Friday, November 9, 2012

In-Betweener

I am not much of a Thanksgiving decorator so to me November kind of falls into no mans land.  I am starting to put together ideas for Christmas decs but I can't put them out yet, right?!?!  But I am ready for the pumpkins to be put away so what to I do in this in between time?

As you all know, since I have said it a million times, I am really trying to reuse and multipurpose this year.  Yes "multipurpose" can be a verb...why not!?!  So I have decided to start moving things in the direction of my Christmas decor without pulling out the Santas and Reindeer.

This may be a little off topic and I am sure I will touch on it more later - I like to pick a theme for my holiday decor.  But I use the term "theme" loosely.  Last year my theme was Gold.  This year it will be Cozy Lodge.  Just think wood tones, natural fibers, warm candles and cozy slippers.

So my in-between design is starting to take me there.


Bark wrapped candles are everywhere right now and yes I have picked a few up at the store but these I made!  And even if you aren't going for the Cozy Lodge look you can take this simple idea in so many directions.

I began by digging up some thin cardboard.  I actually used the back page of a pad of construction paper.  I cut it to be half the height of my candle and long enough to wrap around and overlap a little.  Then I used birch paper that I already had.  But this is the place where you could use any paper - glitter paper, wrapping paper, fabric, newspaper even!  Cut the same size of the decorative paper as you did the cardboard.  Use hot glue or a glue stick to attach the decorative paper to the cardboard.  Once it is dry wrap it around a candle to get the right size and hot glue it into a cylinder.  Just like this...


Then, you guessed it, put it over the candle.


You could even reuse this on different colored candles - change it to a silver candle for New Years!  Put it in a hurricane or dress it up any way you would like.  And if you where able to collect all the materials from scraps around your house like me then this project was free!


So start thinking about your theme for the season.  Get ideas from catalogs, Pinterest or go window shopping.  Trust me, a theme will not only make your decorations work well together it will help you a ton when it comes to putting ideas together!