That time of year again!

  Well it's that time of year again. We will be decorating, baking, wrapping, and in general... going nuts. My favorite thing to do is getting the tree up. I have been decorating in different colors and motif's now for a few years. I stopped doing the family tree when I no longer had a family to enjoy it.

  Anyway, I love decorating, and as an artist it's something I do very well, for the most part. Last year right after Christmas, I started to search out bronze ornaments, during the sales. I was able to pick up a lot of different designs for just a fraction of their original cost. I also decided to use a kiwi shade of green and cream colors to accent the bronze I was finding. There were several different shades of bronze as well, which gave more interest to what I would be doing.

  I also found bronze berries, flowers and leaves, as well as lovely green velvet holly leaves in the right shade. A cream flower, as well as bronze poinsettias, would make lovely focal points. I also found a few glass ornaments like the slice of pie, mushrooms, "orange" slices, and large kiwi green icicles. I use a lot of bronze wired ribbon in a couple of different shades. 

  The flower and berry "nosegays" are a favorite of mine and I always make up a few each year. I like to have birds in my tree, but this year there are large bronze butterflies. A real find and most unexpected. I also was able to get 2 strands of cream pine cone lights, that are wonderful mixed into the other colors. There are bronze pine cones as well.

  Around the bottom of the tree are the "unbreakable" ornaments. Those are there for the adventuresome kitties that always find their way into the scheme of the tree decorations. They like to think they are one {tree decoration} or that it's all just for them to play in. Either way, I have the plastic ones on the bottom row. Most of the time they don't look to bad either. I also like to find small little balls to go towards the top of the tree, and anywhere they fit, that larger ones don't.

  I also have a strand of green lights and a strand of orange lights. I was hoping for bronze, but the orange lends its-self well to the color scheme. As you can see, not all ornaments have to be little/large balls. And no you don't have to have garland or tinsel. The tree topper was a plain rusty looking snowflake. I added the glitter, and finding bronze glitter was not easy.

  I still need to make a tree skirt, and the stocking that will hang on the fireplace mantel.

I like to get my tree up by the first of Dec. and down by the new year. All in all this tree is a keeper!