Christmas decorating

 Hi again friends! Christmas draws nearer and I thought I'd show you some of my decorating this year. Settle in because this post is picture heavy! Normally I'd break it into two posts but I've pretty much run out of time - I'm travelling tomorrow so if I don't get it done now it won't happen...

 My Christmas tree this year is in the dining area. I kept the tree fairly pale and vintage inspired. It has silver balls with the occasional pearl pink or gold one, and a few more detailed ornaments. The lights are those LED ones that are super bright but also blue tinged, so I coloured them with pink nail polish. (You can see more about the technique on this post.)

 This is an ornament I made back in November. It's a tiny bottlebrush tree in a salt shaker, with glass glitter instead of salt.

 Here's another glass bottle tree. I made four in total, with slightly different trims on the lid.

 I have a couple of these little clip on birds.

I wanted white ornaments with pastel polka dots but couldn't find anything like that. I couldn't even find white ornaments to paint dots on, so I had to spray paint some coloured ones. It was a bit of a performance but I love how they turned out. I only made four in the end so not enough to do the whole tree... maybe next year I'll do some more!

I had time this year to do a bit of Christmas baking. This is shortbread, dipped in pink tinted white chocolate and chopped pistachios and dried cranberries. Simple but delicious and looks pretty and festive, I think. I've also made a syrup for cocktails with raspberries and basil leaves, and I tried a little bit out as a tea... delicious and perfectly summery!

 I also made this summery garland to hang in the window. A lot of Christmas decorations are winter themed, and sometimes that's ok. But since it is summer here, I'd like to acknowledge that and a flowery garland is the perfect way to do it! The garland is off Trade Me (party supplies section) and I've hung glass jars of flowers and various ornaments I've either made or been given. (The rest of my polka dot ornaments are here!) Below are some close ups of some of the ornaments.

 Here's my kitchen shelf in it's latest fit out...

 I love these bottle brush trees in teacups! Bottle brush trees are actually really hard to come across in New Zealand. I read sometimes on American blogs about how they go into chain stores and buy big bags of them... not so here! I actually found it really hard to go through with glueing the pearls onto the trees because you know... so hard to get more! But I did it in the end and I'm really happy with how they turned out. I also found some tiny glass baubles to put in the cups, and this tree topper which looks vintage but is just a really cheap one that the glitter is flaking off.

 On the top shelf I have some more Christmas tree ornaments and tiny baubles, and I put some rosemary in glass candle holders. I wanted some greenery somewhere and this puts out more of a traditional Christmas vibe.

Last but not least, this is the table in the hallway. I started up a small Christmas village and it's slowly being taken over by cards. Every year I plan to make some glitter houses for a village but once again it hasn't happened, but I like the eclectic look here too!

Hope you've enjoyed this tour. Now it's time for me to start to pack and get organised as I'm going to visit my family for a few days over Christmas. The weather forecast is fantastic and I'm looking forward to some long summer days relaxing with family and friends, before I come home and get stuck into the garden and other projects. Merry Christmas, to those who celebrate it, and I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season. xxx