Rustic Décor for a Summer Porch: Rocking Chairs

Image by Greg Waskovich from Pixabay 

Summer and porches really do go together. While my personal experience with “real” rustic porches includes homey things like muddy boots, fishing tackle, milk buckets and other odds and ends of rural life, there is a long tradition of a wide, shaded porch being an extension of the living room, complete with a porch swing, bench or rocking chairs. It’s long been the perfect place for colorful hanging plants as well as wreaths and bouquets of flowers in tin pails or mason jars. 

We had a wide, wrap-around porch when I was a kid. It was covered but not screened. The house was a late nineteenth century farmhouse on an uneven lot and the porch was only a foot or so above the ground on one end, rising to about four feet off the ground around the other side of the house, where the land dropped away. This was a trap, as small children liked to ride their tricycles from one end to the other and could potentially go off the high end. 

Don’t ask me how I know this.

July door wreath

My own porch now is very small and narrow, with not really enough room to spend time comfortably. Those smaller spaces can be decorated, too, and we use baskets of flowers hung from the front edge of the roof. Also a summer wreath, like this one, brighten up the front door and add a splash of color, as well as mark the 4^thof July celebration.

Your rustic front porch, however, is clutter-free, level and inviting on a warm summer day. How to make it more so? 

Begin with seating, and the iconic rocking chair. While cradles with rockers and rocking horses have been around since ancient times, the rocking chair was invented in the early 1700’s in America. Visiting Europeans thought we were a little strange, in fact, with our ubiquitous rocking chairs. At first they were used in gardens and on porches, but eventually made their way indoors. President John F. Kennedy had them placed in every room of the White House to ease his bad back. They are very therapeutic, as well as indispensable for rocking babies to sleep. 

Image by designerlisahenry from Pixabay 

Cushions can be added to your porch rocker for more comfort, although here in the humid Pacific Northwest we bring them in at night, or launder frequently, to prevent mildew. 

Add a rug, if your porch is big enough, and an end table or coffee table (a large wooden wire spool works for this) and you have a casual addition to your living space. Candles, lanterns or small, twinkly strands of lights let you stay out listening to the frogs and crickets…or coyotes, depending on your location.

In the south folks would be sipping sweet tea but add the beverage of your choice and enjoy those crickets.

Margaret

Rustic Décor: Using Nature’s Colors

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay 

A big part of creating the peaceful, relaxing ambience of a rustic-style home is the use of color. What makes a color “rustic?” Usually softer tones, neutral colors and colors taken from nature make up the basic color palette of  rustic decor. While nature can be very colorful, depending on where you look, we tend to think of soft blues, greys and greens as well as earth tones like sand, off-white, brown and beige. These are the colors that we find soothing, calming, restful.

How to incorporate those colors into your home? Of course, the use of white and off-white walls, rock and wood are traditional. A little creativity influenced by the outdoors can add some nice touches. Pay attention to details: the color of the rocks along the river, the bark of trees, the muted grey of water and fog – all are inspiration for your home’s color scheme.

macrame cord and lichen

I have been gathering ideas and patterns for a macramé wall hanging. It is to be a piece knotted around a curved stick taken from our forest. The stick has grey-green lichen still attached and I spent some time searching for a matching cord color for the hanging itself. I discovered the shade I wanted, finally, as “sage,” and it seems a perfect match for the lichen-covered stick.

While colors in nature always seem a bit muted and subdued – gray green rather than bright green, pale gold, soft robin’s egg blue – there is always that pop of color, especially in the spring when you get the bright yellows of buttercups, or the clear blue of bachelor’s buttons. While your home might have the softer, more neutral colors as background, add a pop of color here and there: the large sunflower, the window box of pansies, a shelf of brightly colored crockery.

The effect of color on mood and our emotions has long been studied and documented. The colors you use go a long way toward creating the peaceful, welcoming home you desire.

Margaret

How To Make a Pinecone Flower Arrangement

decoupage pot and pine cone flowers

We are having a lot of fun experimenting with our pinecone flowers. We’ve also worked with moss, pinecone and sweet gum pod picks - and decoupage. Something on Pinterest inspired me to put all those things together and make a floral centerpiece featuring hand painted pinecone flowers.

Here is the process if you want to try your own.

You need:

Pinecones

Pruning shears

4 or 5 inch plastic seedling pot

Decoupage glue

Pictures or decorations for pot

Hemp twine

12 inch bamboo skewers

Paint and brush

Hot glue

Dry floral foam

Preserved moss

We kept it simple and used plastic 4 inch planters we get by the dozen for gardening. In our case we might want to sell and ship them, so weight is a consideration. Also, we have a bunch just lying around, so no need to run to the store. However, a cuter look would be the heavier clay pots or ceramic flower pots if shipping weight is not an issue.

The first step is to decorate the plain black plastic pots. We chose a flower print and decoupage for one. This was trickier than anticipated as we put the printed photos on like wallpaper and the edges had to match. Turns out the pots have a slight taper, making the process more difficult than it might have been. Still, the end result was acceptable for a first try.

hemp twine wrapped pot

The second pot, same size, I wrapped in hemp twine using glue. Messy, but not a bad rustic look. Another look I want to try is wrapping the pot with a strip of lace or hemp ribbon.

The cone flowers take the most time. We use pinecones, washed and dried in a low (200°) oven to kill bugs, then cut into halves or thirds, depending on the size. This is not as easy as it sounds as dried, open cones are hard and resist cutting. A sharp pair of pruning shears seems the best option. My internet search for “easy ways to cut pine cones” led to the same conclusion, although other ideas include clamping them in a vise and using a powered Dremel tool or saw. We are getting better at the cutting, although it still takes some hand strength

pruning shears and pinecone

to wield the pruning shears.

Once the cones are cut, remove any remaining seeds, the papery membranes (seed at one end) that lay along the cone scales. We use long tweezers to remove seeds.

Now the cones flowers are ready for painting. You can use spray paint, and we have. Our current favorite method is craft paint applied with small brushes by hand. I put one coat on the bottom of the “flower,” then paint the top. After that dries I add a second coat just to the top. Here is where you let your creativity shine. You can leave the flowers one color, looking like daisies or zinnias (the bottom of the cone) or you can add various touches, putting a darker color down the center of each “leaf,” or outlining the leaves in black or a another contrasting color. 

painted pine cone flowers

The next step involves a drill, hot glue and bamboo skewers. We use twelve-inch skewers which you can buy inexpensively in bundles of several hundred. Their intended use is for barbeque, but they make great picks for pinecones, cone flowers or sweet gum pods. They are easy to cut to the desired length and are already pointed at one end.

This year my grown children gave me the perfect gift for Mother’s Day: a cordless drill with something like 80 attachments and drill bits. So, if your drill is charged up, insert the drill bit that matches the diameter of the wooden skewer. The cone flowers are sturdy enough we have not found it a problem to hold them steady and drill a small hole in the center underside of the flower. They are hard and woody, so it may take a few minutes to get ¼ inch hole.

Fire up your glue gun and apply a drop to the hole, then insert the round – not the pointed – end of

pine cone flowers and moss

the skewer into the hole and hold for a few moments until the glue sets. You now have a flower pick.

There are two types of florist foam and you want to get “dry” foam, not wet. Wet is designed to hold water for your live floral arrangements. The dry is light Styrofoam, usually green, that holds artificial arrangements in place. 

Cut a square of foam to fit inside your decorated pot. It should be a half-inch or so below the top edge and needs to fit snuggly into the inside.

To create the illusion of grass and leaves, we have been using preserved sphagnum moss. This was prepared by soaking fresh moss in a heated mixture of water and glycerin, and so far, the moss has remained good for several months. The process changed the color to an olive green. Sphagnum moss has feathery tendrils that look somewhat like leaves, so it was fairly easy to hot glue them to the top of the dry foam, creating a grassy, feathery look. 

Next, we simply inserted our cone flower picks into the dry foam, creating a pot of colorful flowers.

And there you have it! 

Margaret

Rustic Decor: Finding Our Way Home

Author's childhood home

It’s hard to believe, but once upon a time rustic style décor was not cool. Some accounts say the country or rustic style of furnishings and home decorations started as early as 1840 during a period when there was a move – in some circles – toward primitive and back-to-nature. 

My family was not in those circles. In 1840 we were part of the original rustic movement, homesteaders living in authentic sod houses with rough wooden furnishings. The modern rustic style began sometime in the 1970’s, apparently, (don’t quote me on that.) There was a move away from the sleek and plastic toward the natural and repurposed at that time that has only grown since. 

It is still going strong, with a growing interest in nature-inspired themes and warm rustic colors and textures.

As someone who grew up surrounded by genuine rustic décor, like it or not, I am intrigued by this hunger for authentic, natural and time-worn surroundings. The real thing, in my experience, was too often accompanied by a lack of resources and amenities that many of us now take for granted. As children we used wooden crates (“orange crates”) as bedside tables or bookshelves. I put a board across two, tacked a gathered length of fabric around the ensemble and created my own dressing table. Rustic. But I really aspired to a new, shiny store-bought one.  

What brought me, and so many others, back to an appreciation of rustic elements in our homes? Speaking only for myself, I think there is a deeper appreciation for my roots, for an earlier, simpler lifestyle, and one that appears – at this distance – to have had more depth and meaning. Handcrafted items speak of care and attention to detail, of things lovingly crafted for a specific purpose. Some items have the irreplaceable patina and glow of many years of use, whether it be the old wooden rolling pin made irregular and polished by generations of cooks, or the wooden kitchen table with the “distressed” look created by thousands of family meals and gatherings.

Now we buy things already “distressed,” made to look rustic on purpose. We once grabbed an old canning jar to hold our bouquet of wildflowers, since we had nothing else - now we buy one made for that purpose. Now that I can afford the glass vase, why do I choose the canning jar? 

One of my first memories of beauty in home decor was of my mother’s pansies filling a plain wooden window box beneath the living room window. As you can see from the old photo above, we lived in a small house or cabin built of thick, wide Douglas fir planks. The shingles on the roof had been hand split and were probably of cedar. The window box was also of wide fir boards and no part of the house had ever seen a coat of paint, or ever would.

As a tiny tot, I stood next to the house wall and ran my hand over the grainy weathered wood of those twelve-inch planks. The texture, the color variations, the curve of the grain around a knot, all created a life-long impression as did my mother’s lace curtains against the small-paned windows, the pansies in the window-box. I know in my home furnishings I want to invoke that innocent time, the rustic cabin under the tall firs, the wooden door opening to a world of grass and flowers, and the taste of

hot, sweet blackberries overgrowing a shed door.

It’s a cocoon, a safe, sweet place that is conjured up by rough wood floors, the scarred kitchen table, the fire in the fireplace. We wrap grandma’s old quilt around us, secure in the peace and security of…home.

We all need that, and with the world seeming to spin more out of control, rustic décor will continue to attract and resonate with many in spite of not having experienced the authentic pioneer lifestyle, or maybe because of not having experienced it. 

C.S. Lewis wrote, “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”

It’s a good thing to create safe spaces, rustic spaces, for our modern selves. This longing for simple beauty, nature and peace is a good thing, but I suspect – and this is what C.S. Lewis was alluding to – it also stirs up an old yearning for something deeper, “…to find the place where all the beauty came from,” as he said elsewhere.

Perhaps rustic décor is actually pointing the way…home.

Margaret

Rustic Fireplace Decor

We can quickly get into a serious discussion about energy efficiency and cost-to-benefit ratios when discussing fireplaces, but from a decorator’s viewpoint a fireplace is so appealing. Add an insert for heat efficiency, or make it gas instead of log-burning to deal with the loss of heat up the chimney (and the ash and log mess), but nothing speaks of comfort and country ambiance like a fireplace: fieldstone, rough wood mantel, braided rug, rocking chair, dog - you get the picture.

If you are so fortunate as to have a fireplace, and are keeping with the country or rustic theme, how do you decorate this focal point? 

Most fireplaces have a mantel, and they are ideal for displaying those personal touches that make your country room special.

·     Wreaths. Wreaths are not just for Christmas anymore, although a fireplace mantel with a wreath of fresh greenery on the chimney and a fir bough swag across the mantel sets off the old-fashioned Christmas tree in the corner. Other seasons include wreaths as well, with a wide variety of materials available. A grapevine circle with spring flowers, a wreath made of painted pinecones, a fall wreath that includes colorful fall leaves and burlap…all look great positioned just an inch or two above the mantel. 

·     Candles. I love real beeswax candles. Beeswax (or any other kind) candles set in rough wood holders, or small canning jars look great on a wooden beam mantel. A slightly rusty lantern works well as a candleholder, too. 

·     Plant material. This is such a broad category and can include anything from living, potted plants in ceramic pots or rustic wooden holders, to dried grasses arranged in old vases or canning jars. Bouquets of wildflowers, sunflowers in jars, or dried floral arrangements all look good against the brick or stone of a fireplace. Don’t forget sticks – a length of natural driftwood or a curved stick from your woods on the mantel with a dried flower arrangement at each end brings nature into your living space. 

·     Found objects. Anything you collect or discover works well as a display on your mantel. This might include old books stacked at one end, or a collection of antique tin toys, or old jam jars. “Found” treasures are totally subjective and personal and add your own brand to your fireplace mantel.

·     Frames. Anything framed can decorate your mantel, from prints, paintings, or family photos hung on the chimney just above the mantel, to a cluster of old framed mirrors, or a wooden window frame with peeling paint, with or without glass, propped on the mantel itself. 

·     Baskets. Small woven baskets either on their own or filled with interesting objects – rocks, toys, small balls, dried pinecones – look right at home against the rough wood and brick or stone of a fireplace. Pine needle baskets, cedar bark, willow all fit right in. A layer of interest is added if you or an ancestor made the baskets, but store-bought works too. Have fun with the look.

A fireplace in a room is usually the visual focus, so it pays to maintain the decorations. Many change with the seasons, or even more frequently, with a few permanent pieces kept year-round. Enjoy your fireplace, the atmosphere it creates, and the opportunity to express your own rustic style.

Margaret

The Last Homely House

Image by rubymaeodell from Pixabay 

And the house of Elrond was a refuge for the weary and the oppressed, a treasury of good counsel and wise lore. ~ Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age 

Any Tolkien fans out there? 

I have been calling the creations we offer at Wildings Whimsy “rustic.” Turns out I’m right, but only by accident. In my defense, “rustic” just seemed right. Country style décor is a broad term that includes things like the Magnolia style of Chip and Joanna Gains to more ranch or mountain style favored in places like Idaho and Montana – the big log house, rough wood, antlers and antiques. It also can include French or Italian country. However, country style décor in all cases retains a down-home, comfy feel to it, a little worn and well-loved, but sturdy and long-term. It says deep roots and strong traditions, a “homely house,” in Tolkien’s description. (Elrond’s house was “the last homely house east of the sea.”)

Rustic style is under the country umbrella, so a look or a decoration or piece of furniture might be country but not rustic, but if it is rustic it is country. Got that? Rustic is a lot of rough wood, handmade, natural, maybe old and rusty, or practical like old canning jars. Rustic is beds made of pallets and wall décor of old barn boards and hemp twine, burlap, sunflowers.

author's primitive bowl

Primitive, which inspired my research since I thought our products might need to be reclassified, is a more restrictive group. Handmade by non-professionals, practical and utilitarian…and old. A chair or dresser made by your great-great grandfather probably qualifies. I have the perfect example of primitive in the old wooden bowl my mother used for bread dough. It was hand carved by someone in the distant past and is an unfinished, imperfect, antique work of art, a true “primitive.” So is the old willow basket my mother used to carry laundry out to the clothesline to dry.

But we sell rustic country or just plain rustic décor, not primitive: wreaths made of pinecones, coasters of rough wooden alder rounds. We also place an emphasis on natural forest elements.

How do you incorporate rustic into your country style of decorating? Color schemes are usually subdued with browns and natural greens. I had a friend who decorated a large log house that was her place of business. As she showed me around, she commented that she loved the look of white lace against rough logs. That’s the mix when it comes to rustic country style, the worn softness of old

Image by digitallydazed from Pixabay 

quilts against a handmade wooden rocking chair; sunflowers in a mason jar tied with a piece of hemp string. It can include a mix of modern styles offset by rustic elements as well: traditional furnishings accented with a series of framed sticks or moss wall art, a rough wooden crate as an end table next to a contemporary chair.

We want to create safe, nurturing places for family and friends - and part of that is the décor. With rustic elements we help create a comfy, down-home style that brings connection to family and tradition, and to the natural world: “homely houses.”

Elrond's house was perfect, whether you liked food or sleep or story-telling or singing (or reading), or just sitting and thinking best, or a pleasant mixture of them all. Merely to be there was a cure for weariness. ... Evil things did not come into the secret valley of Rivendell. – J.R.R. Tolkien

Margaret

Preserving Moss

Image by Kbiv3000 from Pixabay 

I am still learning to work with moss, including the best way to preserve it. 

With some mosses, especially the “old man’s beard” or “witch’s hair” (usnea lichen) we have simply let them dry naturally. Other mosses can be dried as well, and – according to the literature – are not dead but dormant and can be brought back to life. While I have dried some varieties of moss, I have not attempted to rejuvenate them. 

The first step in drying moss, after collecting it, is to clean it. You can put it in a sink of soapy water and gently wash away the dirt, pull out sticks and encourage bugs to leave. Rinse the moss and gently squeeze out excess water. Lay the moss on newspaper or paper towels to dry for several days. In this dried out, dormant state, it should last for years.

I know of two other ways to preserve moss, one I have tried and the other not (yet). With these methods the moss is soft, pliable and will last a long time, but cannot be brought back to life. Both make use of glycerin, a clear, sweet syrupy liquid made of various vegetable oils (palm, coconut, soybean) that is easy to find and inexpensive. Smaller bottles can be found in the drug store; I ordered a couple gallons off the internet. Glycerin is used in preserving flowers and leaves and I have used it to preserve fall leaves, salal (lemon leaf) leaves and scotch broom. If you add food coloring to your preservative mix you can colorize your leaves or stems as well, although that is also something I intend to do in the future, so have no personal experience.

Image by TanteTati from Pixabay

First, the glycerin/hot water method of preserving: I have used this method to preserve sphagnum moss. I would recommend a ratio of three parts water to one part glycerin, although I have seen recipes for one part glycerin to two parts water as well. Put the mixture in a large pot and heat it on the stove until hot but not boiling. Remove from the heat and add the moss, leaving it in the water for about an hour. You may have to weigh the moss down with a plate or brick to keep it submerged. When the mixture cools, take the moss out, gently squeeze to remove the excess solution and put the moss on paper towels to dry. It will be soft and will remain that way for months if not years.

The glycerin solution can be reused for your next batch of moss.

The second method, which I have not tried, adds methyl hydrate (methanol) – wood alcohol – to the glycerin. This is said to produce more reliable and long-lasting results than the water-glycerin method. 

The glycerin can be found in drug stores, the methyl hydrate in hardware stores. 

Mix two parts glycerin to one part methyl hydrate - no heating, just mix it together.  Add the moss and let it sit for about ten minutes, then remove the moss from the solution and lay it on paper towels for a few days. It will feel crunchy at first as the alcohol replaces the water in the moss, but then will soften and remain so.

Up next…what to make with your dried or preserved moss!

Margaret

P.S. Here's a good explanation of both types of glycerin moss preservation.