree, and the tree decorations.

Christmas trees are so difficult to photograph.  This tree has always been some variation of gold but this year I needed to replace the cheap gold balls that were losing their color and I started running across ornaments sets in shades of "tonal blush". So I upgraded to a burgundy/pink/gold color scheme which blends with the salvageable gold ornaments as well as the large burgundy ones I had on our all red living room tree in 2016.

The ornaments range from a dark burgundy which looks almost black through creamy cherry, dusty rose to rose gold, pink and plain gold which I think looks very up to date and classy.  Yes, Pink and Dusty Rose...  They look really nice against the drapes that I put up in 2023.

I searched for a new topper but didn't find anything I liked

Next to the tree is my Hoosier cabinet which has lately been featuring my collection of Uranium glass under black lights.  This didn't need much additional decoration so I just added bubble lights and a mistletoe garland.

I added a Santa here

I brought out all of my Christmas themed kitchen collectibles from Snowflake Crackers and Jack Frost Sugar to Yummy Cocoa mix and Nabisco Sugar Cookies.  We're ready for a Holiday baking session.

I always have a vintage Campbell's Soup ad hanging here in the kitchen.

I change it out now and then and recently purchased a Christmas themed one.  I enjoy looking it while I prepare our meals. 

Saturday Evening Post 1929

My horse drawn sleigh theme lasts all winter

I enjoy shopping for a few Christmas themed items to add to my collections each year.  A few years ago it was rounding out my collection of Reed and Barton carousel horses for my ornament tree.  This year I finally chose a beautiful set of saddle mounted sleigh bells.

I made the mini wreath out of a single fir tip

I remember an old family friend had a pair of these displayed on her coffee table each Christmas.  They had belonged to her family back when sleighs were the only available form of winter transportation.  This style of saddle chimes is readily available online.  Many of them come already mounted on a wooden stand, but someone took the time to have these beautifully mounted by a harness maker who included the appropriate harness hardware and an accent layer of patent harness leather.  This display elevates these bells above any I have ever seen before.

There are many types of sleigh bells from body bands and hip mounts to shaft mounted bells.  People have been using bells on their horses for millennia but they became associated with sleighs because of their use as a safety device.  Those of you who live in snow country know how quiet the snowy landscape can be with all usual sounds muffled.  Traveling by horse and sleigh there would be no tell tale hoofbeats and the sleigh glides silently over the snow.  It would be sort of like cruising silently through a parking lot with a hybrid or electric car before they started adding the fake vroom-vroom noise to warn pedestrians.  Bells were required so both pedestrians and drivers could hear sleigh traffic coming in the snow. 

 These saddle chimes would be mounted on the harness saddle and screwed down with the rein terrets.  I have only seen saddle chimes depicted on pairs of horses.  There was probably a protocol for what type of bells were appropriate to your rig depending on whether you had a one horse open sleigh or a pair, or draft horses with bobsleds.  If there was, that tradition has been virtually lost to time.

Centerfold engraving from Harper's Weekly 1888
shows saddle bells with a feather plume fastened on top

Full engraving
Sleighing in Central Park, NY

Sleigh and pair of Standardbreds in front of the Ahern Mansion Jamestown, NY
Showing appropriately sized Body Bells

Shaft Bells and Shoulder Bells

Hubbard, Spencer, Bartlett and Co 1895

Hubbard, Spencer, Bartlett and Co 1895

Have you ever given any thought to how roads were maintained before the age of automobiles and plows?  Both horses and sleighs require a fairly firm surface to travel on and this was achieved by packing the loose snow with a roller.

Oxen 1907
Now that would be slow going!  Oxen are never in a hurry.

The above photo comes from an interesting collection of snow roller photos

Snow Rollers: How Michigan Cleared Roads After a Snow Storm, 1800s-1920s

Growing up I had a couple of sleighs and used my great grandfather's sleigh bells many times.  

My Great Grandfather's Bells
We had them riveted onto a new strap by an Amish harness maker

Good sleighing weather was single digits when the road salt stopped working and you could get a good hard packed road with a layer of fresh snow for hoof traction and no bare spots.  If we had a snow roller we could have packed paths in the open fields because without packing the going is either too deep for the horse or the sleigh breaks through to wet ground which freezes ice to the runners.

My sister and I and Dandy Christmas Day 1985

Dusty and I at the Chautauqua Institution Sleigh Rally 1986

A few years later we purchased a calendar produced by a local artist and found she 
had used the exact same shot and changed the background to one of the quaint Victorian houses
that the Institute is famous for.  During the sleigh rally participants were encouraged to make use of the unsalted roads in the village.

Oliver Christmas 1989 or 1990

At this age I am grateful for my remote car starter and am glad that I don't have to bundle up under a buffalo robe and travel to town by horse and sleigh.  But nothing compares to the memories of gliding across the silent snow with the mellow sound of sleigh bells. Tomorrow is the winter Solstice.  In merry olde England this was referred to as "midwinter" even though it is actually the first day of winter.  Here in Western NY we feel like we have already had our share of winter weather.   It is a good time to snuggle up with a warm drink and watch the snow falling gently outside.  In the weeks to come we will begin thinking forward to spring and starting seeds and looking forward to warmer weather.

Just hear those sleigh bells jingling, ring tingle tingling too...

Come on, it's lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you!

Dashing Through The Snow by Jeanne Newton Schoburg
prints available at Fine Art America

There’s a happy feeling nothing in the world can buy

When they pass around the coffee and the pumpkin pie

 It’ll nearly be like a picture print by

 Courier and Ives

These wonderful days are the things we

 Remember all through our lives!

Heart Shaped Objects

 Hearts have always been one of my favorite shapes.  It started in grade school when I learned how to cut a perfect one from a folded piece of paper.  Its also a very flexible shape.  They can be fat or skinny or fancy or plain.  They can be edged in lace or made of smooth metal.  I look forward to this time of year when I round up all of my heart shaped objects and come up with some sort of happy vignette.

Tin hearts have become one of my favorite collectibles, whether they are Jell-O molds, ice cream molds or cookie cutters.  Especially if they are baking tins.  There is something about all of the years of bakers pouring love into these tools to make goodies for their Valentines that gives them a special aura.  

The latest addition to my collection is the 1920's Kreamer tart tin.  I've been wanting one for awhile and they only come up once a year or so.  When you see one you can't linger too long over the decision because no matter the price, someone will buy it.  When it arrived in the mail and I opened the packaged I fell in love with it.  It is so cleverly made.  Each one of the heart shapes is individually stamped into its own circle and then set into the larger flat tin.  It is a work of art and it makes my heart happy.

My large spring form pan is also a clever design.  The bottom fits into a very narrow lip and the tip has a slide which pulls off to release the sides.  It would take more than one cake mix to fill this baby!

I've come across several more smaller sized cake pans.  These three are my first finds.  I put them on this shelf back in 2019 and liked them so much they've been there ever since.  I added the swans last year.

As winter wears on these homey touches keep my heart warm.

Have a Happy Valentine's Day.

A Slow Start

Thanksgiving came pretty early this year and I'm not ready for holiday decorating yet.  The tree is up and that's about it.  Usually, on Black Friday, I put on Christmas music and probably a movie and spend 6 hours decorating the whole house ceiling to floor, no corner forgotten.  This year I spent the day really cleaning the house instead.  I usually clean the house well the weekend before because I don't want to decorate dusty shelves.  This year on Black Friday I pulled the area rugs, dusted the walls and corners, cleaned the wood floor and the tile kitchen floor, shampooed the area rugs and laid them out in the sun to dry and basically drove every dust bunny out of the place.  This morning when it was time to decorate, I developed a strong disinclination to glittering up my clean floors.

But I did decorate the tree, after assembling it out on the front porch and carrying it inside.  I went slowly, with the hand-vac close at hand, glitter contained.  The only other decorating I did was bottle brush trees, ornaments and candles scattered amongst the china displayed in the pie safe which is something new, and therefore more interesting from a creative standpoint.

Then I duplicated my favorite arrangement from last year which took all of three minutes, the amount of time it took to place batteries in the candles.

One thing I'm totally drawing a blank on is the table centerpiece.  That is usually my most creative idea of the year.  Sometimes I do the same one two years in a row, but never more than that.  I usually find something online for inspiration.

2005

 For several years I used the centerpiece form I got from the Colonial Williamsburg catalog.  This is a neat cut iron form which holds a hurricane lamp glass or a pineapple in the center, and has rings to hold pears or apples, or just ornaments after your pears get over ripe.   You place a foam or oasis disc underneath to hold your greenery and I always made the effort to find fresh greens.

2008

 Sometimes a new collectible purchase inspires my centerpiece,  This oval enamelware roaster base is a great beginning and I replicated this arrangement at least once.  Again with fresh greens.

2012-13

 In the kitchen, my cheery red colander is my favorite starting point

2014

2015

 Sometimes I find an inspirational photo online and have to go looking for the components.  This sometimes leads to whole new collections.  My Campfire Marshmallow arrangement brought a lot of fun and the following year I amended it to add the mini-marshmallow tin. 

Double Decker Marshmallows 2016

Last year's simple wooden bowl base is my favorite I think.  I may duplicate this.  I also bought a lantern for my autumn decorations this year so maybe I'll use that instead.

2016

Or maybe this year I'll just go buy a poinsettia....