Merry Christmas!

Hope it's "Out of this World"!

PB's handmade gifties

Pb gave handmade gifts to the fam this year.  We had the idea to made tramp art inspired wood burn portraits.  He drew the portraits and I did the burning since it was not as easy as I thought it would be for a nine year old to do.  Opie Taylor was able to do it unsupervised was what I was going off of...well, I burned myself at least three times.  PB then painted the background with an acrylic wash and we glued pull tabs from coke cans on the edges as decoration.  The messier edges of glue we covered with black ribbon.  We also glued bent tabs on the backs to make them stand up, easel style. 

Last year he made coffee mugs by the ever popular Pinterest method of baking sharpee marker on ceramic mugs.  FYI!  This does not work!.... I had to bake them for twice the time and at a much higher temp. Even then they have to be delicately hand washed.  I have one mug right now sitting on my work table awaiting image repair due to it sitting in dish water for more than two minutes.  It was a method too good to be true... 

Hopefully the gifts this year will hold up longer!

Glupert and Bumkins' Shenanigans

Here are a few shenanigans that PB's elves got into this year.

They viewed a candy cane under his microscope...

They pulled out one of the View-Masters...

They got goofy with the Groucho glasses!

"New" Christmas Decor

I have noticed in just the last couple of years, at least in my area, the drastic decline in vintage christmas stuff in the thrifts.  I shouldn't complain too much though, I have acquired 10+ storage containers over the past 10 years and surely do not need anymore...  But I did find a few neat items this year. The little plastic snowman above I got for a mere quarter.

"As seen in Life" set of christmas lights.  These babies still work and reach temps of 300 degrees each. Perfect to light up your tree, bake cookies and possibly light up the livingroom curtains in the process.

I was pretty excited to find this paper Coca~Cola promo popper gun from 1954 in perfect condition for 2.99!

Not pictured, but I found my eighth Empire Plastic blow mold Santa... I said I would stop at eight... We will see... 

Hall Decking 2013

I am the ghost of Christmas future sent back in time to remedy there not being a Christmas decor post for 2013!  

Every year I like to look through my past Holiday decor posts to get inspiration from previous arrangements.  What things worked and what things looked like reindeer poop. 

I noticed that 2013 didn't represent so I looked through my old photos and realized why...the pics were really crappy and the decor was no mug of hot cocoa.

I still wanted to put some holiday cheer up for retrospect so I picked out a few photos that kinda work.

So here is Christmas 2013 by way of 2020.

🎄  🎄  🎄

This is all I have that isn't blurry or lit by a wonky strand of Christmas lights.

And in the scheme of my decorating it is not good at all.  Overcrowded in some areas, sparse in some, and not balanced in most.  I still wanted to include it so I can gloat about how much I have improved since!

 

IAWL Christmas Tree

The theme for this year's Christmas tree is Frank Capra's 1946 classic It's A Wonderful Life!

It is one of our favorite movies no matter if it's christmas or not. 

 I printed out several movie poster images and scenes from the movie on cardstock and embellished with glitter...

The opening credits and a shot of the fam with the Merry Christmas wreath that George left at the office.

 "I wish I had a million dollars!  Hot Dog!"

"Look daddy!  Paste it!"

 "Buffalo Gals" scene (top right) and "A great big one!" with a suitcase covered in labels from travels (lower right).  There are also several other ornaments made from movie posters, travel brochures, and covers of Tom Sawyer books along with little silver bells everywhere for angels to get their wings!

Under the tree... the presents are wrapped in IAWL paper of course!

IAWL Wreath

 I changed up last year's wreath to fit this year's It's A Wonderful Life theme...

A fast and easy switch-a-roo, just change out the images!

At viewing last year's wreath you may notice that our address was "320 Sycamore", a reference to the Bailey's Old Grandview home from IAWL. 

IAWL Bedford Falls village

Continuing with the It's A Wonderful Life Christmas theme!

We have a "It's A Wonderful Life" Bedford Falls village that got top billing this year.

Gower's Drug Store

 The Bijou Theatre with the Bailey Brother's Building and Loan next door.

Other pieces displayed are Martinis', the Library (a less seen building in the movie but we used it due to our love of libraries), the bridge and the Old Grandview house.  

I have started coming across other buildings for the village lately at thrift stores....like Ernie's Garage?  I don't recall that building ever being in the movie.  And the Chapel, which has maybe a whole minute of exposure. I guess all the other good buildings were covered so random and possible locations were made to keep those folks that must have "the whole set" buying. 

I would like to see them make a Pottersville village myself, complete with a Violet Bick prostitute ceramic figurine and flashing neon dance club signs!

Calling All Jitterbugs!

Stocking Toss Pillow

As I am just now wrapping up the christmas decorating, I came up with a last minute quick craft.  I have been picking up old cute stockings are thrifts for several years.  I don't have a set yet that match well so I generally leave these guys in the storage containers each year. I am sure this in not a new idea...It is too simple and awesome to just be from my brain. But it came to me to stuff them like pillows and place them here and there...on the living room furniture and the beds, in what ever groups or lack of, that they could work! 

 Ma Bess, gets a spot on the living room chair...

And Bob and Ann are on the couch!

I have a couple of others that are going to go on the beds.

PB couldn't understand why we have "Bob and Ann" when those are clearly not our names! I tried to explain that I bought them for the names! HA!

Cranberry Coconut Holidainty

I love collecting old cook booklets, especially the Pillsbury Grand National bake off contest ones.

I like baking something that is worth thousands of dollars!

  {See the $25,000 Cake here.}

I have not made the 1953 cover winner ("My Inspiration" Cake) just yet.  But for the holidays, I did make Senior Winner, Mrs. Willard Aiken of Des Moines, Iowa's 

Cranberry Coconut Holidainty dessert!

I liked the idea of it being an "easy top-of-stove" dessert and it had a cute name...Holidanity.  I also liked that it is a sweet-ish dumpling and made with coconut!

It turned out tasting pretty good.  PB, who is generally a picky eater, ate 4 servings of it! 

I think that the dumplings were a bit dry though, I have been thinking of trying out using cake mix, maybe making coconut cupcakes and serving the cranberry sauce over the top...

Click on the image above for the recipe and you have the added bonus of "Black-Bottom Refrigerator Dessert" included on the next page!

I have been wanting to find vintage recipes to make that can become my family's favorites and "asked for" holiday traditions.  I think with a few tweaks this could be one! 

I LOVE coconut.  For more vintage recipes, several with coconut, check out the "Recipes" area located at the top right hand of this site.

And speaking of coconut...here is a clue as to what our christmas tree theme is this year:

Made up your mind yet?

I'll take chocolate.

With coconut?

I don't like coconut.

You don't like coconut?

Say, brainless, don't you know 
where coconuts come from?

Look it here...
from Tahiti, Fiji Islands, the Coral Sea!

Double Bubble Tree

The tree is decorated with wrapped pieces of gum!  

I could get behind decorating a tree in vintage candy wrappers.

Grapefruit Tarts

With an abundance of grapefruit in season,  I have been looking for different ways to use them. We are all tired of broiled grapefruit, grapefruit juice, plain grapefruit, grapefruit kabobs, grapefruit salad, fried grapefruit, grapefruit sandwiches, grapefruit gumbo, and the oh so ever popular... grapefruit surprise.

My man picked me up a bunch of these 1940s Culinary Arts Institute cook booklets at the flea market recently and fate stepped in.  Grapefruit Pie Tartlettes!

I made them as individual servings baked in a cupcake pan, because that is just more fun. They were very yummy! Very grapefruitty!

In the Leftover Cook Booklet there is a great miscellaneous section in the back with recipes to use up that left over Tongue we all hate to go to waste.  That recipe is only available upon request.

Ironing Table

That is a super cool ironing "table".  It appears that the legs are off to to one side so it could be an ironing "desk" even.   I can only guess that this must be Santa's new wife, poor old chubby Mrs. Claus, she got replaced by a new model.....no doubt his secretary from the North Pole workshop.  I hope the ex Mrs. Claus at least got a few elves and a reindeer or two in the divorce.