WINTER DECOR

Once the twelve days of Christmas were over our Christmas tree and all the decorations came down pretty quick. In fact it was too quick as Andrew confessed he felt some withdrawal symptoms. Apparently the house looked too bare and empty. Now I feel that has less to do with the decorations themselves and more to do with the 9 foot tree he dumped in our lounge, but judge for yourself on that one! This withdrawal worked out positively for me as it meant he actually helped to create our winter decor. I started the whole thing and then he edited it until it was just right. 

Our theme is based loosely on Scandinavian interiors, with the decor being simple, clean, white or neutral colours and not fussy at all. I spent a lot of time (too much probably) on Pinterest working out what to do but so far I love what we came up with. It's a fresh look that's low maintenance and just looks clean. After all the fuss of Christmas its nice to have a simple, clutter free decor.

Accurately capturing the white-ness proved difficult so in some photos things appear more yellowy, sorry about that! Blame the photographer. That would Andrew of course!

H 

ENTERING THE BLOG WORLD

Whether its just my perception or whether its commonplace in America I'm not sure, but decorating your home, in particular your mantel, to fit with the season seems to be a big deal. It could just be that the few American blogs I read have fallen into this niche of decorating for the seasons so I have a skewed perception but either way I like the idea. 

Having decorated my mantel to celebrate 'fall' (see instagram for photo evidence) and decorated it again over Christmas I decided that I liked the constant change up over my fireplace as it gave me something new to look at. So I decided I would fall prey to the decorating to the fit the season trap and create for myself a wintery inspired mantel. 

Now I'm about to enter the blogger world of over-sharing a thought process that really nobody else cared about. However I know Andrew likes to read these inane monologues as apparently he misses them! So if you don't want to read it just skip the next paragraph and enjoy the pictures!

My initial thought was that I didn't want it to look too wintery as that would feel too cold, or serve as a depressing reminder that its a miserable time of the year. I wanted a more neutral look with similar and tonal colours. I needed something natural to be included but I wanted simplicity to be the key. I used the trusty tool of pinterest to generate some ideas and inspiration which combined with a healthy dose of the Country Living magazine gave me some more focused direction. I was also limited by what I actually had in the house, as much as I'd love to purchase something new we are attempting to limit our possessions ahead of the transatlantic move. Therefore gathering our meagre supplies and utilising anything free I could glean from the garden became my resource pools.

Here's what I came up with...

These old books are about a variety of things, including Modern Russian! They work so well together and help make the W stand out even more. I have to say its less white in the flesh. My camera's white balance is playing up! 

The quote on the whiteboard reads "If winter comes can spring be far behind?" Its by Percy Shelley. I hoped it would provide more hope for me on the coldest of days. I don't deal well with cold you see, less so too when your other half is enjoying warmer climes! 

This little pot was a gift from Tim (Hi again!) for my birthday this past year. Never found the perfect place for it until now. Isn't it cute though!


I'm not sure whether it'll stay like that until March when Spring becomes official and a redecoration will therefore be mandatory or whether it'll evolve with the times. It may even get a quick Valentines sprucing on February 14th. Depends how 'in love' I'm feeling I guess. But there we go, I've utterly wasted your time with something as simple as me rearranging decorations in my house! Sorry about that.

H