Like I mentioned at the end of my last blog, the rest of the decorating now is pretty much done with food. Every time I do Christmas, I like to find different ways of putting everyone's names on the place settings. Because my whole theme had started with a pretty Christmas bauble that I liked, last year I decided that I would make Christmas baubles with everyone's names on them. But these ones would be edible! My idea was to make some slightly oversized chocolate truffles and cover them with fondant to look like baubles. I made them green like the rest of the table with little gold tops for the ribbon. I then dusted them with edible shimmer dust (available from cake decorating supply stores) to make them shimmer, then simply piped the names on with royal icing. I know this may seem difficult, but it was not at all. Find a good truffle recipe and buy some ready made fondant (also available from the cake decorating store). Roll out your fondant cut into large circles and drape over your prepared truffles and tuck any excess under the truffle where you can't see it. Don't be afraid. Give it a go!
As an extra treat, I also decided that a beautiful shortbread star Christmas tree would look stunning sitting at one end of the table. I bought a star cookie Christmas tree kit and iced each star with royal icing in the colour of my green theme and put it on a clear plastic platter that I bought at one of the bargain stores. At home I already had a floating candle bowl that rarely got used and placed battery operated lights inside that you can get very cheaply from most chain stores. I then placed my platter with the cookie tree on top. To finish off, I also found a battery operated light up star in my travels one day, so this sat proudly on top of the tree. It looked truly amazing.
The next thing I added to the table (also food) was a cupcake stand full of little hand made paper bags filled with chocolates. I found a pattern in the Better Homes & Gardens magazine to make these cute little bags and used some decoartive scrapbooking paper to construct them. They were all different designs and patterns, but the colour of the paper was the same. After filling them, I tied the tops with a ribbon bow and arranged them on my cupcake stand. You could do the same, or find some other way to display them. Just recently I had been doing my grocery shopping in Woolworths and found cheap cardboard cupcake stands that would be perfect, and you could also decorate the stand to match your table too! I decorated my cupcake stand with another string of battery operated lights like the ones under my shortbread Christmas tree.
The final addition to my table I've left to tell you about until last, but it was actually the first thing that I completed and which was the basis of all my decorating.
Hanging over my dining table I have a pendant oyster light. The glass slips into a metal ring hiding the light bulb. I got hold of an old wire coathanger and bought a few rolls of different kinds of ribbon in green and gold to match my table theme and got a couple of cheap packets of plastic baubles in the same colours. I sat and tied varying lengths of ribbon to each bauble and hung them around the ring of wire until the whole wire was covered with baubles. I then tied the ring of wire to the metal ring on my light fitting. The effect was dramatic and beautiful. You may not have the same kind of thing hanging over your table, but if you let your creative juices flow a bit, I'm sure you'll think of something that works with what you have.
So now you've heard about the details of how I put together my Christmas table, the last thing to show is the end result. Remember that none of this cost heaps of money. And if you grab bits and pieces here and there over the course of the year, it will not feel like anything at all. Go shopping after Christmas and pick up some bargains on decorations in the sales following Christmas and you'll be able to save even more money, just by planning ahead a little. Most of all, have fun, include the kids, play Christmas songs and have a great time with it!
No comments:
Post a Comment