The Christmas mantel

Happy December, everyone!

While travelling home from Pennsylvania over the Thanksgiving holiday Galen and I decided to take the "scenic" way home and avoid 95 as much as possible.  Travelling along the back roads we were able to enjoy all the bright Christmas lights and decorations that were on display and enjoyed the Christmas music in the car.  

I am now in the Christmas spirit and ready to decorate Mourning Dove Cottage for the holidays.  

I always start with the mantle for some reason.  Maybe it's the easiest place to start.  

  

I decided to make it simple this year with two hurricane lamps, candles and a white ceramic and gold angel.  I wrapped the greens with a light mauve and gold sheer ribbon and added some red berries.   

It gives off a warm glow at night when the candles are lit.  

I hung Otis and Riley's stockings (my two very spoiled dachshunds), and I'll be adding the granddaughter's stocking soon.  (I have to buy new ones this year.)

So, while I enjoy my coffee by the warm fire this morning, I am thinking of new ways to decorate the tree and the dining room and the kitchen and the outside and all the other nooks and crannies in the house, not to mention the outside.  

The boxes have been brought down from the attic.  

Now I just have to find a place for everything and let my creative juices flow.  

How about you?  Are you in the holiday spirit, and have you started decorating?  

Decorating for the season

One of the things I love to do this time of year is plant pansies.  

These pretty flowers are certain to bring color all winter long, and carry through to the spring season here in the south.  

You can buy cascading pansies for hanging pots and hang them outside your window where you can see them every day!  

I am also catching up on my inside fall decorating here at Mourning Dove Cottage.  

I dried these large hydrangea blooms late in the summer.  

I like to put them in urns on the fireplace mantel.  

A few ceramic pumpkins and some berries.   

Pumpkins everywhere.  

I'm a bit late with my fall decorations, but better late than never ~ 
next week we will be getting out all of our Christmas things, right?

Hope you're enjoying this beautiful season!    

The tree is trimmed

and it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Little by little the holiday decorating is getting done.

The stockings are hung by the chimney with care....

the mantel is decorated.

Every year we bring out the nativity scene and display it in our old German cupboard in the dining room.

I still have a few more decorations I'd like to put around in different little spots in the house and this will probably go on up until Christmas! Most of my decorations are the same as years past. I guess I bring out the things I love the most and everything stays the same. How about you? Do you decorate the same every year?

Now the cookie baking begins!

A rose chintz plate

I found this plate at a home and garden show a few years ago and it's one of my favorite plates. It was only $5.00. Reminds me of my grandmother. A Rose Chintz plate made in England. Look at the old crackle in the glaze.



I have it displayed on top of the mantel over the fireplace. I don't change my mantel very often, except for maybe around the Christmas holiday, but I do like the addition of the rose chintz plate.

I think it gives our living room an Old English kind of feeling.

Enjoy your day!

Holiday decorating

Decorating has begun here at Mourning Dove Cottage.

The ornaments are hung....




and the Christmas tree is finished. I love red and gold and those are the colors I usually use in my decorating. The tree is decked out with some vintage Christmas ornaments that my mother and grandmother gave me along with some new fun ornaments too.







I decorated the mantel with a long evergreen garland and sparkly red snowflakes, a snow globe and a white and gold angel.








While we were decorating on Saturday, we had a light snow. It was beautiful. Galen took this photo of our house from across the street the next morning....by then some of the snow had already melted. Snow doesn't last very long here in the south but it was pretty while it lasted.

Enjoy your day!

Donna

Holiday preparations

We'll be moving furniture and making room for our Christmas tree this weekend. The green chair, that Otis is sitting on, and the side table will be moved, and the tree will go in that corner. Not too many places in our small house to put a big tree!

The mantel is decorated and Maddie's stocking is hung.

A few more decorations. I'll be doing most of my decorating when we put the tree up.

The paperwhites grew so tall, I tied them with a big white ribbon to keep them from falling over.

Mmmmmm, Christmas candy.

And a nice cup of cappuccino while I ponder over Christmas cards.