Saturday, December 30, 2017

O Christmas Tree

I've definitely been collecting things to show you even if I haven't been able to post.

The weekend after we got back from DC, we went with my sister and the girls to Longwood Gardens to see their trees. Fabulous as always! (The girls are three and a half now.) We saw so many trees with unusual color combos. This one was (advertised as) "Tiffany blue" and had some copper accents. Another one was red and lemon yellow--it worked!
Then we put up our own trees. The snowman tree, last year (because we were heading to Florida) we bought a new artificial tree--black tinsel!--we got it back out this year because I was too sick to want to wander around tree lots. We didn't put it up until the Monday before Christmas when I was shamed into it at work. The dude helped so much over this period. He doesn't usually love all the Christmas brouhaha, but he really pitched in, buying presents, decorating, cooking, baking. I found a good one!



This is the handmade tree. Almost all the ornaments were stitched (or made) by me (there are a few by you too!). When we were at Winterthur, there was a tree of needlepoint ornaments that rotated. (I don't know how I managed to miss a photo of it!) The dude said we'll have to get one of those for this tree. Ha ha!

My collection of Sandy Cozzolino ornaments, growing slowly. I posted this photo on her Facebook page, and she said two in the middle, the Santa with holding the tree and the teddy bear Santa, are among the earliest ones she designed!
I did get the trees for the mugs that I set out to do over Thanksgiving break. I bought that huge gold tree at Target. (It is in there straight; I don't know what went wrong with this picture.) A fun little vignette. I shared it on Facebook and lots of people have these mugs. I think they might be looking for trees to stick inside during the sales!
For my aunt's December 27th birthday, we headed to Winterthur to see their trees. Although I should have photographed the needlepoint tree, I took this one instead. For the past 30 years, Winterthur has had a dried flower tree. All of the flowers are grown and preserved on the property and saved for this tree, which was HUGE. I think you can tell if you look at some of the flowers, like the sunflowers or the hydrangea. Pretty amazing!

I hope you were able to enjoy lots of lovely Christmas trees--if that's your thing. I do love the sparkly lights in this dark time of year.

8 comments:

Karyn said...

Sounds like a wonderful Christmas, though I'm sorry you were under the weather, but it sounds like your dear dude really pitched in and came through for you...isn't it funny to watch them go into action when push comes to shove? LOL they really are keepers.
The trees are all amazing, as are your decorating pics, and yes I too have a set of Santa mugs, but mine are not as wonderfully eclectic as yours...and the tree idea is fabulous!
Hoping that your New Year's is wonderful and that you are feeling well enough to enjoy it.
Hugs

Linda said...

Beautiful trees Nikki.

Linda

Pamela said...

The girls are three and a half! Time flies. I love your Santa collection. What fun!

Robin in Virginia said...

Thank you for sharing your trees along with the ones from Longwood and Winterthur. What a fabulous collection of stitched Santas you have! It looked like you enjoyed your trek to DC. I hope you are feeling much better and remain healthy.

diamondc said...

Anna: I love your tree, I hope your Christmas was lovely and fun.
I hope you are feeling better.

Happy New Year
Catherine

Julie said...

Lovely Christmas pics you have shared.
I hope you are feeling much better.
Happy New Year!

Jo who can't think of a clever nickname said...

I love Christmas Trees. Did you see Aimetu's blog where she showed her church's Tree Festival?
Love the trees in mugs, brings a whole new meaning to the phrase "mug tree"!
Your stitched Santa collection is most impressive too.

Beth said...

Loved, loved loved your tree post! Your collection of Sandy Cozzolino ornaments is amazing - so much work represented there.