"Cherish" Room - Opening Day!

After a week of working almost day and night to get the walls of the room and furniture painted, vintage finds researched and priced, and making some holiday decorations, I decided it was time to open the room! After all - it is a work in progress - constantly!  Every time a piece of furniture sells, the room gets a makeover to make room for a new piece that may not fit in the old spot! AND - I have so many more holiday projects I wanted to put in the room before I opened, I realize now that I will never be 'done'! So please join me on a tour of my new space - the "Cherish" room at Fabulous Finds!

Let's begin on the east wall as you enter the room -this is my 'cabin' wall!  The desk is a vintage rancho style desk with a cabin on the front panel.   The red desk top is set off by the red of the child's rocking chair -a vintage Nichol and Stone from the late 1950's.  A hand forged iron cross is featured above a vintage mailbox stuffed with letters to Santa!

 This wall also features a bare wood framed chalkboard, a 'Merry Christmas' banner and some rustic frames.

The vintage metal shelf is a perfect display piece for a pair of vintage fawn salt and pepper shakers and the little boy Lefton Snowball Kissing Bell.

 Moving towards the right, the Christmas Tree is almost camouflaged by the printed fabric sporting a wood pile image, hanging behind it. How I snapped this one so blurry is beyond me but I'll take a new picture tomorrow and fix it!  The table sits on an old "Dancer's" table (see previous post!) and in front of it is an old ammo box. 


Ok - that's a little clearer!  A handmade "wish" banner encircles the tree loaded with glittered word ornaments, Victorian cone ornaments to fill, letters, and more!

The main focus wall of the room is next featuring a huge, beautiful vintage chalkboard and a 48" round pedestal table clad in this season's plaid!  The basket to the left on the floor is filled with two peppermint striped pillows, as does a black iron candle stand.

 On the table there are two apothecary jars filled with beribboned jingle bells,


a box of rusty metal tags with stencil letter cutouts perfect for monogramming a gift bottle for the holidays,


and a metal ornament tree with a flock of spring loaded dove ornaments!

Moving right again, we scan past a wall of vintage frames, a wire mesh shelf hung with stockings and a 'joy' banner, some letters, a small bird hook and other wall decor, to come to the ethereal section of the room!

Topped by a massive baroque style frame, this vintage dresser supports a trio of pastel holiday trees, and two mirrored stocking holders with pewter toned stockings. Look closely and you'll see a trio of little cherubs gracing the negative space!

The pastel tones in this corner offer a completely different holiday decorating choice.  A vintage french provincial dining table is the perfect piece to set the tone.  The white feather tree and vintage aqua tinsel tree add a bit of sparkle and softness, while the white lights add a bit of twinkle to the holiday magic!

 Under the padded 'dream' letters, two small magnetic chalkboards hang from the seven bird iron hook, and a rose cross stitch adds a touch of pink to the wall and ties in the vintage tablecloth.

Zoom in further and a vintage pair of playful fawns welcome you to the fantasy.  The 'cut crystal' platter is really a vintage acrylic piece!

Two more vintage fawns play in front of an old lidded jar with snowflake motif.  The ram ornament wishes you 'Noel".

Finding a home in the feather tree are some glittered owl ornaments, dove wreath ornaments and snow glittered jingle bells. (See that patch of green in the top right corner?  Check back to 'Cherish' Room - Day One to see how the whole room used to be that color!)

We now have arrived at the last wall - and where we walked in!  Another sea blue edged chalkboard hangs between the two room windows.  A spinning card rack is filled with Victorian die cut holiday cards, thank you cards, and other French themed blank cards - all offered for less than $2!  A set of old mattress springs serves as a back drop for the 'info desk' and also is great for displaying the variety of greeting cards, clipped on with clothespins.

The feathered angel wings fly above a photo album filled with pictures of 'special order' projects I've done. To the left -  a basket of raffle tickets wait to be filled out for some lucky person to win the newest Taylor Swift CD and a t-shirt, a special incentive for visiting my new space! Stop by and maybe you'll get an early Christmas gift to give someone, or keep for yourself! 

 Thanks for taking the tour with me - the "Cherish" room will continue to evolve with each new piece of refinished furniture, vintage treasure or handmade item I bring in - you never know what you'll find so stop by often! Let me know if there is something special you'd like for me to find or make for you - giving you things to 'Cherish' is what I love!

Apothe'scary' Tabletop!

 

When my boys were little, Halloween was a major decorating event!  With two of my three sons home this past weekend, the decorations were limited to the dining room table for a casual ghoulish dinner with their girlfriends.  The chandelier got a spidery makeover first -

Tearing an old lace tablecloth into shreds substituted for 'spiderwebs' since I didn't have any and with the price of gas these days, couldn't justify a trip to town!  I draped the strips over and under the chandelier's arms, leaving the 'shreds' hanging.

Little glittery spiders grabbed right onto the shreds without tape, wire or anything!

Soon it was arachnaphobia all over again!

  

Next I added a skull tablecloth I found at a thrift store - it wasn't long enough to fit the table so I just put it in the middle.  

 A rugged black runner crossed over the top running the length of the table and then two matching place mats anchored the table ends. Next, Apothecary jars were placed over the runner and as many glass cloches as I could find. 

Rummaging through the "Halloween" tote I got out of my attic I found all sorts of 'body parts' I could fill the apothecary jars with!

Witches fingers. . .

Eyeballs . . .

Teeth . . .

 and a bunch of skulls!

Glow-in-the-dark bugs filled this apothecary jar!

This small metal rat was missing an ear but who could tell under the little cloche when he was surrounded by eyeballs?!

This sticky red blood found at the dollar store really set the mood - I wrapped it around the large apothecary jar and I had my accent color!  Fun labels with ghoulish titles were leftover from last year but still had plenty of stick left so each jar got one!

My tall red glass candlesticks were a perfect blood red and the big-eyed black owl candles came from Marshall's.

I had a few more big and little glitter spiders so I placed them on top of a silver pedestal dish.  This black web 'cloche' is really a wire basket I turned upside down to 'capture' the spiders.

 

Lastly - I rolled some rubber eyeballs out for 'scatter' and let them lie where they stopped rolling.

 With the apothecary jars and cloches filled, it was time to move onto the place settings.

I love using my plain white dinner plates and then adding a fun salad plate on top to go with the theme.  These black and white plates were a birthday gift from a friend.  Plain white paper napkins were placed in black crow napkin rings and look plenty fancy!  The red handled silverware was found at a thrift store.  Red water glasses echoed the red dripping blood!

The menu was simple - chicken enchiladas, green and fruit salad, and chocolate cupcakes for dessert.  Orange and black sprinkles topped the cakes made fancy by web design cupcake wraps.  The wire pedestal cupcake stand was another thrift store find.

My one decorating splurge this year for Halloween was this "Happy Halloween" burlap banner I bought at Pottery Barn - I couldn't resist!  The orange 'flicker' lights were a great find at Big Lots and really enhanced the mood of this casual Friday Fright Feast! Here's wishing you and yours a Happy Halloween!

I've linked up to 
Catch a Glimpse Thursday
The Weekly Creative #6 

"Beachy Blues Buffet" Tabletop

Sometimes a piece of fabric can inspire a table top!

In this case, a piece of Hawaiian print fabric in a variety of blues just happened to be what I needed to set the tone for a casual beachy buffet I hosted recently.

The yardage was one of the last things left in my mother-in-law's house when we were moving her to her new home.  I loved the various hues of blue and I thought the batik type print gave a Carribbean vibe.  The beachy buffet was held to thank those who had donated to my son's recent humanitarian trip to Haiti!

The colors in the fabric matched a lot of my depression glass that I had been collecting over the years so I gathered some pieces and put them to use.  The dark blue apothecary jar was my most recent find!

 I chose yellow and white daisies to contrast with all the blues!

The napkins were rolled up and encircled with jute napkin rings and placed in my cherished vintage sand bucket found at the Sacramento Antique Fair.

The light blue milk glass pedestal bowl was a gift from my husband - filled with lemon heads to carry the yellow through the table scape.  The vintage paper fish coasters were thrift store find, as was the blue cut glass handled bowl they are nestled in.

Here's a close up of the milk glass - I just love the curves in the pattern! 

They remind me of the ocean waves!

The tiny seahorse slat and peppers had to be included!

After adding the little starfish and some silver glass glitter to the edges of this sign found at Marshalls, it was ready to welcome the guests!

I placed the blue vase filled with daisies atop a vintage soda crate to create some height, added a couple of blue and yellow candles in a pair of milk glass candlesticks, a few seashells, and the "Beachy Blues Buffet" table top was complete!

I'm linking up to Tabletop Tuesday!