*If you are here for The Cowgirl Up Link Party, this week only it will begin Tuesday morning at 8 am, so please come back then to link up.*
Hi, it's Anita here from Cedar Hill Ranch. This post is part of our Christmas in July series. We have 8 days of Christmas projects to break up this July heat, and the posts are showing on 8 fabulous blogs. I'll show you the schedule later in this post.
When the Cowgirl Up ladies were discussing doing a Christmas in July, I have to admit I panicked a little. I had no idea what I was going to do, because I don't think of myself as being crafty.
My first reaction was to say no. But then I might be considered the "Cowgirl Grinch" or the "Texas Scrooge", so I decided to keep my mouth shut. I'm the oldest of of the Cowgirl Up group,
so I work at not being "the frumpy, cranky, old one."
Everyone chimed in about what a great idea it was, so that was that. I could go along with the group or be the "Debbie Downer." Now I had to come up with something, or be the mean mom that tells the cool kids they are being too loud.
Before I get to my project, I wanted to tell you a little bit about the ranch. Come on, and pull up a chair on the back porch.
Or we could hang out on the front porch.
This spring when the bluebonnets were in full bloom, this was my view when I had my morning cup of tea. I love it when the bluebonnets are blooming. It's a magical few weeks.
Cedar Hill Ranch is a 30 acre ranch in the heart of Texas. It's what I call "Texas Living with a French accent." Dinner on my back porch with my friends and family is really a picture of what life is here is all about.
Come for a visit any time, just click here.
Here's the schedule for the entire Christmas in July Series. You can see all of the posts by visiting the blog you are looking at right now, but I would love it if checked out all of these wonderful blogs.
Here are the links
Amanda @ The Ivy Cottage Blog
Korrie @ Red Hen House
Anita @ Cedar Hill Ranch
Debbie @ Confessions of a Plate Addict
Samantha @ Crafty Texas Girls
Missy @ Lookie What I Did
Linsey @ The Farmhouse Porch
Pamela @ From My Porch to Yours
I had some ideas of what I could do for this project, but they required my sewing machine that was in the shop. Since then I have received news that it will cost $200 to repair it, so I'm shopping for a new one. So what to do... I pulled everything (and I do mean everything) craft-related out of every drawer in the house, and laid it all out. After surveying my materials, I came up with the idea of making Christmas cones that could double as place cards.
The first thing I did was to use my script stamp to add French script to my card stock. (Honestly I can't read this, so it could be in French, English or Spanish and I wouldn't know. I'm calling it French, but really I'm not sure what it is.)
Next, I formed the cardstock into a cone shape and used tape to keep it in place.
I thought I would try adding a little je ne sais quoi to the cones. I used a Martha Stewart snowflake paper punch to make some paper snowflakes, and added them around the outside of the cone.
I think solid green paper might have worked better, but I didn't have solid green, so I used what I had. I added a twine bow to the top of the cone.
I also used these card stock tags from Pick your Plum for the placecards, using just the first initial of each guest's name. I also cut a little piece of snowflake trim to top off my cone. Later, these cones can be hung on the tree using the twine bow at the top.
I filled the cones with tiny, little pinecones. Okay, pinecones don't come this small, they are actually from Hemlocks in North Carolina. I grab these from the ground each year when we go there. I also used vintage sheet music from my FIL's collection to go under the saucers. These are church hymns, and the date of publication was 1926.
Here's a view of the table with my new Christmas cones.
I used my Lenox Wheat dishes for this table. These dishes were my MIL's and she always talked in reverential tones when discussing how special these dishes were. I wondered when we would ever have an occasion special enough for her to use them. Sadly the answer was "never."
She kept these stored away for that special occasion that never came. I'm sure she did use them at least once when she was younger, but in the 30 years that I knew her, they stayed snugly stored in one of her china cabinets.
After I made the cones, I realized I needed a way to keep them upright on the table. I thought of placing them in a tall glass, but then remembered my chicken wire that I had left over from my chicken wire project, click here to see it. I cut small pieces of the wire and made them into small cylinders, then squeezed them together to better hold the cones.
To go with all of the gold trim on the dishes, I used my MIL's solid brass napkin rings, and also her embroidered napkins. (She had an pretty impressive stash of linen and cotton napkins.)
I also used her embroidered tablecloth,
And her bronze flatware, that she picked up on a trip to Thailand.
This turned out to be fun! Thanks for joining our Christmas in July party. Remember to come back Tuesday morning for Cowgirl Up. Next week Cowgirl Up will resume it's normal schedule of going live Monday night at 9 pm.
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