Take $10 Coupon Code

Let me help you with your Christmas decorating and shopping! Use coupon code TAKETEN to receive $10.00 off any $50.00 purchase. Coupon even applies to any burlap and lace wedding bouquets! Click the link on my sidebar, click here, or search gyspyfarmgirl on etsy to start shopping. 

Vintage, Junky Christmas in my Gazebo

As promised, it's now time to show my completed rustic, vintage, junky Christmas/winter gazebo decorations! I'm absolutely in love with how it all turned out! 

Now pull yourself up a chair and grab a cup of hot chocolate, because there's lots of pictures to come.

Saturday was just about the perfect day. The morning started out a little cold, but I was able to finish up Tanisha's burlap and lace wedding order, made a couple of new Christmas wreaths, started some laundry and did some indoor work. Later, the sun warmed the day and I enjoyed some time outdoors.

As I went to open the gate for the mail lady to stop and pick up my outgoing orders, I walked down the road to gather some of my Christmas tree decorations. I love seeing all the wild grasses as I travel the back roads and this particular white fuzzy grass has been telling me it needed to be on my shabby chic tree. 

After the mail came, the girls and I went down in the woods on a nature walk to gather pine cones, holly, cedar, and pine.

Then the fun really began! I showed a sneak peek of my junk wreath last week. We'll here it is up close. Bed springs, a saw blade, washer, and medallion are my "ornaments" suspended by twine on the window frame. A swag of cedar and pine accents the window.

I filled my old crock with more greenery and pine ones. 

The base around the crock was a silk Christmas wreath that I added a few fresh clipings into.

I was kinda sad, trying to figure out what I would put in my tired looking flower buckets. Then it hit me, I poked the greenery into the dirt and instant makeover. I left the kale and begonias in the bucket and just added the greenery around them to make the bucket much fuller and hung them back up on their spring hooks. 

Some of you might know the story, but our gazebo was literally pulled from a trash ditch a few years ago! It really was someone else's junk. Everything was either pulled from someone else's trash- gazebo, buckets, crock, bike, springs, metal water cooler,  gym basket, tin on the roof or found at a garage sale - burlap, Christmas tree, 3 strands of C7 lights and quilts or made by me. Nothing store bought here! I prefer to keep my Christmas decorations that way- natural and rustic. We are not ones  to get into the commercialism of the holidays and no Santas will find a place among my decor this year.

Now here's my fuzzy grass from the side of the road! 

Anybody know what it's called? 

I simply tied in the grass stems with the branches on the tree. Since our house is itsy, bitsy, teeny, weenie, and we are so overcrowded (hey, we're junk collectors😉), I don't think I am going to put up an indoor tree. No one ever comes to our house during the holidays, so I think we are going to enjoy our tree outdoors this year instead. 

A few more clippings, a rusty Texas license plate, pine cones, and a burlap bow fill the gym locker basket on the front of the bicycle. 

As the daylight faded away, we grabbed a couple of vintage and tattered quilts, a cup of hot chocolate and enjoyed some time under the twinkly lights. 

I have a feeling most of the decorations and lights will stay up long after Christmas and we will enjoy sitting out in the gazebo in the evenings. 

Thanks for hanging around till the end! Hope you are having a fun, stress free weekend.

 Merry Christmas! 

An Updated Sunflower Picture Frame Wreath

I recently updated my picture frame wreath and am now ready for fall and harvest time.

This is what the wreath started out like last year. The base is a wooden picture frame with chicken wire in place of the glass.

The wreath got made over last fall with the pumpkin welcome sign.

After last fall, the sunflowers were getting a little frazzled and faded and it hasn't been hanging on my front door in  a while. Yet, I couldn't throw away this wreath.

A super quick makeover this week made the wreath fresh and pretty and ready for fall.

I cut scraps of burlap material to fit the centers of the sunflowers. I glued the burlap to the flowers and tied on the Harvest Thyme sign with some twine.

 A new piece of burlap was tied to the frame to hang the wreath.

Now we are ready for fall to hurry and get here. I am so ready for cooler weather. How about you?

Linking to Funky Junk Interiors

Recycled JUNK Stuff

I've been working on several custom burlap and lace wedding orders recently, but found the time to create a few new things for my etsy store.  Here are some of my new junk style, recycled, repurposed items.

 Turquiose, aqua, antique white, and brown have been my go to colors recently and the colors were used in all these items. Layers of paint were distressed to create a chippy, peely, shabby chic look. A JUNK burlap banner is the focal point of this wreath, complete with rusty bed springs, vintage lace, and pearls. A perfect wreath for the junker!

I upcycled two wooden spindles with paint and drawer pulls/knobs to create fun Junk Gypsy style jewely holders. 4 turquiose knobs were attached to the base to create a fun way to display your necklaces and bracelets.

I added this heart necklace to my store as well. I found a pair of vintage clip on earrings at an estate sale recently and converted them into necklaces. I have been wearing one of the heart necklaces and listed this one for sale. The vintage heart is on a new 24 inch ball chain.

All items can be found in my etsy store. As part of my Christmas in July sale you can use coupon code CHRISTMASINJULY to save 15% on store items.

Bathroom Makeover - Junk Style

Yesterday I shared my little chippy chair and today, I'm sharing the bigger picture! I am slowly working on renovating our bathroom. I was really needing a towel holder and this wall was blank, so I decided to hang this shutter on the wall. Two nails inserted through the hinges secure the shutter to the wall.

So you may be asking, " what's holding the towels?"

Farmall Man had a very inquisitive look on his face when I ask if we had any broken bungee cords laying around somewhere. With life on the farm, there is always a bungee cord somewhere. Low and behold, he had a drawer of salvaged metal S hooks. My man doesn't throw anything away ;) We recycle and reuse!

So the S hooks are used to hold the towels! No nails or damage to the shutter and an easy-peasy fix.

I already had the vintage shutter and bath sign on hand, I created a square rag wreath by using a picture frame base, and found the license plate for 25 cents at the garage sale last week. The shower curtain, complete with hooks, was found, new in package at a garage sale for a $1.00 last fall.

A recycled wooden picture frame was used to frame a basic mirror.

The old chair serves as a tub-side table.

I'm excited about my new towel rack and having towels hanging at an arm's reach from the bath tub.

So if you are keeping count:

$5 chair

$1 shower curtain

25 cent license plate

All other items were free or reused from somewhere else!

Now on to the next bathroom project...I need a new vanity. I have something very unique in mind, if I can only pull it all together!

I'm linking to:

Savvy City Farmer

Poinsettia Watering Tip

Christmas and Poinsettias go together like a hand and glove, the only problem is, so often the poinsettias die from lack of care. I wanted to share a little tid bit of info with you about watering a poinsettia.

Actually, you don't "water" at all - use ICE CUBES instead! Yes, you read that right. A plant wholesaler shared the tip with us one time and it really does help.

Poinsettias like consistant moisture - not too wet, not too dry. A few ice cubes a day keeps a happy plant. The ice slowly melts and waters the plant and you don't have to worry about water splashing on the leaves and causing spots.

So each day as you fill your glass with ice, give your poinsettias a 2-3 cubes as well (for a 6 inch plant) or when you finish your drink, place the "used" ice cubes in the pot. One time I had a customer tell me that she gave her poinsettia the last drink of her coke each day and her poinsettia was thriving the next summer!

{I wanted to say Thank You to everyone who has voted for my Christmas Wreath

 in the Better Homes and Gardens Pretty Wreath Contest! I'm currently in first place for the week and would appreciate your VOTES each day through December 11.}

Please Vote for My Wreath!

Hey Everybody!

 Its my Birthday Week and I could really use some help from all of you! I entered the Christmas wreath in my gazebo in the

Better Homes and Gardens Pretty Wreath Contest

 and now I need you to please go VOTE for my wreath.

 You can vote once per day, everyday this week. So please go vote on all your devices - computers, phones, ipods, and ipads.

Pretty Please!

It would make my birthday really special if my wreath was the weekly winner and gets to compete for the grand prize.

You don't have to have an account with Better Homes and Gardens. Please click the vote button and enter the words in box and then tell all your friends to please vote as well.

I would greatly appreciate your votes for my wreath and helping with my birthday wish!

P.S. Just want to shout out a "Welcome" to my new followers! Glad to have y'all as new friends and followers!

Christmas in the Gazebo

 When we completed our gazebo makeover in the summer, I knew that decorating it for Christmas would be so much more fun! Now I've had a few months to plan...but I didn't...I just flew by the seat of my pants decorating it this weekend! That's the way I roll and when I feel the most creative!

Last month, while looking for a place to take photos with indirect, natural light for my etsy store items, I propped this door up in the gazebo. Its been a great backdrop for my wreaths and to be honest dragging it back and forth is not appealing, so I have left it in the gazebo.

I started decorating by hanging my garland up around the gazebo and found an old green wreath in storage and tied it to the old window frame and hung on the door, but it was just too blah. So I set out to spruce up the wreath. I went out back and clipped a few snippets off several cedar and pine trees and gathered a few pine cones. The fake green wreath provided a good base for the fresh greens and I was able to tie the fresh sprigs to the base with the wired branches. A wide scrap of burlap provided the finishing touches to the fresh Christmas wreath.

 While I was digging out my decorations, I decided to place my pencil tree in the gazebo. (Its the tree I usually put up in the house.) It already had lights on it and I placed it in my wash tub along with a few pots of fountain grass. I decided to display some of my watering cans on the tree as ornaments. Then I placed my small gardening tools on the tree as well. After all, its the time of the year when the garden tools aren't used for anything, so on the tree they went! The pencil tree looked kinda blah as well and I had a few extra cedar sprigs left over from my wreath, so I started tucking in the fresh greenery into the fake tree. Ahhh, that made it look so much more natural and fit in with the outdoor rustic feel. Why haven't I done this before?

 Suzy always finds her way into a gazebo photo shoot! She loves this place!

 You know, I might just have to add fresh Christmas greens to my junky tree in the house! That would give the house a wonderful "Christmas" smell....the wheels on the bus are spinning right now!

I had a customer at the flower shop tell me today, that a Christmas Tree Lot give her a few broken tree limbs for free. She was going to make her own centerpieces with free Christmas Greens! We have plenty of trees on our property, but if I didn't I would certainly stop by the tree lot to get a few branches to decorate.

I'm tickled pink how it all turned out and you know the best part - it didn't cost a penny! A nature inspired tree and wreath with fresh tree clippings and ornaments straight out of the greenhouse - no trip to the store for this project! I've had the garland since our very first Christmas here and now that I look at it, fresh greens would be so pretty added into it as well. Hmmm...my next day off project!

I'm linking to: