I left our house in California a few days before Thanksgiving never intending to decorate the cabin for Christmas.  

I left all of the bags with the cabin Christmas decorations in the closet under the stairs.




And then we stopped to eat lunch at Cracker Barrel, and I wandered through their gift shop, at first intending to find a few Thanksgiving and fall-themed things for the cabin-- but forget about that-- their shop was crammed with Christmas goodies and very little else.  

Apparently, if one wants to shop for, and celebrate Halloween and Thanksgiving, you need to do it in August.




At that point I succumbed to the Christmas craziness and realized that, yes, I do want to decorate the cabin for Christmas after all, even though we would  be celebrating Thanksgiving there.  

I bought some extra wide red-checked, wired ribbon and a cute little Christmas plaque-- sit about--whatever you call these things-- and I told myself 'keep it simple, use lots of greens (there's no shortage of that) and it will be quick and easy'.  




And it was simple and fairly quick, at least for me.  I ended up buying a few more rustic-looking ornaments from the local grocery store and Family Dollar because just one roll of ribbon and one Christmas plaque was a bit too simple for me.    




So we had a sort of hybrid Thanksgiving-Christmas celebration.  I baked chocolate chip cookies and made a bourbon pumpkin pecan-streusel tart, a Turkey Day tradition, made the stuffing, roasted the turkey, and listened to Christmas music.








I had very carefully planned for a quick change to Christmas when I conceived the grand pillow scheme for the bed. 




All I need to do is turn a few pillows around to hide colors that are too 'fall', change a few pillow slip covers, hide a few more pillows in the closet, and voila-- a Christmas-themed bed.




The Fauxplace.  My husband makes fun of it because it isn't a real stove, but I don't care.  It's clean and easy to operate, it warms the cabin quickly, and it was on sale.  




It even has 'flames' that look pretty realistic when it's in operation-- especially when I look at it first thing in the morning without my glasses.  

I'm fine with an electric 'wood burning' stove.  We'll have a real, wood-burning stone fireplace in the main house which I'm sure will be a glorious monument to my husband's fireplace construction skills-- our renovated fireplace in California certainly is (click here and here). 

It sure makes our time at the cabin cozy when it is cold and snowy outside. 




















 

With the onset of the cabin project I have come to love rustic decor more than I ever dreamt I would.  Before the cabin, it wasn't really my thing.  Now I can't wait to get started on the planning and design of the rest of the house (that will attach to the cabin some day), retire, move there, and be mountain rustic every day.

Until then, I will have to be satisfied with spending vacations and holidays there, and if regular rustic decorating has turned out to be loads of fun, rustic holiday decorating has turned out to be truckloads of fun.  



So far we spent last Thanksgiving at the cabin (can't wait to spend Christmas there and launch into Rustic Christmas) ...below are some highlights of what our first cabin Thanksgiving looked like...


Lots of texture and simple details...






My mom's dishes are now the cabin dishes and using them brings back many memories of every day meals and Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations. Another reason to love being at the cabin.



The stag flatware was a Bass Pro purchase, not a place I would normally consider for decor, but I was trying to use up a gift card, and at the time these were perfect for our 5th wheel trailer.  Now they are perfect in the cabin.







This guy was also my mom's.  He sat on her fireplace mantle for years and was usually featured in her holiday decorating.







Sadly the pine cones from our pinon trees are small, squashed-looking little things and just don't work well for pine cone decorations.  I'm sure I got the pine cones on the table from a craft store...kind of silly for someone who owns 15 acres of pinon-juniper woodland, but the conifers with the nice looking pine cones are at higher elevations here. 

We did some sightseeing in Capitol Reef National Park.  This is the Fruita Schoolhouse, which was built in 1896 and served not only as a school for the children of the settlers in the area, but also, when needed, a community center and a church meeting house.





According to the interpretive sign, the last class was taught in 1941.  As you can see in the photos in the sign below (and the photo above), the room was quite small. Imagine trying to concentrate on your lessons while all that rugged wilderness beckoned from the windows...





I picked some apricots with my sister in the historic orchards at Fruita in Capitol Reef National Park.

I also started a cabin-travel journal.  I started an online watercolor course last year (still need to finish), and sketching in a journal is a great way to loosen up and practice...




That's it for now.  I will be sharing more cabin-related posts in the coming months....I know its been a while since I posted anything.