14.12.11

christmastime creativity and an artful tabletop challenge

The past few days have been full of artful creativity and inspiration! It's good to be home. Here is a bit of what I've been up to. I'd love to hear about your holiday craftiness too!


Here's my December Goals collage.  My wish is to take really good care of myself, and be open to feeling true comfort&joy. I want to relax, play, and be OK with lots of imperfection.

I love making these goal collages in my journal/planner. They really help me to move through the year with vision and focus.

washing all the glassware
 Sunday was my sweetie's birthday, a big one with a zero at the end.

I planned a special dinner party.  I don't usually fuss much with table settings; I have a kitchen full of mismatched seconds from my studio, and cute thrift store cutlery. Flowers, candles, good wine, and good food usually make up for my haphazard tables.

But... I really wanted to honour this birthday in a new way.  Also, we were recently blessed with the gift of some beautiful family silverware. I wanted to set a real table.

What to do? Could I translate my mismatched, artful, thrifty ways into a real table setting?

I did some cruising around online for inspiring pictures, and started dreaming of lots of candles, sparkly glass, vintage white and cream, and cute mismatched floral vintage china... I set myself  a challenge: to create the entire table setting - china, centerpiece, candles, runner, and glassware - for $100!

I spent an afternoon cruising the thrift stores in town, and came home with a huge box of pressed glass vessels, and service for 12 in mismatched floral china. It took four thrift stores and lots of scrounging and pondering, but it was fun. I also procured two big bags of course salt, 100 tea lights, a bunch of mini-roses in a gorgeous antique cream shade, a box of cheap restaurant style wine glasses, three metres of burlap, some white paint, and a metre of cream dingleballs. I kept track, and in the end I spent about $110. Yay!

glassware plus course salt and tea-lights lining the centre of the table

washing the thrift-store china

an almost completed place setting.


the completed table! painted distressed white, with burlap runner, cut-glass and tea-light centrepiece, mismatched vintage china, white flowers, and the family silver.
The table was gorgeous. The party was great fun, with wonderful food, friends, and wine animating my well-set table. And the whole project was just such fun...

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