Where's Your Christmas?

I feel like some of my older posts are worthy of revisiting.  Seems like a good time for this one.

It's here!  The time of the year when the urging, begging, annoying, nagging and other forms of persuasion begin in most households relative to moving in the Christmas decorations.  Boxes either have to be retrieved from an attic, basement, garage or the storage building across town.

Did you ever consider there might be a better option than putting it all in a box and hauling it to some dark corner?  I did and here is my solution.

This is a drawer in a large English chest that sits right in the living room where my tree gets decorated.  The drawer has several layers of tissue on the bottom and I've used divisions to separate ornaments by color, theme or size. 

This section is for some big ornaments. 

A section of the same drawerl.  

  

Another drawer.  This one holds holly candle rings, my collection of bottle brush trees, Christmas CD's, rolled ribbons, some neat Dept. 56 ribbon candle rings, a cup and saucer from my childhood teaset, old wood blocks with significant letters.  It is a tradition that I use the same ribbons year after year.  They show up tied on cup handles, candlesticks, bunches of holly.  Sometimes to accent a special ornament on the tree or to anchor one in a precarious spot.  I even have some satin ones from a Christmas wreath that hung on my Mom's door in the fifties.  As you can see by the top of the chest I was in the process of storing things when the photos were done. 

An idea of what goes in one side of the drawer.  In the back is a very old ornament box that I always use to display some treasures.  There is the ornament that commemorates my little bug.   I have a small collection of wooden tops most of which stay out year-round in a pretty bowl.  The one in the drawer joins the others at Christmas.  Most of my stuff is sentimental and traditional.

The two smaller drawers at the top of the chest hold my creche figures on one side and the other drawer holds small fragile ornaments . There are some small Radkos, some old family ornaments from my parents - one blue one is showing in the back.  In front is my collection of little grape bunches.  I cherish them.  

The bottom drawer really holds a lot of stuff.  There are several stuffed Santas - two from Toy Works that I wrote about a while ago, lots of stockings - decorative and personal, some small pretty boxes, books, a old flocked reindeer who visits under the tree every year, a couple of pillows and a Dept. 56 Santa with his hot air balloon.  I also have a collection of those little advertising hat boxes like you see in the upper right corner.  

My tree, swags and some other large things are in storage but my wonderful big chest holds all the stuff that used to go into boxes.  The best part is that throughout the year I can open a drawer and get a touch of Christmas. 

Happy Holidays!!

~Sami

What Now?

Although there are a few more of the twelve days of Christmas, most of us are thinking about putting it away.  Some may have already done so.  In the interest of that process, I was looking around at storage pieces.  If you've read here for a while you know that a lot of my decorations go into a big old English chest that sits in my living room.  Search the word Christmas if you'd like to read that post.  The little Search gizmo is very efficient.  The title of the post is Where's Your Christmas.

I did go looking at storage options and I found some interesting stuff.  Maybe there isn't anything here that will accomodate Christmas but at this time of the year finding stash space becomes a primary consideration.  On most resolution lists there is some allusion to cleaning out or cleaning up. 

All that is to say, I'm talking about storage pieces because I found some neat ones.

This cart is from Ikea.  If you're a craftsperson this has endless possibilities.  I could use it in my laundry room.  How about on a porch as a bar cart?  Dorm?  Bathroom?  If you sort ornaments as you remove them from the tree this would be useful.  I'm sure it comes in colors.

Speaking of dorm and laundry rooms, wouldn't these work well?  I found them on Pinterest.  Their only reference was 'offi perf box'.  If I can find them I will edit to give a reference.  Do you store extra towels and bedding somewhere?  How about pantry storage?  Gee, weren't polka dots a big item last year? 

What a fresh Scandanavian look here!  It comes from Horchow and is called 'Hilliard".  I liked it less when I learned the design is inlaid bone, not painted.  It comes in blue and would make a good color and design starter piece for a bedroom or sun porch.  It would certainly make a significant impression in a foyer.  Instant heirloom!

This handsome dentiled piece is called 'Storage Capital' and is from Bee Line.  This one and the previous piece would be friendly in the same room.  Classic, traditional, functional and fairly resilient for fitting in.  I can't quote it specifically but Bunny Williams, the namesake of Bee Line,  has a motto that goes something like "Always traditional but never predictable".

I loved every one of those old rickety commercial shoe racks on casters that used to show up at antique shows but I never had one.  I might be happy with this instead.  The photo was copied from Stanton Home.  Industrial and amenable to innovative ideas. 

My very best wishes to you for finding your storage solutions in the new year.  If you have none then you are free to celebrate but whoever of us who read these blogs isn't itching to get on with a project?  There is always something to fix, change, improve on or renovate.  Be on!!

Please share your thoughts and don't forget to check out the other Christmas storage post if you have few more minutes.