Vintage and Thrifted Christmas Decorations Holiday Home Tour

Let’s dive into the wonderful world of vintage Christmas decorations and discover why they stand the test of time.

where to shop

Let’s chat about where to find the amazing vintage items you can use to bring holiday cheer to your home.  January and February are great months to shop for unique items for the coming year. People will get rid of their Christmas decor and it’s the perfect time to snatch up pieces for your Christmas decorating!

Be sure to visit antique stores and thrift stores throughout the whole year but especially early in the year. People will be donating and selling their old Christmas decor and it’s the perfect time to grab it!

In the spring and summer, you will find yard sales with lots of decorating supplies. People will be cleaning out their attics and basements just for you to shop! Wink, Wink!

You might also find some great vintage Christmas decor by organizing an ornament exchange party. Plan one for the fall and invite your family, friends, and neighbors. It would be a great way to share with others and kick off the holiday spirit!

​YouTube Christmas home tour video

Be sure to watch the YouTube video I have linked later in this post for the full tour of how I have used vintage and thrifted decor items in our home!

vintage items in the dining room

Now let’s take a look at how I have used some of my vintage and thrifted pieces to decorate for the Christmas season. 

We’ll start in the dining room. The first place I gravitate to when decorating our dining room is this wall. It’s the perfect place for a holiday display using some vintage treasures.  

The two vintage cabinet doors were gifted to us many years ago. The glass was missing so my hubby added some chicken wire to fill the empty space. I have also clipped family snapshots to the wire over the years. 

vintage glass ornaments

Last year I hung vintage glass ornaments in the shape of a Christmas tree. The chicken wire came in handy!

ironstone as Christmas decorations

Recently I have been on a kick to hang plates in those empty spaces. I switched out some of the plates and added red, green, and gold ironstone transferware plates. These plates were used last year to create an alternative Christmas tree idea.

Then I hung a handpainted Partridge in a Pear Tree watercolor painting that I made this year. Below the wall display, I created a Christmas buffet table setting using vintage ironstone that I have been collecting for some time.

The dining table is the next spot I love to decorate. Ironstone pitchers filled with faux greenery sprigs from previous years and some found at thrift stores. I take berry garlands apart to create my own floral pics. It’s cheaper to do it this way! It’s the perfect way to spread the faux greenery to several areas in our home. It’s a great money-saving tip!

The lace tablecloth belonged to my mom and is close to 50-60 years old. I like to gather it up in the center of the table. Doesn’t it look perfect with all that brass?

vintage silver and brass

​The oak sideboard in our dining room holds vintage and thrifted brass candlesticks and a silver pitcher filled with dried hydrangeas from our gardens. The two botanical prints on the wall are labeled November and December. The plan is to collect all of the months but these two will do for now!

You can see that I love to decorate with ironstone, brass, and silver. Be sure to keep your eye open while out shopping throughout the year so you can curate a beautiful collection of ironstone, silver, and brass to use in your decorating all year long!

​handmade nativity

Last but not least, is our nativity scene. This year I placed the handmade barn and Hestia figurines on top of this old cabinet. I didn’t get the greatest image this year, but I’m also including a better image from previous years.

thanks for being here!

I hope you are enjoying this project! Let me know if you have any questions. Or leave me a comment to tell me about your project and ideas!

thanks, Cindy 😀

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holiday decorations in the living room

Now let’s head over to the living room. Our home is open concept and the three main living spaces all connect.  

We placed four Christmas trees in the center of the large room between the living room and kitchen area.  It’s such a festive display with all of the trees that can be seen from each space in this large room!

Yep, we have a total of four Christmas trees in the middle of this large room!

four Christmas trees!

The main Christmas tree is from King of Christmas. The two trees in the old wagon were traded with my two daughters. I had decor they wanted so we made a deal with each other! 

The small tree sits on top of a footstool I made over a couple of years ago. That tree sits next to another handmade snowman holding a little snow baby.

vintage colors for Christmas

I chose a vintage color palette for all of the trees this year. An old world Christmas look would be easy to do with all of the vintage finds I have collected.

The timeless charm of shiny brite ornaments, string lights, and other vintage pieces is a great way to create this look of a bygone era. All of the colors are gold, silver, and cream.

While thrift and antique shopping over this last year, I came across so many vintage Christmas ornaments still in their original box. Just recently, I found a great deal at the local God’s Way Thrift Store in Milford, Delaware.

There were three boxes of glass vintage ornaments marked for $3 for each box. A couple of the ornaments were broken so the clerk offered each box for only $2!

old world look DIY Chrismas ornaments 

This year I was in our local Michael’s store and stumbled upon another amazing deal! If you bought one ceramic Christmas ball ornament, you would get three of them for free! Each one ended up costing only $1 each! I grabbed some metallic paint, and velvet ribbon and gave them a Pottery Barn look for next to nothing! Don’t they look vintage to you?

It wouldn’t be Christmas decorating if I didn’t make some handmade ornaments. This year I created four little ornaments using wool felt I made from a thrift store coat. They are easy to make and would be a great gift or even a gift tag for someone special. 

bird and star ornaments

The two medium-sized trees were decorated simply. The taller of the two has a collection of birds. We’ve been collecting these sweet little birds for a few years now. I’m always looking for more! The smaller of those two trees had a couple of red berries already attached and a handmade star on the top.

Hindsight, I could have hung the paper mache stars I made a few years ago on the small tree with the handmade button star tree topper! Maybe I will go grab them now. What do you think? should I add them?

I’m also going to keep my eye out for some silver bells for next year’s Christmas decorations. I could add a silver bell here and there on the large tree!

tree skirt ideas

I didn’t use traditional tree skirts on any of the trees this year. The large tree is in a handmade crate. Hubby built it using reclaimed lumber from an old barn. The two medium trees are in a rusty vintage wagon that has been with us for over 20 years.

And the sweet little tree from Hobby Lobby is on a stack of books on top of a thrift store footstool. You can see that the sweet snowman sitting on the vintage child’s chair is still decorating the small tree!

vintage decor in the kitchen

Moving over to the kitchen area, you can see I kept things simple. The kitchen is a workroom and we need space to cook all of that Christmas food, don’t we?

I added a couple of ironstone pitchers filled with fresh Nandina clippings from our garden on the kitchen counters and over by our cafe. You’ll also see the sweet cardinal figurine that my hubby gave to his mom when he was around ten years old. So sweet!

small trees on an antique dresser

Small trees decorate the vintage dresser we have near our kitchen island. The trees look great staggered at different heights on top of a vintage linen tablecloth and a couple of battery-powered pillar candles. See the bouquet of button flowers? They are in an antique glass milk bottle labeled “Annapolis Maryland.” That was a great find!

Look closely at our front door. That DIY pinecone wreath was one I had made for the fall. We transformed it during a live video over on YouTube. So it was practically free!

handmade snowman

Our kitchen island is all decked out with the handmade snowmen that hubby and I both have made over the years. He turns firewood on his vintage lathe to create these wooden snowmen then I dress them with thrift store sweaters. I also use those thrift store sweaters to make these sweet snowmen.  All of the snowmen are gathered sitting on stacks of vintage books for the perfect centerpiece.

The great thing about many of the Christmas ideas I have used in the kitchen is that they can stay out for the winter months. It’s fun to have winter decor that goes with both Christmas and the chilly months of winter!

additional kitchen Christmas decorating ideas

Here are a couple of different ways you could use to add holiday cheer to your kitchen while still keeping the counters available for cooking:

• ​ironstone bowl filled with vintage cookie cutters
• a clear tall thrift store glass container to hold candy canes
• a small wooden bowl filled with jingle bells

YouTube Video Christmas Home Tour

Here is the video showing our Christmas Home Tour. Just tap the image below to watch!

thanks for joining me!

I’m so glad you stopped by for our Christmas home tour this year! We would like to give you a personal thank you for supporting our blog by visiting. We also hope you find inspiration to upcycle and decorate your own home with thrift store finds and vintage decor here on our blog!

Merry Christmas!

Thanks for joining our journey!

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Cindy Rust

Cindy has been decorating her home with thrift store finds for 40 years. She is an avid thrift store shopper who loves to makeover the items she finds into vintage-inspired home decor and furniture. When she isn’t thrift shopping or painting a piece of furniture, you can find her making homemade butter, working in her garden, or painting with watercolors.

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