Vintage Christmas Collections - Highlights of My Christmas 2014 Decorating - Part 2

We have this gorgeous antique secretary in the parlor that I've been crazy about since we brought it home with us to NC years ago. It has a roll top, nifty little pigeonhole slots and it belonged to my husband's mother.  This year I decided to decorate it for Halloween and Christmas using our collection of vintage holiday stuff.  I really like the way it turned out!

It's situated in a pretty dark corner so I decided to add a strand of sparkling lights as well as some light up plastic blow molds.

I'm always fascinated by the interesting graphics on vintage packaging and tins, like the pocket tobacco tins that are tucked into a few of the pigeonholes, and all the Christmas lights and ornament  boxes.

I know this photo is kind of redundant but I like the lighting, especially in the cabinet.

Here's a closeup of all the vintage goodies on the bottom and middle shelves with the doors open.  It's just filled with charming collectibles.

The vintage stuff on the top shelf in the background from left to right is a children's book, a box of Swedish angel chimes and a box of unused cards.  The vintage boxes on the middle shelf are both light sets and in the middle is a game where you snag the ring on Santa's mustache.

Not the best photo but it shows the cute box details.  

Don't you LOVE the silver glitter on the reindeer antlers?  

A couple more closeups to show the detail of the spiffy graphics.  I especially like the box details of the Diamond Ray Jeweled Icicles.

A part of me yearns to keep these Christmas cuties up all year.
I'm tempted to do just that because I don't have so many vintage Valentine decorations but I do have a fair amount of vintage plastic bunny rabbits tucked away somewhere in the attic!
They might look interesting grouped together inside this cabinet.

Highlights of My Christmas 2014 Decorating

One of my first and favorite things to decorate for the Christmas are the shelves on the cupboard in my kitchen. 

I keep some of my favorite Jadite and McCoy pieces displayed on it all through the year and just add cute candies, vintage collectibles and seasonal whatnots to it.

I adore the vintage pink McCoy kittycat cookie jar especially with the touches of Christmas red.

On my birthday I was shopping at World Market and spied that terrific pink velvet-y deer on sale, 2 for $5!  So I bought them and casually set one there on the shelf and thought it looked perfect next to the holiday candies.

The other pink deer ended up on the bookshelves in the hall

That silver sleigh with the reindeer is one of very favorite things!

I set up part of my vintage blow mold collection on an antique buffet we have in the dining room that I have set up as a bar.  I like the way all the nifty bottles look with some of my vintage glassware.  Cocktail anyone?

Don't these bottle brush trees look cute in the window?

I'm crazy about vintage stuff, especially the graphics on the boxes.  I've been toying with using vintage boxes as a design element for a few years.  The challenge is getting just the right amount of interesting stuff in your display without looking cluttered and too messy.

Sometimes I like the box better than what's inside!

For instance, my scary Santa collection is rather cluttered and kitchy displayed on a bookshelf in the parlor.  The guy sitting in the back on the left is kinda weird, isn't he? That guy came in the cool green box with the peephole {on the right}.  Then the Santa with the bell shaped skirt? that spins around came from the 'Musical Santa' box.

I display lots of Christmas collectibles on the Kitchen hoosier cupboard.  

Here's a closeup of that vintage box of silver icicles

As I was decorating the tree this year with with all those cherished family heirlooms I started stacking all the empty vintage Shiny Brite boxes on this antique chair in my foyer.  I liked they way it looked so much I decided to leave the boxes out as another kind of decoration.

Here's a preview of another post I'm working on about using my vintage Christmas collectibles and their boxes for a display I made in our antique secretary.   I'm thrilled with the way I've decorated it this year.  It looks knock your socks of amazing!  But I'm not happy with the photos I took at all.  My camera is vexing me and being very temperamental.

 This photo isn't bad, except for the glass refection.

Most of the photos in this post were taken by my Lovely daughter, Sarah.  

Thank you for helping me, Dearie!  

Visit her blog, Lostvestige for more of her wonderful photos.