My Kitchen Window

For years I have decorated my kitchen window for Christmas. Why not? I spend a lot of time there, I should have something nice and fun to look at it too. We usually decorate pretty heavily anyway, for Christmas, and the kitchen deserves its Christmas look as well. Right after Thanksgiving, when the rest of the Christmas decorations come out of storage, I find the multi-colored string of Christmas lights that I hang to frame my kitchen window. Out comes the snow made from batting, which is taped to the window sill (for obvious reasons). We find the ceramic (or whatever they're made from) village pieces that my daughters and I have painted through the years and arrange them on the "snow." Sometimes I can even find the Christmas-y window clings too. The Christmas dishes, glasses and mugs also come out at this time.

Last February or so, as I was getting ready to take down the kitchen window decorations (they weren't screaming CHRISTMAS so much as WINTER, and the snow on the window sill was pretty much all the snow we had seen that winter), I got the idea to decorate my kitchen window for all seasons. After all, I still spent a lot of time here all year round--not just at Christmas--and it would be nice to look at something pretty and fun all year round, not just at Christmas. So off I went to my "not-so-local" craft stores to look for things to decorate for Spring/St. Patricks day/Easter.

The multi-colored lights were replaced with white ones, only because I couldn't find pastel colored lights. The snow came off the window sill and I replaced it with pale green glass stones (I think they're used for flower arranging or something). I bought two smallish bouquets of spring flowers--daffodils and some kind of blue flowers that I can't remember the name of--and two bud vases to hold them, placing those on each side of the window. I have some baby animal small statues which I placed on the window sill, and added green top hats and coins for St. Patricks day and for Easter some little bunnies and other Easter-type statues.

For Summer/4th of July I still had to stick with the white lights, since no one was selling red or blue ones yet. The flowers were replaced with sprays of flags and shooting starts that I stuck into the vases. The pale stones were replaced by blue ones. I found a garland of stars to hang with the lights, to kind of give more color to the window than what the white lights afforded. I never did get around to the summer theme I wanted to do, which was a beach theme, with sea shells replacing the blue stones and some more summery flowers. I put the Spring flowers back in the vases, but we still looked pretty 4th of July-ish.

Today I decided it was time to decorate for Fall. Down came the white lights, the garland (not sure why I left that up), the flowers, the blue stones, and I was back to a bare window. Back to my "not-so-local" JoAnn Fabrics, this time I came home with almost everything I needed in one trip. Found orange sunflowers to go into the vases, although I should have bought another vase since one of them is pale blue. Found orange glass stones to replace the blue ones. Bought a scarecrow statue that sits on the window sill. And I found ORANGE lights to replace the white ones (yipee)! While there I noticed the Christmas decorations being put out, so I will be buying a string of both red AND blue lights soon.

Oh, and the piece de resistance? A sign to hang from the hook above the sink. It reads "The Witch Is In."

I put the baby animal statues back in the window for now, but I will be making a trip to the Dollar store soon for some other statues to add to the mix. Other than (hopefully) finding pastel lights and buying the red and blue ones I saw, I should be ready for the coming year.