French Christmas Ideas for the Tree

I love looking up new ideas to make my tree look tres Francais!  This year I'm dreaming of some macaroon ornaments...

 

These super shiny ones in multiple colors and that oh so cute packaging...

 

Is sadly no longer available.  Found it here. 

But these are available:

 

Santa, please send me these!!  Found here.

 

 

 Sur La Table has some super cute ornaments this year! 

 

 

A perfect dainty pink macaron.  I can't get a bigger picture, but the website does.

 



Both found HERE. 

 

And while we are at Sur la Table...have you seen their Gingerbread House??

 

 

Now that's a Gingerbread House!!  I'd love one if someone would put it all together for me, too.  I can only imagine the disasters I'd have if I tried that ambitious of a project...

 

Fa la la la la....

 

 



French Cottage Style - Valentine's Day Decor

This may be a bit early, but in between Christmas and Valentine's Day the days can seem so gray and dreary.  So I'm skipping ahead to Valentine's Day and I've already done a bit of decorating and inspiration - cottage style - that I thought I might share with you...

First, you have to decorate your mantel - I love the touch of French chic and the red antique books. 

 

Cliched, but true - red roses are very romantic.  ;)

 

 

 

 

These are my lovely and amazingly delicious sugar cookies - nothing says Valentine's Day like a heart shaped cookie.  I love the red and white fabric underneath, don't you?  So sweet!!

 

Add some romance to your walls with pretty still life portraits - I love this little painting I got at a flea market.  All it needed was a painted and antiqued white coat of paint on the frame to turn it from '60's drab to Shabby Chic fantastic!

 

And no cottage is complete without a country kitty offering you a Valentine...

 

 

 

Hope this brightens your day!  ;)

 

Happy Monday!

 

Silhouette Ornaments and Last Minute Orders

I've been so busy keeping up with listings for the shop and shipping I've been too busy to update ye olde blog, but I thought I'd take a minute now to do so...

First, I have new ornaments in the shop:

First up:

This is the loveliest, I think.  Making papered ornaments is difficult, especially the round ones.

This ornament SOLD just the other day.

 SOLD

These are lovely ornaments with two different couples stenciled on each side, the background is French Text.

 

The great thing about these ornaments is they aren't 'Christmasy' - they go well year round - make great presents and can be used as tags on gifts or special Valentines.  I love these.

This is a Custom order made for a customer who wanted facing silhouettes in 5x7 frames, but you'll note they face opposite of what I usually offer.  You can always request a custom order if you see something you like, but want it a little different.

SOLD

These will go on either side on the wall of above a bed - so cute!!

And to be different I made some beautiful dark red ornaments with white silhouettes this year - this is a set of three ornaments sold together with SIX different silhouettes - three couples all together.  They look much lovelier in person...

Available in my shop HERE

For those of us who like hearts...



Stenciled different ladies and gentlemen on each side.


These are the PERFECT Valentine!  ;)


The long promised last medium sized French Text house with a black roof is finally up:

Available HERE

Available in My Shop HERE

 

 

Happy Holidays!!



Fairy Houses for Holiday and Everyday Decor - Just in Time for Christmas!

EDITED to add:  As of 12/4/13, my banner of my blog shows most of the houses that are up in my shop (and one just about to post) all together on my fireplace mantle as part of a Christmas/Winter Display.  Aren't they adorable??

***

I promised better pictures, here they are:

These are the houses that are available in my shop as of today.

 

They make an impressive display on my book shelves in my bedroom. 

 

This is the largest of the houses - it's beautiful.  The paper on the front is the title page of the song - 'Savoyarde' by Carl Reinecke.  It has the same dark red roof that the other two music houses have - all three look beautiful together.

 

 

Available in my shop HERE.

This picture shows the medium sized house inside the large house - they fit each other perfectly.  You can put the small house inside the medium and then all three will take up the room of only one house.  Great for storage and shipping.  If you buy two or all three sizes I can combine your shipping.  Convo me for details.

 

 

I very rarely make these big houses - this is currently the only one available.  You can really show off the Antique Sheet Music with this house.  So beautiful.  You can store and play with some dollhouse furniture with this house.  It is not for small children to play with, though - older children, maybe.  ;)  I think it looks great on a shelf or above a fireplace.  Just about anywhere.  Great at Christmas and anytime.

 

The lighting kind of washed out the color of the pictures a bit - it is darker in person and better able to see the music.  I'm not sure why the pictures just don't do it justice.

 

Here are all three music houses together...

 

 

 Not only do they nest inside each other - you could even stand them on top of each other - they balance easily on their chimneys.  Not sure why you'd want to do that, but I thought it was cute so I thought I'd share it:

 

 

And don't forget the two little French Lit houses - they are still available right now, though the medium size sold out fast last month.  I am making one more medium French house right now before I stop for the holidays and I don't know when I'll make more - they are very labor intensive.

And if you want more details on your house - this is in my shop as well...

 

Available HERE

 

It's covered in pages from a Vintage English book on composers.  Very cute!  It has black shutters, a Floral vintage design paper door and a button door knob.

 

Maybe the Borrowers live there!  ;)


Don't forget to buy Homemade and Upcycled gifts for Christmas!  Support Small Businesses and give One of a Kind gifts...all available at 58Cherries on Etsy.  ;)

Big, Medium, Small - All the Sizes of the Fairy Houses Together

I'm going to be posting the largest sized Music Fairy House soon in my shop and I wanted to give a little preview/overview of how the houses look in relation to each other...



This is just from my camera on my phone late at night - much better pictures to come.  But on the middle shelf you can see big, medium and small houses in relation to each other - all red roof and Antique Sheet Music.  They look adorable together, no?  And bottom shelf has the two black roof Vintage French Book papered houses. 

Hope you all had a happy weekend.  Busy finishing up orders to ship and new items for the shop before Christmas.  Busy, busy, busy.  Orion is helping, of course.  ;)



Or maybe not...

Here he is around Halloween doing his Hitchcat pose:




And here he is just hangin'





If you look at his baby pics a few months ago you'll notice he's much fluffier and pretty!  He's growing up very handsome, indeed.  In fact, he's very smart and visual - he's watching me type this right now - sitting on my knee watching the letters go across the screen.  He's telling me to be careful with my spelling and my grammar is atrocious.  ;)

10 more days until Thanksgiving!!  Gobble Gobble

Valentine Decor - French Shabby Chic, oui!

Nothing says romance and Valentine's Day like French shabby chic vintage finds... 

 

I wish I had a lovely romantic room like this:

 

And everyone likes chocolate, but since I'm on a diet I guess this would have to do:

 

Available on Etsy here.

 

I added a few new items in my shop that are sweet and romantic:

 

 

 Some wood ornaments on French book paper.  There are different silhouettes on the backs - check out my listing here for more details.

 

And one on antique sheet music.

 

 

Two different silhouettes on one ornament. 

Available here.

 

And this latest pair of framed silhouettes are still my favorite.  I'm finally keeping a pair for myself.  I love the antique silver color of these frames and the romantic details on the frames really suit this pair.  I have a listing for these in my shop, too.  Just FYI.

 

 

 

Available here.

 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Silhouette Saturday - A New Selection

Working on new items to come into my shop soon.  Here's a little preview...



As I said in my last post I will be adding more and more new silhouettes to the shop over the next few months.  Some needed larger frames than I had already so I had to get new ones, but they are the same style as the ones I already had in the shop.  The ones on the left and right are the larger silhouettes - you can compare them to the smaller ones in the middle.  I just love the variety it provides.  I am thinking of making a permanent silhouette wall in my own house - large and small silhouettes, oval and rectangle frames, music paper and french book paper backgrounds, etc.   The overall effect will be beautiful! 

I have to wait for better lighting before I can take proper pictures of my new items for the shop.  I also framed an antique typewriter print on french book paper - it is sooo cute I don't quite want to part with it, but I will.  I don't think I can bear to part with the newest antique silver colored frames I put my usual silhouettes in (the smaller ones towards the middle) - they are so pretty!!  I think I'll have to see if I can find some more frames like that to sell.  Just this once I think they need to stay with me.  ;)  I've been promising to keep one set for myself to hang up, but I can't seem to keep these in stock and I've sold off my own set at least 4 or 5 times now. 

Is anyone else having a problem with blogger and uploading pictures from their computer?  I can't get the upload button to stay on the screen - it blips in and out and then there is no way to upload.  It's been the root of my rare posting these days - can't post without pictures!  If you have this problem, too - there is one semi-solution I've found, if you post the picture anywhere else on the web and then copy and paste it directly into the post you can get your pics in.  I sometimes just copy and paste from my shop photos, but what about my personal or rather my non-shop photos?  I don't have photo bucket or anything else, but I guess I'll have to do that soon.  Blogger isn't being helpful about fixing this problem.

Oh well, have a Great Weekend!!

Country Christmas Decorations - My Living Room Decor

Just a few pics of my living room decorations...

 

 My Christmas tree - about 8 foot tall and loaded with our ornaments - musical, Santas, mercury glass, etc. 

 One of my smaller trees - loaded with bird houses and skis.

I love the Scandinavian look to them - the skis are my favorite! 

 

 

 

 

I always love a woodsy Santa - he has a Fox at his side. 

 

My newest ornaments - pretty little pine cones.  So cute!

 I love globes and ancient maps.  Also pomegranates

 

This woodsy Santa seems to have come by sled.

And back I go to working to get ready for the holidays!  So many cookies to bake!  ;)