3 Easy and Elegant Thanksgiving Centerpieces
Draw inspiration from items around your home to make three simply beautiful Thanksgiving centerpieces.
1. Fruitfully Fabulous Warm up your holiday table with a scentsational centerpiece -- dress pillar candles with dried oranges, lemons, and limes.
Thinly slice the citrus fruits about 1/8-inch thick. Place a wire cooling rack on a cookie sheet, and then arrange the sliced oranges, lemons, and limes on the rack. Put the cookie sheet and rack in an oven preheated to 250 degrees for approximately two hours, or until all moisture is removed.
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Tip: If you find that your slices have not dried in 2 hours, you can also turn off the oven and leave the fruit in overnight.
Using a glue gun, connect the citrus slices to each other, forming a band around the base of each candle. Do not glue them to the candle. Once your candles are decorated, cluster them in the center of your Thanksgiving table and weave berried branches throughout to create a cohesive centerpiece.
2. Nuts About Candles Rummage through your cupboards, attic, and garage, and pull out all of your glass containers -- hurricane lamps, vases, glasses, and stemware. The different shapes and sizes will give your tablescape an interesting topography.
Make sure the glasses are sparkling clean without any trace of fingerprints. Depending on the size of each container, place either a pillar, votive, or tapered candle into each glass. Fill with hazelnuts, walnuts, or pecans. Stagger the amount of nuts in each container.
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Tip: This is the time of year where you can find unshelled nuts quite easily in the produce section of your local market.
Once your dinner is over, you can pour all of the nuts into one big bowl for everyone to enjoy while watching the football game. Don't forget to supply nutcrackers!
3. Autumn Harvest Take advantage of nature's bounty to create a beautiful Thanksgiving centerpiece. Collect branches and berries from your backyard and mix with dried flowers. Add an assortment of colorful leafy sprigs to bring texture and vibrance to your arrangement.
Build your arrangement horizontally -- wide and low -- instead of vertically. This will allow conversation to flow easily across your Thanksgiving table without guests having to peer between the branches.
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Start your arrangement by interlacing the branches in your basket to form the foundation and structure for your centerpiece. Place the rest of your dried flowers in your basket, anchoring them in the interlaced branches. Don't worry about following any set pattern. Use nature as your guide to create a bountiful and wild composition.
Tip: You can make this harvest centerpiece days in advance, as water is not necessary to keep it beautiful.
How will you decorate your holiday table? Let me know in the comments!
-by Bibiana Heymann
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