A Peak at the Holiday Decorated Homes and Gardens of Punta Gorda 's Historical Area

On the first weekend of December Punta Gorda's Garden Club ladies play host to selected homes and gardens in the historic district of downtown Punta Gorda which they have adorned with holiday decorations all made from natural components sprayed, glittered and glued with amazing results.

The Holly Days home tour, as it is called, gives local residents and visitors a peak inside the interiors of some of the quaint cottages and  Floridan-style vintage homes and recreations.

The minute we walked up to the first home on the tour on Trabue, our eyes couldn't stay fixated long enough to focus.  Before even reaching the door of the 1920s era home, said to have been built by the town's founder, we caught sight of the little bird-type houses carefully embellished with croton leaves, spanish moss and whispers of other natural bits and pieces.  "They're called fairy houses," the docent explained, "when I saw this beautiful Cuban laurel tree outside the Trabue house I knew we had to use fairy houses to decorate it."

Once on the porch another docent pointed out  some decorations we might have missed as we were being ushered into the house, including a simple but at the same time magnificent red and gold ornament dangling behind a piece of palm frond. 

In each of the homes we visited, along with a brief history of the home, the tour guide gave some information on the theme the decorators had used in creating the artful holiday schemes.  For instance, on a home on Olympia, "presents" was the theme, as illustrated in the example.

Each room in each home received a holiday designer touch including the bathrooms.

And window treatments like this eye-catching wreath adorning a stunning French window with a garden view amazed.

Of course, the gardens weren't missed like this fence wrapped with blue flower created with natural leaves and pine cones strung together with vines.

Here is a slideshow with more highlights from this spectacular show.  If you missed it, do take a few minutes to glimpse at these images --- I took many more and tried to carefully select the most representative.  Better yet, do put this event on your calendar for next year.