D.I.Y. Saturday #25 – How to Bring Thanksgiving Touches into your Home

Entry #323, November 6, 2010

Happy Stagetecture Holiday D.I.Y. Saturday! For the last 24 Saturdays I have focused on do it yourself projects that will help you around the home with maintenance, and improving your home. For the next 7 Saturdays we will focus on holiday home ‘how-to’s’.  (Believe it or not, 8 Saturday’s from today is Jan. 1, 2011!!) To make your season less stressful and to get ready for your entertaining needs, I will bring a holiday themed D.I.Y. craft, project, or helpful tips to make this holiday the best ever!

Today, I thought I’d help you start getting your home into the Thanksgiving vibe. By bringing in color, smells, and dinner table suggestions, you can start getting ideas now! Remember the secret of this holiday is to ENJOY it, not STRESS! Plan your way through, and it will all fall into place.

Welcome Thanksgiving into your Home

Murray Anderson, from Do it Yourself.com gives us tips for starting the Thanksgiving decor.

Thanksgiving is a wonderful time of the year. Friends and family gather to renew friendships, share time together and celebrate the season with a traditional Thanksgiving feast (and maybe a touch football game). However, for many people the idea of actually hosting a Thanksgiving celebration in their home raises their anxiety levels to the high point with worrying about how to decorate their home as well as plan and cook the meal.  While I can’t teach you how to cook a fantastic turkey dinner, I can provide a few easy and inexpensive ways to add some Thanksgiving touches to your home decorating, so you’ll only need to worry about the meal. Here’s some Thanksgiving decorating ideas for your home.

Start with fall colors

Keep in mind Thanksgiving means fall colors, so build your home’s Thanksgiving decorating around a fall color scheme of golds, yellows, reds, browns and greens.

• One easy way to add fall color to your home is to place appropriately colored throws or small blankets on the arms or back of some chairs. Alternatively you can add color by displaying bright red cranberries in a clear glass vase, or provide more neutral but natural color by doing the same thing with pecans or acorn in their shells.
• Alternatively, bare branches can be arranged in an urn or pot then made into Thanksgiving decorations by tying fall colored ribbons around them.

Bring autumn colors in to welcome Thanksgiving

Your Thanksgiving dinner table

• The table is the centerpiece of your Thanksgiving decorating and one way to minimize your stress level, is to follow this simple plan. Keep the decoration simple, keep it low (so it won’t impede conversation) and don’t use anything with a scent (candles, potpourri) that will impact on your dinner.
• To give your table that Thanksgiving look, start with a regular neutral colored table cloth then simply add a table runner in gold or yellow to bring in the Thanksgiving feel. Complete the look with neutral cloth napkins but napkin rings color coordinated with the runner.
• Add low standing (and inexpensive )light to your table using tea lights or votive candles in clear glasses.
• Create a simple, seasonal center piece using freshly fallen leaves, some bare branches and glue gun. Glue the leaves and some small branches to a larger branch, add some candles in glasses to the middle and finish up with some brightly colored Indian corn or small gourds.

Plan your dinner table now… Image: Country Living

Some finishing touches

• Give your home a welcoming scent by placing some cinnamon in a warm oven. Or, place scented candles (pumpkin pie, pecan pie, nutmeg) around your home so your guests will slide into the Thanksgiving mood. Just be sure you don’t put any of these scented candles near where you will be eating because the  scents could overwhelm your dinner.
• If you have a fireplace, light it or turn it on. The sight of a crackling fire gives everyone a warm, comfortable feeling.
• Don’t have a fireplace – you can still stack some logs or pine cones in a large basket to give your home a fall feel.
• Finally, you can give your home a true Thanksgiving touch by placing wheat sheaves tied with Thanksgiving/fall colored ribbons in the corners of your rooms.

YouTube – Thanksgiving Table Decor

Watch Stagetecture’s You Tube Channel for more DIY ideas