Festive Forest

Welcome to the first ever Rusty Hinge Festival of Trees where I asked you to send me a photo of your Christmas tree!  With no further words from me, let's take a look at them all and begin our tour!  So please sit back, relax, and enjoy this festive forest of glittering trees!

Amber from Grand Haven, Michigan is an avid antique collector and very talented decorator!  The garland for her tree was made by sewing together punched circles of vintage wrapping paper!  Very clever!

Suzy's tree is decorated with nature's bounty!  If you look closely you will find birds, nests, red berries and birdhouses.  I love her striped stockings hanging on the fireplace mantel.

Kris from Junk Chic Cottage displays her beautiful tree in a vintage wagon!  What a wonderful idea!  I love it, Kris!

Aren't these the most gorgeous trees?  They are so elegant!  Thank you, Lory of A Designer's Tale, for sharing them with us!

The gold with blue accents are stunning on Wendy's tree!  This glittery, gold look is made complete with matching gold and blue wrapped packages underneath.  I love your attention to such little details, Wendy!

Isn't Susan's tree from Homeroad gorgeous?  I love the gold ribbon wrapped throughout.  Very chic!

Fiona from Steptoe and Daughter sends us a photo of her lovely tree all the way from Australia!  Packed with beautiful ornaments and baubles it is wonderful eye candy!

Carola, I have one word...Stunning!  Carola from Welcome to Boxwood Cottage explains that since it is a tradition there in Germany, she only uses real candles and vintage German silver ornaments which are family heirlooms on her tree!

Erin from Collected Comfort has not only decorated her beautiful tree but also her staircase banister.  I love how she displays all of her Christmas cards there with the lighted garland.  What a great idea, Erin!

I recognize this tree!  In fact, we just had our extended family party here.  Marjon, (aka Mom!) decorates her tree with glowing white lights and sentimental ornaments.  Each one represents a different year of her four daughters.

Erica in California from Tin Roof Farmhouse shows us her most adorable table-top tree.  Notice the vintage door decorated with lights and ornaments as a backdrop for her retro gold tree.  Isn't the contrast between the rustic galvanized bucket and the glittered tree fabulous?

Look at Lorry's retro aluminum tree!  It is most fabulous with all the little putz houses surrounding it.  My jaw has literally dropped, so excuse me while I pick it up off my keyboard!  Love, love it all!

And I couldn't end the Festival of Trees without showing you our little tree.  All the presents have been opened so the base is decorated with an antique sled stacked with quilts and a vintage Swedish metal tree stand used to distribute candy canes.

These photos of our tree come with a funny story that I must share with you.  We normally cut down a fresh blue spruce right out of our back yard (you can read about last year's homegrown tree here.)  This year was no different, Karl and I selected the tree and proceeded to cut and haul inside.  After several long moments of fighting with it and trying to stand it up, we realized that it was very wide and overtaking our living room.  We decided that just a few pruned branches would help this situation.  But after several more very long moments of fighting with it to stand straight, we begin to see how hopeless it was and that this tree was just not going to work.  When one last effort to stand it straight cracked our tree stand,  back outside it went.

The story doesn't end there and we didn't give up.  We have a smaller stand that would work with a shorter tree, so Karl sawed the tip of our tree off to bring back inside.  Upon inspection, I realized that our tree has been reduced down to bush shaped and contained the same form anyway it stood.  In other words, it was very sad looking.  So back out the door it went again (and now resides as a lighted tree on our front porch!)

 That still left the problem of what to do for our indoor tree... so Karl and I decided to decorate our little faux four-foot tree with all our special ornaments and prop it up on a stone capital base.  So yes, our little tree is an artificial one.  Shhhhhh....don't tell!  (Karl says one year only.  Next year, we will attempt at a real one again!)

There you have it!  Our first ever Rusty Hinge Festival of Trees!  A big thank-you to those who sent me their beautiful trees.  It has been so much fun compiling them together and it turned out grand, don't you think?



I wish all of you a most Blessed and Happy New Year!




Maria ~Rusty Hinge