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    Country Living Christmas at Home: Holiday Decorating – Crafts – Recipes
    Country Living Christmas at Home: Holiday Decorating – Crafts – Recipes
    Country Living Christmas at Home: Holiday Decorating – Crafts – Recipes
    Ebook472 pages1 hour

    Country Living Christmas at Home: Holiday Decorating – Crafts – Recipes

    By Country Living

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    About this ebook

    Have yourself a merry little Country Living Christmas with this gorgeous guide to decorating, cooking, and celebrating the best holiday ever!
     
    Country Living knows how to make Christmas memorable, and that’s why this spectacular book will become your new go-to resource every year. It’s filled with more than 200 beautiful decorating ideas, recipes, and crafts, plus tips galore. Stunning photos show festive table settings; splendidly decorated trees; fun and easy Christmas projects, from wreaths to no-sew stockings; gifts from the kitchen; and gourmet-worthy recipes like Turkey Roulade with Sausage-Cornbread Filling, Brown Butter Mashed Potatoes, Slow-Cooker Apple Cider, and sweet treats like Red Velvet Snowballs and Chocolate & Cranberry Fudge.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHearst
    Release dateOct 29, 2018
    ISBN9781618372710
    Country Living Christmas at Home: Holiday Decorating – Crafts – Recipes

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      Book preview

      Country Living Christmas at Home - Country Living

      introduction

      WHAT MAKES A MERRY CHRISTMAS?

      The proportions may vary from one home to the next, but the ingredients tend to hold true for most. To us, the jolliest holidays comprise a blend of the tried and true and the unexpected—beloved traditions along with whimsical surprises. Heirloom recipes, silly rituals, oddball ornaments, family in-jokes. Licking the beaters, baking breakfast bread, stringing a popcorn garland, and untangling the lights (okay, maybe not that one). Early pots of coffee and late-night sips of warm cocoa or mulled wine. They’re about fun, magic, joy, and above all, the shedding of everyday preoccupations to be truly in the moment with the people you love best (or as many of them as you can fit under one roof).

      Because there’s always room for more holiday magic, we’ve mined the magazine’s archives to bring you some of our favorite country-Christmas decorating ideas, handmade gift inspiration, and recipes for unbeatable entrees, elevated side dishes, and holiday desserts so pretty they belong on a pedestal.

      As for the silly rituals and family in-jokes—well, those are still all up to you.

      PART 1

      decorate

      IDEAS FOR EVERY ROOM

      Decorating your home for the holidays is like unwrapping a gift in reverse: Instead of peeling back the layers of patterned paper, gleefully ripping off ribbons and bows (or gingerly removing them to store in a box for later use), you’re adding on layers, bundling your home—and by extension, all those who enter it—in your most appealing, and personal, array of seasonal accoutrements. From the day you haul home that prized specimen from the tree farm (or unearth your beloved artificial number from the storage shed) to the moment the last heirloom linens have been laid out on the dining room table, prepping your home for another year of Christmas festivities is an act of celebration in and of itself.

      The holidays are all about anticipation, and nothing sets the stage for the good times to come like a joyfully adorned front door. Seasonal greenery, a cheery bunting, wintry artwork, even a full-size tree—it’s all fair game, indoors or out.

      CHAPTER ONE

      gather

      WARM AND INVITING SPACES

      --------------

      From the tree adorned with one-of-a-kind ornaments amassed over many holidays past to the cherished mantelpiece mainstays that have become as much a part

      of your annual December ritual as tuning into the Weather Channel’s televised Santa Tracker, so many of the cornerstones of holiday décor find a home in your family

      room and foyer. The most memorable setups are anything but cookie-cutter—they don’t even have to be red and green! All they have to be is yours.

      White walls and furniture provide a pristine backdrop for cheery pops of color and unexpected holiday accents—ice skate–inspired stockings, a cardboard taxidermy deer sporting a Rudolph-red clown nose—to really shine. Textured throw pillows and papier-mâché ornaments in red and blue keep things cozy, warming up the otherwise icy palette. It’s an airy-meets-merry winter wonderland.

      Festive First Impressions

      Let the neighbors duke it out over who’s got the most elaborate light display. Winning the award for warmest welcome is a much more worthwhile—and less electric bill–inflating—pursuit.

      What better way to say joy to the world—okay, neighborhood—than a house embellished with barn red and evergreen? This outbuilding’s classic L-arm exterior light fixtures add a touch of the latter hue year-round, while shedding light on a festive-meets-functional arrangement of everyday planters, pots, and pails piled high with birch logs, plus a pair of tiny trees bedecked with pinecones. But the greenery doesn’t stop there: An all-weather wreath of Scotch pine and fir upgraded with LED lights and hardy ornaments complements a similarly adorned drape of greenery above.

      Whether your guests have come from over the river and through the woods or just from the other side of the cul-de-sac, a rustic wreath (assembled from a twist of moss- and lichen-covered twigs), a stack of cozy plaid flannel blankets, and a vintage Danish muller filled with warm spiced wine will knock the chill right off.

      Not the Santas and sleighbells type? Relying on subtler seasonal elements that can carry you from fall through the end of the year makes for a cozy compromise. Dress up a grapevine wreath (or a pair of them) by nesting nuts and apples in the lower half, then hang with 3-inch-wide burlap ribbon. Repurpose a bushel basket as a rustic planter for shrubbery or a mini tree, and display coordinating wool blankets on the rungs of a wooden ladder. The finishing touch: a stash of firewood stacked on a bench, which promises a crackling good time inside.

      A pinecone wreath is another earthy way to get the holiday point across, without a lot of flashy (jingle) bells and whistles.

      Propped against a wall at one end of the porch, a giant toboggan stands sentry to accept December guests (when it’s not carrying a crowd of them, cheeks flushed with cold, down a snowy hill). A pair of skates dangling from the door reinforces the playful message.

      Crisscrossed wooden skis bring a winter-sports vibe as the base of a wreath (just hang a vintage pair in an X shape, and add the seasonal greenery on top). Grain sack trees give racing stripes a rustic twist—and you can pin holiday cards to the surface for an easy display. Layer on Nordic motifs such as a woolen snowflake throw and Fair Isle–inspired wrapping papers for even more ski-chalet chic.

      A front-hall console or side table can become the stage for a joyful holiday vignette—a bowl of ornaments here, vintage figurines there. Stash extra blankets and throws in a basket beneath for more warm-and-fuzzy feelings.

      Opening Acts

      Greenery, goodie bags, and gift stacks galore! Set the scene as soon as guests step in the door with decorations for the foyer, staircase, and more.

      Commission a spare chest of drawers to serve as a way station for gifts. Add greenery or a wintry bouquet to act as an anchor for the arrangement.

      BRIGHT IDEA

      Drape a folded throw or a wide woolen scarf over a side chair’s seat to add an unexpected pop of a holiday hue.

      Don’t save all the presents for Christmas Eve. Treat overnight guests to welcome gifts of candy and hot cocoa mix, bundled in coffee mugs. Hung from a garland-draped banister, they brighten guests’ arrival and point the way to their temporary digs all at once.

      Who needs needles? This bare-branched ivory tree is the ideal small-space solution for the decorator who wants to maintain a mostly monochrome palette and an airy entryway feel.

      Coats can go in the closet. This time of year, why not turn over the workaday rack’s prime real estate to a display of gift-stuffed stockings or a hanging fabric advent calendar? Round things out with coordinating cushions on a hallway bench nearby, or a pet bed with a swapped-out seasonal cover.

      Cool Comforts

      Not so into red and green? Cool and muted hues can still be plenty merry. It’s all about being true (blue) to your personal style.

      Behind the stairs, tucked-away built-in seating and shelving offer a sweet nook for stashing extra gifts—or a convenient perch for arrivals to sit down and unpack them.

      With its natural textures, calming palette, and glinting hints of sparkle, this easy-breezy stairwell is nautically nice. On the banister, a 2-inch-thick hemp rope accented with mercury-glass clamshell ornaments gives classic greens a shipshape look, while driftwood tabletop trees and a shell-encrusted sconce underscore the coastal theme. Top watery-blue and sand-colored kraft paper packages with a seaside ornament for a little extra splash.

      A vibrant green swag and golden beaded garland make a casually glam complement to this romantic, blue-hued hallway, while drawing the eye up to emphasize the room’s lofty proportions.

      Put It in Neutral

      Subdued seasonal accents drawn from the natural world embody an all is calm, all is bright approach to the holidays.

      All the winter embellishments this midcentury modern-

      meets-country setting needs are a few well-placed pinecones and a none-too-flashy tree.

      A diminutive potted evergreen straight out of the Charlie Brown playbook gets an extra dose of charm from a perky plaid bow tied around its upper trunk. The only other color in the room comes from a lush garland and a stack of snuggly blankets below.

      Who says ornaments only belong on trees? In this library-like den, floor-to-ceiling built-in bookshelves glimmer with gold and silver baubles that play off the room’s glass and brass accents.

      BRIGHT IDEA

      Hang symmetrical bundles of greenery or mistletoe for a modern, sophisticated feel.

      A clubby-meets-campy vibe prevails in this deep teal–hued living room, thanks to a kitschy display of paint-by-numbers (scored at estate sales), a taxidermy deer head with ornament-adorned antlers, grain-sack stockings, and an impressive collection of 4-H ribbons (sourced, en masse, from a thrift store’s dollar bin), hung alongside ornaments on the tree.

      Vibrant Living Rooms

      From Santa’s big down-the-chimney entrance to all that exhilarating unwrapping, this is the space where so much holiday magic happens. And getting it ready is half the fun.

      Antique ornament fans know: Vintage Shiny Brite® balls are a go-to for adding color to a holiday scheme.

      Dress a mantelpiece with evergreens in contrasting textures for a more organic-looking arrangement.

      the perfect winter fire

      Whether you’re playing a game of charades or simply warming yourself after a bracing winter walk, there are few things nicer than a

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