While doing display work for Anthropologie, my favorite projects involve chopping and drilling wood, which I seem to be doing quite often for holiday installations. I'm really getting into using power tools- you can do so much with just a few pieces of equipment. Motivated to try it at home, I designed this birch log candle project for my Thanksgiving table. You can find birch logs in packs of 3 at Michael's for about $20. Clustered on a table they create beautiful, ambient fire light, especially perfect for winter time...

I suspect that many of us will be rushing to get our Christmas trees this weekend or next, because December just sort of snuck up right after Thanksgiving.  We ventured out to Moon Mountain in Sonoma for our annual tree hunt, where we snagged a 14' Norway Pine, which we had cut in half, creating a slender tree for our living room, and a big bushy fella with old fashioned lights for outside our back cottage. I wired it's upper branches to shape it into a Christmas tree. For our indoor tree I wanted to keep things more delicate. I've always admired the clean lines of the Scandinavian style potted live tree- I think it looks so much more buttoned up than a skirted stand, but a 7ft cut tree needs a substantial base to keep it upright, so until this year I made do with creative tree skirts like last year's cut paper version. For this year, I designed a basket stand using an abaca woven storage bin and a standard issue metal tree stand. In just a few steps, you will have a sturdy, understated base to surround with pretty packages!