Silver Christmas Trees

As promised, here are some pictures of the silver Christmas tree candle holders I refinished! While they certainly don't look "brand new" by any means, they look much better than before.

The bases were probably the worst part, and I think those turned out really well.  The part where the actual candle will sit didn't come out quite as nice.

Since I didn't have any silver cleaner product at home, I decided to look online for ways to clean silver. Some of them were just gross (cover it with ketchup & wipe off - yuck! I don't really want the scent of ketchup every time I light a candle!) and some were just too much work. I finally tried a combination of two different ideas. 

First I combined a liter of water with 2 tablespoons baking soda in a pan, and threw in a piece of aluminum foil. After the water was boiling, I dipped in each piece of silver for 10 seconds. It helped, but not as much as I hoped. I tried dipping them for a bit longer, but still not much difference. 

The second thing I tried was a paste of baking soda & water. I rubbed this on the silver pieces and it did take a lot of the tarnish away. I was pretty satisfied with the results, so I stopped making any more mess after that & called it good!

I am also making some progress on the Retro Tree (although my family has informed me that the tree can't be officially "decorated" until after Thanksgiving.) So far I have lights and just got some more new ornaments that I'm very excited about.

These are some Christopher Radko "Shiny Brite" ornaments I found at Menard's, which claim to be a "Vintage American 1940's design"...since I wasn't around in the 1940's, I'll have to take their word for it! But I think they are very cool, and will look nice with my lights & other ornaments on the Retro Tree! I'll hopefully be sharing the end result soon (but after Thanksgiving!!)

It's a Retro Christmas

Don't fall over from shock, but this IS an actual Christmas post. I know it's a little early, but lately I've been doing some planning in my head for my "new" Retro Tree. (You may remember that I purchased a tree after Christmas last year that I'm now designating as my Retro Tree).

Today I found some items for the tree at a local thrift store. Not as many as I hoped for, but I do like them & think they'll fit with my theme. I'm also not sure that they are truly retro but that's okay too. My personal criteria to define retro is something that comes in a package that does NOT list a website. I figure the item must be at least 20 years old without a website on it somewhere!

Here are a couple bead strands I found...I'm not sure how well they will show up on the tree, but I thought it was neat, and the price was right!

These glass ball ornaments are just the right size - my tree isn't very big, so some of the larger balls are just too much for it. I think the colors will also go well with the painted ornaments my great-grandmother made (now those really ARE retro!)

The last item I got (and probably my favorite) was this brass candle holder. I think it is made for one of those huge pillar candles (which I don't have), but what I'll probably do is look around for some other way to use this, maybe with a vase or some other Christmas item I already have. Also its not really retro (and it definitely isn't for the tree), but I thought it was very cute, and with a little clean-up & brass polish it should look fantastic!

Total cost for all three things was $1.42!! I love paying "retro" prices for my Retro decorating! I hope to put the tree up this weekend to see how everything looks, and then I can work on it throughout the Christmas season. It will definitely be a work in progress :)