q is for quandie

Hey you local readers, have any of you been to the Gingerbread Wonderland at the Norway House?  This is the second year that the Norway House in Minneapolis has invited bakers to contribute a gingerbread creation based on an actual structure in the Twin Cities to their pepperkakebyen (gingerbread city).

My sister read about this in a local community ‘stuff to do’ type magazine and she suggested we check it out.  So last Saturday Debbie, Kris and I headed into the city in search of the Norway House.

Once there we paid our $5 admission fee and prepared to be amazed by gingerbread.

The structures ranged from relatively simple (and keep in mind that I say ‘relatively simple’ while realizing full well that I would not be able to achieve even this level) …

to this insanely elaborate model of our state capitol building …

I can’t even imagine the amount of time that must have gone into some of these.

Technically the bakers were supposed to copy a real building or structure in the Twin Cities, and there were some pretty amazing results.

One that really impressed me was the Mill City Museum.

If you aren’t familiar with the Mill City Museum, it was created out of the ruins of what was once the largest flour mill in the world (google it to see photos and read more about it).  The building was destroyed by fire in 1991.  The remaining walls were later fortified and the structure was developed as a museum.  I don’t know about you, but I love a good ruin.  And I think it’s pretty fantastic how this baker recreated that look complete with scorched gingerbread.

Are any of you non-locals familiar with the iconic Minneapolis landmark, the cherry on a spoon?  It’s a giant sculpture of a cherry balanced on a spoon at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.  And here it is recreated in gingerbread …

The Stone Arch Bridge …

Mickey’s Diner …

Minneapolis City Hall …

Although technically not in Minneapolis or St. Paul, I guess this year’s display would not have been complete without a gingerbread Paisley Park complete with purple snow instead of purple rain.

And of course, the new Vikings stadium had to be included as well, complete with the football field inside.

If you are going to attempt some gingerbread houses this year, but want to keep it a little more low key, there are still some fun details you can copy.

For example, this fence detail is adorable.

Or how about adding some candy cane toboggans for your gingerbread people to ride down the hill on.

The detailed frosting on some of the houses was gorgeous.

Have you considered frosting the entire gingerbread house in classic white?

 Or blue …

Yellow is pretty too.

I used google translator to learn that ‘strikkelykke’ means ‘knitting happiness’.  So maybe that pile of stuff on the ground in front of the people is yarn?  And I can see mittens, and a scarf draped over the bench.

I hope you enjoyed seeing the pepperkakebyen!  Did you have a favorite building?

If you are local, I highly recommend checking it out in person.  I only shared some of the buildings, there are quite a few more that I didn’t include here (there are 71 structures in the display).  The exhibit is open through January 6.  You can find more info on Norway House’s website {here}.

This year I’m having a blue Christmas, aqua blue that is.  It’s one of my favorite colors, so why not use it for Christmas too?

My friend/co-worker/Carriage House sale partner Sue gave me this rusty aqua blue truck for my birthday last month.

It didn’t start out in my favorite color, it was originally green.  But Sue painted it and added that adorable Christmas Tree Farm sign on the door.  Keep this in mind if you ever happen to find a vintage toy truck that isn’t quite the color you want.  Just paint it.

The truck looks adorable filled with vintage aqua and white Christmas light bulbs.

My friend/co-worker Jodie gave me this authentically aqua rusty toolbox …

It’s the perfect color to house my vintage aqua ornaments.

My friend/co-worker Cathy gave me this charming trio of tiny glasses.

Aren’t they sweet filled with tiny Christmas ornaments?

I put together this ombre box of shiny brites myself …

As far as I know, Shiny Brite didn’t make an ombre box of ornaments, but maybe they should have!

I couldn’t leave out my other rusty aqua truck, so I added some seasonal cargo to the truck bed.

The sprinkling of snow adds the perfect touch.

 We’ve had some very gloomy days this past couple of weeks, but I’m hoping to see just a little hint of sunshine this weekend so that I can get some photos of my house decked out for the season.

I’ve also got another house tour planned for the coming weeks.  My fellow Reclaiming Beautiful vendor, Amy, is graciously welcoming me into her home this Sunday for a photo tour.  I hear that she really does it up for Christmas, so I’m definitely looking forward to seeing her place and then sharing it with you here on the blog.  So be sure to stay tuned next week!

Just before I left on vacation I ordered a new Christmas tree online from Target (no affiliation).  I had been shopping for boring stuff at my local store during my lunch break and I saw this pretty 6’ pre-lit silver tree.  I’m calling it silver, but they call it rose gold.  It looks pinkish in their photo (below) but in person it looks pretty much silver.

I didn’t want to attempt to wrestle it into my car, and in fact I wasn’t even sure how well it would fit.  As a reminder I drive a VW Beetle convertible.  Not a lot of cargo room, especially in the winter when you can’t have the top down.

So instead I took a quick pic of the tag with my phone so I would have all the info and when I got home later that night I ordered the tree online.

I wasn’t especially thinking about getting a new tree, but the price was pretty reasonable at $127.  Then I got an additional 15% off because it was on sale, then another 5% off for using my Target red card.  Plus I got free shipping because I used the red card.  Heck of a deal to get the tree delivered right to my door instead of having to try and squeeze it into my car, right?

And since my vintage ornament non-collection (because I don’t really collect stuff) has been growing by leaps and bounds, I decided a bigger tree was a good idea for this year.

I picked up quite a few vintage ornaments at garage sales over the summer.  Garage sales and estate sales are a great source for them.  Most shoppers aren’t thinking ahead to Christmas in the middle of summer, so it’s easy to snap them up on the cheap.  I bought these for 75 cents per box …

My other favorite source for vintage ornaments is a little shop in downtown North Saint Paul called La’ Garage.  The inventory at La’ Garage comes from the purchase of entire estates or just random second hand stuff, along with some new goods.  Every year they close up shop the week before Thanksgiving and completely revamp the store for Christmas.  They open bright and early on black Friday full of vintage goodies.  This year Debbie, Kris and I headed over there bright and early that morning.

Normally I wait and shop later because I’m not a fan of the crazy crowds, but I did find more ornaments this way.  I came home with this stash including the funky cake pan.  I just loved the ‘look’ of the cake pan.  I’m not sure what I’ll do with it yet, but it had to come home with me.

Anyway, lucky I have the bigger tree this year because it is chock full with all of these additions.

The size of this tree is perfect to tuck into this corner of my piano room.

I really don’t have much room in the living room itself for a tree, even this slim model.  So instead it’s just around the corner.

I put my collection of tree toppers in the window next to the tree.

I feel a bit like a broken record at Christmas.  This is year 4 of sharing my vintage ornaments on a silver tree.  I’m really going to have to come up with something new next year.  But whatever it is, it will have to be in addition to my silver tree of vintage ornaments because I enjoy pulling these fragile glass balls out of their tissue paper each year and hanging them on the tree.  I have my favorites that always get placed front and center.

How about you, do you decorate your tree the same way every year, or do you change it up each time?

My vacation earlier this month really threw a monkey wrench into my holiday budget.  I’ll admit that I spent a little more money than I had intended.  Or more precisely, I hadn’t taken the time to really add up the expenses; the resort, the cruise, the airfare, the meals at the resort, the rental car, the drinks … each one on its own seemed entirely reasonable.  Added up altogether, well, I went a little over budget.

Now I have to cut back on spending.  Right in time for the holidays.  Yikes!

So rather than buying Christmas wrapping paper this year I decided to pull out some supplies that I already had on hand and whip up some of my own.

I dug out the giant roll of brown craft paper that I purchased a few years ago, some generic shipping tags, a few old book pages, some string and Fusion’s gorgeous Copper metallic paint.

Then I added one more special ingredient; a roll of old player piano music.

I found these at a local antique store recently.  They were $1.25 per roll.  I wasn’t entirely sure what I was going to do with them at the time but I figured for that price I could afford to speculate.

I painted an old gift box with the Fusion paint, wrapped it in a strip of player piano music that had been folded in half, and then added a layer of painted ribbon (plain white ribbon that is also painted with the Fusion Copper) over that.

I layered painted shipping tags with book pages to create my tags.

I used the full width of the player piano music to dress up this larger gift box that was simply wrapped in plain brown craft paper.

I especially saved the very beginning of the roll for this box so that I could feature the label.

The copper paint and the brown craft paper work beautifully together.  The dichotomy between the utilitarian craft paper and the shimmering metallic really works.  I used painters tape to tape off stripes for this next package.

In addition to painted paper and boxes, I also painted a brown craft paper gift bag, which was then stuffed with some more player piano music.  You can also see that I stenciled copper snowflakes onto one package.  And while I had the paint out anyway I painted that reindeer who started out a more garish gold color.  I much prefer him in copper!

I may have produced my gift wrap on a budget, but I don’t think it looks that way.  What do you think?  I hope I’ve inspired you to get creative with your gift wrapping this year!