Country Christmas Charm

The rolling hills of the countryside covered with a layer of fresh snow and our cozy little cottage all decorated for the holidays really sets the stage for our dreamy holiday season. We decorated our little flower cottage for the holiday to show it off and to also use it as a backdrop for photographers who have come out to shoot sessions with their clients. The inside is heated and all white washed with bead board walls, so it provides a gorgeous, neutral backdrop for any photo session. Isn’t it adorable?!

The front doors of the cottage were decked out with custom, handmade wreaths from the farm, filled with gorgeous winterberry and accented with buffalo plaid. They looked so good! Several customers who came out to the farm and a handful of people online tried to buy them. Lol! Um, yeah…my heart just about burst with flattery. It was a very sweet compliment!

The next big project we worked on was a large greenery installation at Dreiberge Coffee for Laura Wills Photography. Laura lined this up with me about a month and a half ago with a crazy idea for a ‘cascading greenery garland wall’ for her holiday mini-sessions.

She sent me a couple conceptual pictures, told me she trusted me and off I went to figure out how the heck I was going to pull it off. Admittedly, the idea of hanging heavy greenery off of a wall worried me a little, but luckily I had a few ideas about what to do (might have consulted a support group) and also had the master of engineering, Adam, to help me out.

Shout out to my hubby: he’s always the one that figures out how to pull of most of my crazy ideas from a structural standpoint. He’s really good at building things, so this comes as second nature to him. I only get a little annoyed when he asks me for exact measurements. For this particular install, he asked and I told him that I was estimating 75’, but that I wasn’t totally sure. Guess what though…this thing ended up being almost exactly 75’. Boom!

Below is a picture, captured by Laura, of Adam and I working together to hang the garland. It was so heavy, it look to sets of hands to hold it into place.

All 75’ of this garland was hand-tied and took about 6 hours to create. It’s highlighted with plumosa, and red cedar, with the base consisting of noble, Douglas fir, and white pine. Can it be more gorgeous?

Here’s the finished, stunning product, captured timelessly by Laura. How many times can I gasp when I see this picture?

Of course my family had to jump in on one of the mini-session slots. Cute, huh?!

The following weekend, we did a pop-up Christmas market on the farm with my mom, who made adorable hand-made crafts. We did a hot chocolate bar inside the flower cottage, all decked out with the treats for visitors. It was a huge hit!

I loved seeing a ton of familiar faces, and several new faces as well. Can it be any better than getting to hang out with you mom and make wreaths all day? It was wonderful. We are so grateful for the support.

The finale of our on-farm Christmas season? Wreath-making workshops on the farm with incredible attendees who always make us feel amazing and dazzle us with their wreath making talents.

We set the event space up with the greenery and all of the extra sparkles that makes the wreaths ‘pop’. We light a fire in the woodstove and Adam puts a kettle on top to boil out the smell of Douglas fir and eucalyptus in the water. It smelled just like Christmas.

We loved using words like zhuzh (yes, it’s a slang terms for fluff) repeatedly and also hearing an attendee tell us she was making a ‘Lizzo’ wreath pure gold highlights that still have us laughing!

Now we’re looking forward to some downtime spent with our family. Happy Holidays to all of you!