Santa Really Does Have Green Eyes Just Like My Daddy!

Do you wonder how designers get their ideas for displays?  Sometimes it is just as simple as picking up an object to move it!

When I was 2 1/2, my Mom took me to visit Santa.  Like most children, I  sat on Santa’s lap and asked him to bring me wonderous things.   I believe I am telling him I wanted him to bring me his Santa house so I could use it for my herb shop.  It looks like I am saying “and the check out counter will go here and the wreaths will go there…”.   

Or maybe I am asking him to bring me all of the things I will need to turn my future outdoor area into the perfect spot for a holiday celebration!  Knowing me,  I am asking him for his Santa house and all the things I will need!

“Snow” Place Like Home For the Holidays

Turns out, Santa was busy that day so he asked my Dad to sit in for him.  As the family legend goes, when I got back to the car, I looked up at my mom and said “Santa has green eyes just like my Daddy!”.

Santa’s Boots

Sometimes the inspiration for a vignette is as simple as picking up something to move it out of the way so that you can move something else to get to what is behind a room divider.  At least that is what happened to me!

Due to storage constraints in our Florida home, I have to come up with creative ways to hide my “stuff”.  I have a beach themed room divider in the corner of our gathering room.  In front of the divider is an old crock with a hurricane lantern on top of it.  Next to the crock, I keep my Dad’s childhood black boots.  I picked them up to move them out of the way and BAM it hit me…..  these look like they could be Santa’s boots!

I gathered together the elements pictured above and the vignette just came together!  Santa is riding on the moon, not a banana as my husband thought!  Santa is nestled in my uncle’s old tool box.  Santa’s boots are standing next to the box.  The vignette is displayed on top of my Mom’s buffet.  The linen runner is one I found when I was going thru her things.  The runner was a gift to my Mom from one of the foreign students they had hosted. 

Why I never thought to use the boots in a Christmas display before is a mystery.

The rest of the evening, I walked around the house saying “BAM”….. it is something I picked up from my mentor, KariAnne.  She says “BAM” a lot!

Let’s take another look at it!

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Red & Green Just Say Christmas!

 

The chest that serves as the base of this display was my Dad’s navy sea chest.  I have used it in all the places I have lived since the mid 80s.  I added the glass top to it to protect the label on the top.  My first husband didn’t always use a coaster, so the label was beginning to get damaged.  The label is an address label from when my Dad’s girlfriend sent the sea chest back to him after he told her he was marrying someone else!  My Dad was quite the ladies’ man in his younger days!  I will try to get a picture of the label the next time I change the display.

The blue green crate from Dayton , Ohio is one of the many wooden boxes I collected over the years.  I had to downsize my wooden box collection dramatically when we moved to Florida.  All the details about the downsizing process can be found here:  and here:  as well as here:

The Dayton box made the cut, as I like to say, for a couple of reasons.  First, the color.  The blue green color works well in a lot of vignettes.  Second, the fact it has writing and it says Dayton.  It would be better if it said Cincinnati but we will take any Ohio town.  More about my thyme living in Ohio can be found here:

I slowly layered in other touches of red and green.  The tiny green chair was my Mom’s childhood chair.   An old ski tow rope peaks out of one corner. I found it while cleaning out my Dad’s workshop on the farm.

To bring in a touch of coastal , I added the sand dollar piece of art that was made on a piece of barn wood from my family’s barn.  I found all kinds of neat things when I was cleaning out (ok, when my helpers were cleaning out) the barn.  I shared those finds here:

Another Option for a Vignette using  a Boxes as a Base-

Let’s Build A Snowman Vignette

I decided to turn the vignette into a Snowman themed vignette.  I added a primitive looking sign that says “Snowmen fall to the ground in pieces” as well as a few candy canes and some pine.  A snowman figurine sitting in a box of Christmas greenery finishes off the look.

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Red, Rustic & Reclaimed

I turned this trio of spindles into a holiday centerpiece by adding a few seasonal touches.

All of the details can be found here: Red, Rustic &; Reclaimed Holiday Centerpiece

Do you have an awkward area that presents a decorating challenge?  The nook in this cabinet did present such a challenge .  How I solved it can be found here:  Red , Rustic &  Reclaimed

My Favorite Santa

Santa Robert Jones  12-24-1925 to 9-27-2017