It's Christmas Time in the City...

First comes my Nana Tree. I call it that because my grandmother, Nana, made every ornament on it plus the tree skirt. I can't even imagine how many hours she put into this tree and I love getting it out every year.

Easter Cloche

So I looked up the spelling of cloche just to make sure I had it right. I did, but I also learned that a cloche could be a hat or a bell jar. As a child, I always wore an Easter hat. In fact, along with white gloves, it was a big part of the whole Easter outfit.

Too young for gloves but not too young for candy!!

While I still see fabulous hats, I'm not confident that I can carry one off, so the cloche I'm talking about here is the glass variety. I'm crazy for cloches! I have several around the house that I am constantly changing with the seasons. Seashells in the summer, pinecones in the winter, ornaments at Christmas... Are you getting the idea? Today I decided to deck one out for Easter. I found these cute egg lights that were too cheap to pass up. A little plastic shredded grass and I was ready to start.

I took the lights out of the bag and removed the warning stickers because I didn't want to be able to see them.

Next, I put the cloche upside down in the corner of my sofa so that it was secure while I was filling it.

I put the first string of lights in making sure to leave the plug hanging out the top.

Next came some of the grass.

Keep alternating lights and grass until you have the cloche as full as you want it. I filled mine just slightly over half way which used 4 strands of lights and 2 bags of grass. Also, don't forget to leave the plug out for each strand.

Make sure you end with a grass layer because this will be the bottom when you turn your cloche over.

Now, turn the cloche over and add grass around the base on the outside to cover the plugs.

It's really cute! Here's what it looks like when it's not plugged in.

So here's the breakdown:

egg lights, $3 per strand and I used 4 for a total of $12.
grass .50 per bag and I used 3 for a total of $1.50.
I already had the cloche so my total price was $13.50.

Happy Easter!

I'll keep you posted...

Lynn

Easter Decor

I love getting out my Easter decorations! Now that I don't have kids at home, the decor is a little more subtle, but I still have fun putting it out. Here's what I did last year. This year the first step to bringing spring inside is changing all my slipcovers. The rust velvet in the dining room is replaced by green linen and a green and white table runner is added.

Next comes the Easter tree. When the kids were young, this tree was covered with small Easter themed ornaments. All those ornaments are in a box waiting to go to my daughter who has her first child. My tree now has beautiful hand painted eggs that I brought back from Salzburg, Austria. In the spring, they have entire stores that carry nothing but thousands of these hand painted eggs. I was in heaven! I wish I had gotten more, but I had to hand carry them back so I limited myself to what would fit in my carry-on bag without being crushed.

Next, I changed the red berry garland in the dining room fixture to clear crystal along with a wooden Easter garland.

Now for the entry. A bowl of candy and a tole platter of eggs for the table is enough. The top of the stairs gets my giant rabbit. It's vintage looking and 4' tall.