Many Uses For A Pretty Dress

Last night's activities?

I cut up a dress and glued it on a chair seat. Then I got inspired by the fabric's colours, pulled out all my Christmas decorations and attempted to make a plan for my Christmas scheme this year. A typical Thursday night in the Henson household.

First the chair. I bought this little Liberty-esque print dress at a charity shop with the intention of making a pillow. I'm not much of a boob-tube playsuit kind of girl, but I often buy things if I like the fabric.

I found this chair on the street and thought it would be a good temporary chair for my office until I find something I love. Too lazy/busy to paint it, I just scrubbed the street lurgy/cooties off it and thought I'd add some fabric to the seat. (I did the same thing to the white seat in the background).

The little Liberty dress seemed like a good fit so I hacked off the elastic in the middle.

Cut it open and laid it flat. For a couple of pounds I got a nice length of fabric.

Out came the hot glue gun. I first glued the corner, a good place to start to anchor it all.

I glued down the sides, cutting and adjusting as I went.

Et voila. As is always the case when I'm doing things for myself, not for clients, it's a bit messy and far from perfect. But it took 10 minutes and it was practically free and no-one has one like it, so there.

I thought the fabric was so sweet and I had a fair amount left over so I thought I could use some for my Christmas decorations. This weekend's plan involves making some fabric scrap ornaments, like these I made recently for the Country Living fair workshop.

When I did my talk at the Country Living Christmas show I talked about the need to have a tight colour story for your Christmas decorations. This year I think mine will be built around this fabric - greens, blues, whites with a tiny pop of pinky-purple. I pulled everything out and separated those that fit the colour scheme.

And here's what we're looking at this year. The fabrics will be used for my handmade ornaments. My kids were into finger knitting a few years ago so I grabbed these green and pink lengths and thought they'd make good tree garland. There are silver baubles and little brass bells and some green wooden ones.

The proof will be in the pudding. Knowing me I will put it all up, hate it and change it. We'll see.

What's everyone's plan this Christmas? Do you do something different every year or do you pull out old favourites year after year?