Happy New Year! How are you spending the holiday? Our family is comfy and cozy enjoying a quiet night inside. Over the weekend we had a light snow that made for some very cold and slick conditions, so we are just happy to be safe and warm at home together. This evening I am wrapping up the holidays here on the blog by sharing a Christmas home tour “grand finale” for 2017!

This year there were many “plaid tidings” and vintage Christmas goodies to explore in our 1921 yellow brick home! A very old and rare blow mold Santa standing on an antique, chippy pressed back chair greeted guests at the front door which gave a hint of what types of treasures awaited inside.

Come on in out of the cold and take one last look at Christmas 2017 with me!

Earlier this season I welcomed you in through the front door and straight into the music room which is to the left of the door. Our main tree and many of my most treasured Christmas collectibles are in the music room which you can see in my Holiday Music Room Tour. Last week I also shared my Cottage Kitchen Christmas Tour which was full of Christmas goodies too. There is no shortage of Christmas in the rest of the house either! I think you will see why I have titled this post A Holiday Grand Finale!  *I have added some affiliate links to some of my favorite things on the tour for your shopping convenience.

Just to the right of the entrance is our living room which has a very traditional feel with a lot of plaid textiles, German and primitive Santas, woodland deer, comfy Christmas pillows, and nods to colonial and Victorian Christmases past. The smells of pine, cinnamon and orange essential oils are always diffusing throughout the holidays to add to the authentic ambiance of the season.

 

A large vintage buffet in the center of the room is home to many old world style Santas during the holidays. My oldest son is an anthropologist and loves to study world cultures. The collection of “Santas Around The World” on top of the buffet belongs to him.

I made a Christmas card “wreath” using some of my favorite reproduction Victorian Christmas cards. The images are so lovely!

I am crazy about German Belsnickle (traditional spelling: Belsnickel) Santas! I think they are so beautiful with their old European charm and a bit primitive too. If you are unfamiliar with these beautiful Santas, I introduced them in my Christmas Home Highlights 2016 post. Each year my collection grows because I buy one or two Belsnickles at after Christmas sales. It is always fun to open the Christmas totes and find a “new” Santa the following year.

There are always a few vintage deer roaming around with the Santas among the woodland greenery too.

The small Santa with the beautiful red cloak is my after Christmas purchase from this year.

There are other Belsnickels  around the house which you will see as we continue the tour. If you would like to add a gorgeous Belsnickel to your Christmas decor you can find them here.

Now let’s move over into the cozy sitting area by the fireplace. I am excited to show you the vintage green cabinet I scored in November and some cool antique theater seats we found earlier in the fall!

We just moved these awesome vintage theater seats (U.S. Route 60 yard sale finds) into the living room for Christmas to make room for the Christmas dollhouse that I put on display for the holidays in the dining room. They have been so useful for extra seating I think they will be staying in this spot for a while.

Just in front of the sofa is a round coffee table full of Christmas and winter woodland decor. There are a lot of treasures in this view from my comfy spot on the couch, especially my favorite Santa in a dark velvet green cloak and the “new” vintage green shabby cabinet I found in November at a yard sale. I am primarily a shabby chic blancophile (lover of white things) and you will see a bit of that style in the dining room, but green is my favorite color. It is fun to add more green around the house for the holidays!

I had absolutely no spot for the green cabinet when I bought it, and I am not sure where it will go after Christmas, but it fit perfectly in front of the fireplace for the holidays. This year I really wanted to incorporate a lot of plaid and traditional or colonial styles to the decor, so the cabinet gave me a little more space to play around with those ideas.

A beautiful traditional red tartan plaid blanket by Ralph Lauren cozies up a linen wing recliner, while a darker green and navy plaid blanket scarf doubles as a runner on the green cabinet top. I always use lots of plaid gift bags and wrapping paper each Christmas too.

You might have seen the amazing pheasants my husband scored at an estate sale the week before Thanksgiving in my Thanksgving tablescape post. Since pheasants are also traditionally Christmas, I kept them out for the season and used them on the mantel (even Frank Sinatra croons in Mistletoe and Holly…”tasty pheasants, Christmas presents, and folks stealing a kiss or two, as we whisper, ‘Merry Christmas, to you!'”) If you love pheasants be sure to go back after this tour and take a look at the Thanksgiving post here.

For simplicity I  just added a beautiful tartan ribbon, (the prettiest tartan ribbon I have found!) pheasant feathers and vintage style bead garland to the greenery I use on the mantel every year. Grouped with the brass candleabra and colonial fruits centerpiece on the green table below, the fireplace came together as I had envisioned to create a very traditional Christmas look and feel. The addition of antlers is in keeping with the woodsy theme as well.

There are little touches of Christmas all around the room! Using plaids at Christmas is also a reference to our English and Scottish heritage.

From the living room you can see straight into the dining room where the traditional and more Victorian style merge, mainly due to the large Victorian dollhouse that is on display each Christmas. The doll house is getting an interior makeover as a winter project, so there will be an upcoming post devoted entirely to this charming treasure. My dollhouse is vintage, but you can purchase the same model here if you would like to build your own. One is never to old to have a dream dollhouse!

This year I went with a dark green and wine/berry red color scheme in the dining room so I could still use my draperies. The pattern is very “fallish” but I was able to pull out the wine, green, and gold instead of the more autumnal hues in the fabric and it all came together. The addition of a simple magnolia leaf garland with it’s dark glossy green leaves draped along the curtain rod was perfect for tying in the greens throughout the home.

 

My beloved standing Victorian/Belsnickle wood Santa also matches the curtains beautifully and instantly coordinated the decor when I moved him from the living room into the dining room. Originally I thought I was going to have to buy new neutral curtains to use for Christmas, but it is amazing what you can make work and pull together when you shop your house instead.

I wanted an “Olde World” style Christmas tree for the dining room, so I just took a $20 tree from Wal-Mart and gave it a makeover. Instead of fluffing the stems I actually twisted branches together to leave space in between the branches to make it look “skimpy.” This helped to show more of the ornaments, similar in style to the old German feather trees.

A primitive popcorn and chestnut garland, 1920’s lead tinsel garland, mercury glass beads, primitive Santa tags with old postcard images, and other Victorian themed ornaments helped create the look I was going for.

The old shabby chic painted secretary filled with my silver plate collection was easy to decorate by adding some vintage bulbs, bottle brush trees, a Belsnickle in a berry red cloak and a couple of thrifted vintage angels.

A vintage Currier and Ives Winter tin platter will remain on display throughout winter.

This year I really didn’t do an elaborate tablescape for Christmas, so a full tablescape blog post wasn’t in order. I did fill a wooden dough bowl full of Christmas greens (pine, juniper, cedar, magnolia, holly), colonial style fruits and some pretty green candles from Dollar Tree for my centerpiece. I put out some lovely green, gold and white china plates with plaid saucers and a couple of ironstone bowls full of nuts on top.

I also decorated the chandelier with a wreath and bulbs for an extra festive touch.

 

I added a lot of other winter touches around the rest of the dining room and on my shabby French faux mantel and fireplace area behind the farm table.

Another magnolia garland adorns the faux fireplace mantel. I love the simplicity of the green against all the white. The use of magnolia was a surprise since I had only bought the garlands to make wreaths, and I just decided to try them in the dining room on a whim. Although magnolia is extremely popular in farmhouse and “fixer-upper” style homes, here I think it adds more of a touch of old southern Christmas charm.

 

Most visitors don’t believe that my whole house is decorated with inexpensive junkin’ finds, but sometimes the tell-tale signs are there if you look! I just realized that I went the whole Christmas season with the price still marked on my beautiful shabby chic cast iron angel stocking holders! I had just stuck them on the mantel to see if I would like them with all intentions of cleaning off the red crayon price, then I got distracted by decorating and forgot about it. #junkerprobs! No one seemed to notice, I guess there are quite a few treasures to distract from such a mishap!

Even funnier, I didn’t pay that price! I actually found the angels at a yard sale for $1 each from another junker who had previously paid $2.99 at a thrift shop! They may have been thrifted junk, but I think they have a beautiful antique look which is perfect for the mantel and shelf where so many other brocante style treasures are always displayed. The gorgeous ivory velvet ribbon and crystal prisms definitely show my love of all things romantic and shabby chic.

Many of these Christmas or treasures in shades of teal blue and wintry hues will remain on display after the holidays, and with just a few simple changes the dining room will easily transition the winter. I will share more of the dining room decorated for winter  and a bit more of these winter vignettes later this month.

As we leave the dining room, we head back out toward the door but not before passing by the staircase which is full of vintage Christmas treasures to explore!

The area beside the staircase is very vintage indeed! The pencil Christmas tree next to an antique dresser is full of vintage ornaments, and Santa has left many vintage toys under the tree just for me!

This year I also received some awesome Hunter boots for Christmas, and if all the forecasts are correct, I will be getting a lot of use out of them this winter!

In the fall I moved my antique, white distressed dresser from our bedroom down by the staircase and I love it in it’s new spot. It is a beautiful piece to display vintage Christmas postcards, a very old set of lead winter skaters figures, and some other vintage Christmas collectibles.

These adorable vintage angels were a Christmas gift from my mother this year. Yesterday I moved them to a new spot to create A Timeless New Year’s Eve Vignette which you might enjoy reading after this post if you missed it.

I combine vintage ornaments from all eras on the skinny pencil tree.

It is such a fun tree to decorate with so many wonderful vintage ornaments.

I love to display nostalgic old toys under the tree too.

 

As I finish up this post it is now night time, and we all are saying goodbye to the holidays as it’s “back to the real world” tomorrow. I certainly hope you have enjoyed this Christmas home tour “Grand Finale” and all of the other Christmas posts I shared this season.  I know I have certainly enjoyed all of yours and hearing so many nice and encouraging comments from my readers too. 

As we bid a bittersweet farewell to Christmas, I send you and yours Best New Year Wishes for 2018!  I am looking forward to what the new year brings. I have many exciting plans and projects that I will be sharing here on the blog, so be sure to subscribe by email or follow on your favorite form of social media so you don’t miss out on the fun.

Thank you all for a wonderful and inspirational holiday season. Good night, God bless you, and Happy New Year friends!

Amber

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