Front Door Retrospective

The Garden Club's coming!  I want to have a warm welcome for them on the front door.  Since we've moved into this house, my decorating, as well as my choice of flowers has become much more natural and woodsy.  Seven acres of land will do that to ya!  So this was my creation this week.  These rustic wooden garden tools were the inspiration.  I wanted to make sort of an ode to those old English and French compilations of garden tools that form a decorative swag.

I buy faux ferns whenever I find great quality and I have lots of left over stems.  So, into a piece of styrofoam  covered with moss they went.  Then I thought I'd add a bird's nest.  I sure hope no one moves into this nest. In place of an egg, I added a single blue hydrangea blossem.  You can't see them very well in this photo, but there are also dried (or silk) Jack-In-The-Pulpit on the top, too.

Here's the approach from the circle in the front of the house.  I did such a happy dance when I found these triple ball boxwoods at Lowes last month for $35 each.  Yep!  $35 each.  One of my gardenia standards had not made it through the winter, so I knew I'd be shopping for a pair of something.  I was so thrilled when I found these!   I bought two more to replace the boxwood topiaries in the garden.

Ok.  Now we're a little closer.  I'm so ready for the daffodil foliage to finish turning brown so I can pull it out and make this bed look tidier.  But, the begonias and coleus are looking better each week.  Do you see how clean the sidewalk is?  Mr. Pressed Pants gave it a good cleaning with the pressure washer.  I love it all mossy and green, but it is too slippery and dangerous that way.  Our front door is new.  We had a beautiful old French door with etched glass on the house when we moved in, but it was horribly retrofitted and was such a bad fit that the skunks could get in without opening the door, I swear!

Here's the door from the inside with the little "speakeasy" door open. 

Besides wreaths and baskets on the gates, I often match the front door decoration to a particular party decor.  This one was from when the bridge buddies came for an orange and white luncheon.  You can see that post here.

For most of the summer and into fall, I like to use this simple grapevine wreath with silk sunflowers and a yellow gingham ribbon.  It was first used at a dinner party here.

One year for our Valentine's Day Dinner, I put this together from a plaque from Michaels, trimmed with lots of ribbons and tulle.  You can see that dinner here.

Another time, I planned a luncheon featuring green and white vegetables for decor.  For a fun wreath, I hot glued green and white seed packets and a green and white ribbon to a simple grapevine wreath.  That luncheon is posted here.

A close-up of the wreath.

As I'm searching for the post that featured this heart shaped wreath for my bridge buddies, I realized that I never posted a blog for this lunch.  Well, I'll have to fix that soon, but for now, here's the door that day.

These flowers are, of course silk, and then I added the fronts and backs of a deck of pink playing cards on the edge.  It was the bridge buddies coming for Valentine's Day.....get it?

I don't seem to be able to find the doorway with all of the fall decorations on it, but here it is in progress.  I added corn stalks in each corner, and a fall wreath.  The stack of heirloom pumpkins comes from Whole Foods.

Yes, I'm that idiot who stands at the pumpkin bins stacking and re-stacking all different varieties until I find a combination that I like.  Forgive me......I'm that way.

Not sure, but I think this is another year, and still not a complete photo!

Ah......Christmas!!!!!  No snow in Georgia, so I can't work that into my decoration, but never the less, I came up with a pretty good welcome for our holiday guests.

I used lots of tartan ribbon and antique sports equipment as a jumping off point.  This is a wonderful old sled that was made of one piece of wood, but it has split over the years.  Some years, I have used this on a buffet to raise serving plates and add interest to the table.

These are a little hard to see, but there are a pair of antique ice skates in this evergreen swag.  Mr. Pressed Pants was a professional ice skater to pay his way through college, so these are a special nod to him.

And here, I just dolled up an old pair of wooden skis.  This would all look sooo much better with snow, but I've become a Southern girl and other than for the decorative effect, I can't say I miss it a bit.

But my favorite welcome I ever did was for my sweet friend, Allison, for her wedding shower.  She and her mother are so dear to me and I felt so privileged to host a shower for her.  This heart shaped wreath is done with fresh flowers in an oasis form.  She is a redhead and her choice of wedding colors were so perfect for her.  They were bright orange and spring green.  I went with orange and white for the shower and it was so much fun, as it was a color combo that I had rarely worked with and so unique for a shower.  Now, just when tangerine is so "in", I have all of these orange dishes and accessories to use.  This wreath didn't last but a day or two hanging in the sun, but I chose roses with a lot of scent so that they would give the extra welcome of roses and we sure did enjoy it while it lasted.  Precious memories!

I wish that you could all come through our front door.  I'd have a special welcome for each and every one of you.  

Allison at The Polohouse has a wonderfully fun blog party on the first of each month called Favorites On the First..  This month's theme is "Front Doors", and this will be my entry.  Check it out on May 1st.