Where my inspiration comes from...

All of the Christmas decorations are down and put away for another year. I am going through the photos and will be putting a few posts together of 2014's Christmas decorations. Life is getting back to normal.

When I was getting the New Year's postcards together ready to scan I came across two antique Christmas cards that were the inspiration for "ilexander". I'll show him at the end of this post. You can have a look at the New Year's card and postcard blog posts here, here, and here.

I love this silly image of the holly berry guys popping a Christmas cracker.

The verse is delightful.

I had really only looked at the image on the front before and was very surprised when I turned it over after scanning the front to see that printed on the back is

Raphael Tuck & Sons Ltd.

Publishers to the King and Queen.

Copyright London.

and at the bottom

PRINTED IN ENGLAND

I had no idea that I owned a Raphael Tuck card.

This is another antique card that unfortunately has no information on it as to where it was printed but it does look English.

I had not looked at these two cards for many years and was very surprised that they were quite different from what I remembered.

Here is "ilexander" my candy container sculpture that grew out of the two cards. His head is definitely inspired by the first card. The second card inspired the holly staff and if you look at that card you will realize that the large holly leaves that little guy is carrying as well as his long pointed ears inspired the holly leaves at the base of his head. The leaves were definitely needed to show that he was a holly berry but they also create a collar for his jacket.

I had not looked at either of the Christmas cards for at least five years before or during the creation process; the two images morphed into one image in my mind and then evolved into the finished sculpture. I love the creation process!

Go to my Etsy shop to purchase ilexander, there are other views of him as well.

The Urn Arrangement

This is the arrangement in the cast iron urn that I mentioned in my last post. I will take you through the steps that went into creating it.

The first photo shows wire screen placed on the opening of the urn with the salal branches in place.

Don’t forget to strip all of your branches of the excess leaves on either side. Inside the urn is a plastic bucket that stays there the year round. In the summer we place a pot of annuals in the urn. It catches any excess dripping water. The bucket also gives a shallower bottom to the urn, so that the branches for the dry autumn arrangement don’t have to be as long.

The next photo shows the cedar in place. All of the branches so far are laid around the outside of the urn to create a base for the arrangement. Some of the branches are sticking up a little but with addition of more branches will make them lay flat.

Two small scrubby fir trees are added side by side to give the effect of one full looking tree. Pine boughs are added next.

I continued the triangular shape by placing the boughs on either side of the fir tree and a few pine boughs in the front of the urn. I want the central area in front of the fir tree to be flatter for a small display to be placed in this area.

Rose hips, hawthorn berries, and holly add colour and interest.

Two bird nests are tucked in the boughs, one in the top of the fir tree and one at the base of the tree. Added to the birds nests are two paper party hats, bird size of course, and a "tin can" telephone made from two thimbles and a length of thin string. Three strands of 50 mini lights are tucked in amongst the foliage. Three large pine cones and ribbon are wired in among the boughs.

It takes a while make a large arrangement but is definitely worth it. I started the arrangement with a concept not a finished idea and then proceeded from there. I hope this inspires you to try some freeform designing of your own.

Have fun getting ready for Christmas. Don't burn out, take time for others and above all have fun.

Decorating Our Front Door

Several years ago I picked up an old fishing creel for a dollar,and now we hang it on the door and decorate it for autumn and Christmas. I thought that I would photograph the arrangement as I put it together so that you can see how easy it is.

I have used fir boughs to bulk out the body of the arrangement. I took a long fir bough and cut it into 8" lengths for this basket. Cut them longer if your container is deeper.

Put your branches with the cut stem at the top in the back of the arrangement for bulk and place the tip ends of the branches in the front. By arranging the stems this way you get a full effect that looks like you are using all branch tips. I don’t use floral foam because most of the time I am doing this on the spur of the moment. I would probably use fewer branches and have more control if I used the floral foam but on the West Coast we have lots of fir trees so I fill the basket abundantly.

Next I put in salal branches. The large oval green leaf is a good contrast to the fir branches. Then I tucked in some cedar branches. When you use cedar you must check to see which way it curves as the foliage on either side of the branch curves to the right or to the left. I tucked in some holly and some branches of a shrub in our yard that I don’t know the name of, but it has oval leaves and red berries.

Finally I wired in some cones. I did tuck one cone in the basket so that the foliage would be held in place. Using floral foam would have made this step unnecessary. I always do the arrangement with the basket hanging on the door so that I can see how it is looking.

I have also done an arrangement in a large cast iron urn by the front door that I'll show in my next post.