All things old and new to enhance your home and holidays
Celebrate the seasons and special times
Do you know how Thomas Jefferson and the other founding fathers of our country came up with the idea of uniting the colonies into a confederacy of states? If you come up clueless, you’re not alone. Most people have no idea how or where the idea originated. A couple of hundred years before the Constitution…
To do something a little different for Easter, we grew pots of rye grass and then inserted sugar cookies that we baked on bamboo skewers into the pots to create a “blooming pot of flowers.”
Do you know how our celebration of Thanksgiving came to be? If you answered “it was a feast held between the Indians and pilgrims in late November that the Pilgrims continued every year thereafter,” you’re not alone. That’s the generally known history of Thanksgiving, but as with all legends and stories, there’s much more to…
Don’t just make your holiday village displays on shelves, platforms or under your tree… use your dinging room table. A small village display makes and excellent lit and lively centerpiece for holiday entertaining. Here we used Department 56’s Dickens’ Village The Original Shops of Dickens Village. You will have to sacrifice a tablecloth for this…
This table was set for a soup party – the perfect repast for a chilly October evening. Three different homemade soups were served: cream potato, vegetable and beef, and Julia Child’s Soup in a Pumpkin which is a creamy cheese and onion soup cooked and served inside a pumpkin! The table cloth is a rusty…
The Department 56 Dickens’ Village Signature series is displayed on the fireplace with a festive garland and wreath. There is plenty of “snow” to bring the winter time feeling inside.
You don’t need a huge span of space to create village displays. You can display houses in baskets, dressers, buffets… literally anywhere. Here we make use of several different things to makes miniature village displays for the holidays.
The paved road suddenly came to end as crushed gravel began to crunch beneath the wheels. The car came to a dead stop at the foot of the driveway. Just ahead, shrouded in the fog of a gloomy October afternoon, appeared to be a graveyard with three moving figures. Emerging from the mist was a…
You can’t imagine how addicting working with beads and other minute items can be unless you’ve actually tried it! Beading is an obsession from the moment you pick up the first bead and the first pin. Here are some of the ornaments we’ve made over the years. Some are from kits, others are our own…
Villages aren’t just for Christmas anymore! We bring non-christmas Department 56 houses out for a stunning mantle display during the summer. Here we use various houses and accessories to create a lush summer scene. The sheet moss makes the scene complete.