Sure, you’re forced to take down the ghosts and fuzzy spiders (news flash: your neighbors are pissed if you haven’t done so), but some of the seasonal elements we put up to get in the mood  should endure until the end of the year, if not beyond.

Here is my list of favorite affordable decorative displays for the festive and frugal in all of us.

1. Lanterns

Rice paper lanterns bobbing outside (with solar lights) or in your rooms make a huge, happy statement. I love the cylinder shapes with Asian motifs like the ones found at My Green Party Goods, $3.50 each.  Keep out of wind and rain and purchase eco options.

2. Mini Pumpkins

Don’t toss these babies out with the bad Halloween candy. They transition to the Thanksgiving table (orange+pumpkin) and even co-mingle happily pomegranates and pepper berries for winter holiday merrymaking. You can buy organic by the case at Baldor, if you haven’t already succumbed to the adorable guys at the farmers’ market.

3. Bowls of shells

It’s likely you have amassed these already. Gather them in a pretty bowl for the coffee table, scatter on the table, line them on the mantle. Shells – often used to evoke romantic, seaside summer lazing – work just as well in fall and winter. I like combing the beach for sand dollars and tossing them into my mix.

4. Strung Cards

I string three rows of natural wire along my dining room wall to hang beautiful cards from the high holidays and my daughter’s October Bat Mitzvah to Halloween, Thanksgiving and winter holiday greetings. Just pick up some clamps and you’re in business. Guests love them and cards are so cool, why toss them out?

5. Photo Displays

I’ve mounted many photo walls for clients and friends, which is affordable art for the home and a way to display treasured memories from the year. Of course, assorting eco frames on various tables throughout the house works well, too (school photos, Halloween shots, other fun scenes).

6. Foliage

Harvest leaves, twigs and pine cones and branch out in your earthy styling of tables, entryways and other venues that smack of fall color. I like how Arenamontanus gathered a grouping for a desk.

7. Candles

Beeswax candles come in all shapes and sizes and really set the mood for seasonal statements. Mix ‘em and match ‘em, turn off the lights and turn on the tunes. For a great assortment visit 1000 Markets.

8. Recycled Cloth Coasters

Like these vintage treasures from Etsy, turn your excess fabric into coasters with easy sewing for delightful results. When do you put them away? Never.

9. Table coverage

Roll out the organic runners and roll out the fun, kids. This sumptuous moss design from Amenity can take you through the seasons and inspire unique styling. I use them to dress up many surfaces from the dining table to the buffet and entry way.

10. Vintage Dishes

This peach glass from Step Toes is a lovely example of the menagerie of collectibles you can break out to display and use for serving, from favorite heirloom porcelain to tea pots and even plates hung for display. This is where you canhave blast and save on that styling budget.

There are some of us who have cut waaaaay back, but just can’t quit cold turkey. And I don’t mean smoking, although I did quit recently. (Yay for me!)

The can’t quit I’m referring to here is shopping. I can admit my faults and this is certainly one of them. I love to shop for clothes. But before you throw your arms up and start spouting off at my wasteful ways…I always, definitely, without a doubt, no excuses or exceptions – shop green.

Right now I’ve got my eye on this adorable Reversible Hobo Bag from VivaTerra. Made with simple and stylish vintage fabrics, it’s switchable from festive floral to sophisticated black velvet flocking. Besides, two bags in one means more for the money!

Not too big and bulky but roomy enough for the usual suspects at 18” W x 13” H. The Hobo Bag also comes with a small clip-on pouch for all the stuff that gets lost floating around the bottom of your bag.

And what’s more eco than an item made well enough for a lifetime of wearing? This gorgeous lambswool Ready, Set, Go Poncho (top image) has a turtleneck and ribbed design that ruffles softly at the edges. It comes in a creamy, earthy off-white and is one of those wear today and everyday (at least in fall and winter) type of cover-ups.

Find both pieces at VivaTerra for $229 and $219, respectively.

My partner in Sixties vintage couture crime, artist Joan Davis, called me the other day and said I had to check out Torso Vintages, an ultra cool used couture outlet in San Francisco’s Union Square.

In town just a few days to pedal her flower-powered paintings, Joan had immediately sensed where to dig up archaeological relics of Pucci and Gucci – the way my pug can sniff a German Shepherd or hamburger a mile away.

I jotted down the name to this source for  shifts and clutches. Sure, there are ample consignment shops around in  chic towns like ours, but few sell what connoisseurs consider three dimensional art, i.e. something Jacky O. or Lily Pulitzer would have worn to lunch at Harry’s Bar with the girls. You have to weed through lots of synthetic yardage and depleted, tired boas to find the real gems.

As it turns out, the source she told me about is among the vendors strutting their fabulous stuff on the hottest new online boutique for the real McCoys of vintage fashion style.

Yes, hopeless fashion romantics such as Joan and I are the types 1st Dibs is banking on to do for Geoffrey Beene A-line cloaks and YSL Jockey Hats (above)  what the Web site did for haute  furnishings: Gather the best offerings from dealers around the world to sell for a range of prices.

That range at 1st Dibs cuts a wide swath:

From the doable after a glass of wine with lunch: Whimsical Pierre Cardin sunglasses from the 1960s. $250.

To the the pretty pricey: 1960s Pucci shift, $400, and Ungaro dress, $650.

To the investment statement: M. Haskell 1940’s Multicolored Fringed Bib Necklace USA, 1940’s. $3,250.

To a taste of  Samantha Jones at Versailles: Hermes Birkin of Matte Black Porosus Crocodile. $65,000.

John Hadeed, owner of Torso Vintages, finds 1st Dibs is helping to put him and others in his stylish field on the map in a big way.

“We’ve had calls and emails from all over the country and the world,” the collector told SF Gate.  “We’re dealing with people who really love clothes.”

Michael Bruno, the clever founder of 1st Dibs, hired vintage couture expert Clair Watson (above) to supervise the fashion site and locate the first dealers. They include seasoned second-hand harvesters with a penchant for Hermes, such as Createurs de Luxe, and the owner of the Way We Wore in Los Angeles, a dealer named Doris Watson who is offering her most precious and rare works of art to the website.

The good news is vintage is on a roll because of the recession and our renewed appreciation for classics over buying new junk made abroad.

Check out the site and see if there is anything you can afford (that’s bigger than a size 2 or 4) to add to your wardrobe. All you do is click on the era that suits you (from Deco to Contemporary).

What’s the best deal you can score on the site? Perhaps an undesirable Chado Ralph Rucci evening bag for $175. This is not the place to pluck the deal of the century.

Main Image: 1st Dibs

Image two: Vintage Shopping Guide

Sit on the grass; look out at the trees; wake up in the field; float on the water.

These four frolics in nature are woven into the fabric of the vintage French furniture reclaimed by Chair Couture, a delightful contemporary source that seeks to make stuffy, highbrow seating more down to earth.

In salvaging original French antiques for her quirky collection, owner Margaret Elman carefully selects fabrics that fits the mode. She says the recycled polyester or organic cotton used is derived from photographs of nature.

It’s all designed to bring the outdoors inside with splashy textiles in vivid shades that really grow on you.

I remember when a friend first spied the ocean fabric and flipped, telling me it was like nothing she had seen before. She was able to locate the fabric by the yard.

If you purchase one of the reconfigured antiques, such as the Constance chaise covered in a water print (above), the price might hit you like a wave. It’s $15,000. The David bergère chair covered in grassy cloth (at top) is $7,000 and the 1930s carved bed in the dandelion print(below)  is $13,000.

The price tags might be out of reach, but if you have the means, these pieces emerge as works of art that make a huge statement.

With all things digital nowadays, it’s not surprising that my friend’s 12-year-old didn’t know you could still shoot 35 mm slides. Some of us remember when you couldn’t shoot anything but…

…but let’s move on. I have fond family memories of my dad’s slide shows. He’s a photo fanatic who never went anywhere without a camera or two. And much to my mother’s dismay, an entire wall of our garage was stacked with boxes of his slide carousels.

This would constitute a gold mine for Maura G of RedCamper. She creates all sorts of unique, one of a kind and cleverly unusual bags using vintage slides (image above).

The Skylark LTD. is her first laptop bag and it’s eco-friendly. Made with original vintage car upholstery, airplane seatbelt clips and vintage slides, it fits 15″ and smaller laptops, with extra space for the essential charger and cell phone.

Oh, and each of her bags comes with a naked lady. A slide, that is, of a naked lady, just like the one Maura G’s grandfather slipped into his slide shows to make sure no one was nodding off.

Find the Skylark LTD. laptop bag at RedCamper’s online store for $244.

Do you have your email set up for Google alerts? I do. One of them is for “eco-fashion” (go figure, right?).

A few days ago I got an email talking about Oxfam Great Britain’s secondhand and ethically-produced clothing you can buy online and was flabbergasted by how great the pieces were in both sections.

I’m ashamed to say I never knew the same Oxfam has over 700 shops, including specialist shops for books, clothes and music all over the world, which sell many fair-trade items and clothing. This all started in 1948.

According to the website, the proceeds from these usually get paid to different charities or are used to further Oxfam’s relief efforts around the globe. They rely on people donating things for free.

In just the Second Hand section, there are 1,282 pages and numerous others in the Ethical Collection. Where to begin?

Well, how about page four of their Second Hand store under Evening Wear for this stunning evening dress which goes for around $31.00?

Wait until you see the back of it…

What would you pay for a Park Avenue home originally designed by Sister Parish and Albert Hadley in the late 1960s for Brook Astor? Believe it or not, you still have to pay through the nose and cough up many millions for such a primo property, but it’s going down, down, down.

Originally listed at $46 million (well, prices are a bit higher in NYC), the Huffington Post reports the 14-room property was slashed 37% to $29 million. Hey, at that price it’s being called a “fire sale!”

On the market since May 2008, it swings through the entire 16th and part of the 15th floors of 788 Park Avenue. It features five bedrooms and four-and-a-half baths, six terraces, five fireplaces and ample views of Park Avenue and Central Park. Are you sold yet?

The so-called slashing is all part of the real estate wake-up call during a recession that makes us question such obscene prices – for an apartment, no less. When the market was flourishing, those with the liquidity didn’t flinch about the New York City real estate market, but rather, flexed their muscles by showing they could get in there and compete. Now it’s time to correct all that excess.

Had consumers refused to pay the soaring prices in the first place, they could have altered the market while directing their wealth elsewhere, perhaps investing in alternative fuels, electric cars or developing fair trade companies. Or how ’bout some text books for public schools?

According to HuffPo, other luxury residences are dipping down to the price level of insurance executive bonuses. A penthouse on the 40th floor of 15 Central Park West is down 40% from $80 million to around $47 million. An apartment in the newly renovated Plaza is down $38 million from $55 million. And a 14-room property in the Dakota (where John Lennon once lived) is now just $19.5 million, down 19% from $24 million in June.

If it’s possible to lust after vintage linens, then I’m a lech! I have a closet in my dressing room specifically for storing my little secret. Included is an amazing collection of embroidered pillowcases and dishtowels my Grandma Zelda made back in the day at her lake house in Wisconsin. I also have various quilts and blankets amassed over the years, some I continue to use when forced to go downstairs to watch TV when I cannot sleep at night.

I’m always happy to stumble upon old cotton and linen treasures, either at secondhand stores or at websites like the charming Re-Found Objects, a UK source for all kinds of home goods picked up by collectors with savvy eyes.

Among the goodies that fed my linen habit are these vintage silk memento pillows, fabricated of souvenir scarves featuring scenes of Parisian cafes and London pubs, from £35.00.

In addition to the time-traveled cushions, I discovered old Welsh woven blankets and reversible printed cotton Scottish quilts, £85.00 that are so much better than anything new.

I like to wrap myself around the notion that these cozy textiles come with experience. Just think about the far away friends who found comfort in them in years past.

When fashion designers go residential, their sense of color and texture don’t always feel quite at home. Especially when it comes to bedding, it can feel – well, a bit sleepy. Not so with never neutral Trina Turk, whose punchy patterns enter a room with the sock-it-to-me frivolity of Joanne Whirley – euphoric, mod, and unabashedly uncorked with personality.

In fact, the shag carpet appeal of the Laugh-In era has come alive in Palm Springs, the new Mid-Century mecca where Trina Turk Residential has opened right next door to her apparel boutique on Palm Canyon Drive. Turk and her husband, photographer Jonathan Skow, own a home in the desert. Along with retrophiles like Jonathan Adler, they are doing their part to restore the resort to its early 60s glamor of Avanti cars, Sinatra and Hope soirées, and low-slung homes.

Turk’s vivid peacock and floral prints fit in the scene like a worn-in golf glove. The best part is that she locates old pieces – mostly vintage patio furniture – that she restores and upholsters in her own florals and geometrics, infusing old goodies with contemporary spark. It’s oh so greener than throwing them out to pasture.

I spoke with the highly successful designer about her vision for home:

Luanne: Why residential?

Trina: We always did color and prints in our apparel line and it seemed like a logical progression. Most of the prints we do are graphic and bold so they lend themselves to larger expanses of fabric. Over the years, we used my prints in my old home and realized the apparel fabrications are not appropriate for upholstery use (laughs). What we wanted was to find someone who could do true indoor-outdoor fabrics that could withstand the sun, getting wet, kids and dogs. That’s how we paired up with F. Schumacher. We did nine patterns and eight of them are ones we have use in the past on apparel.

Luanne: The Schumacher fabrics are stunning but not organic. Have you thought about going in that direction?

Trina: As a brand, we have credibility in the arena of printed fabrics. Anything that can be done makes sense for us. I don’t see us every doing eco furniture and hard items, but with textiles, we could cross over.

Gallery of featured Trina Turk products

Pisces Print

Peacock Print

Super Paradise Print

Luanne: I realize it can be challenging. Many of those toxic chemicals are what coat the fabric to make it last.

Trina: The textile industry is a very polluting industry, so at this point, it is really about making baby steps in the right direction. With our customers, the sad thing is if a jean is organic or non-organic, they will buy the one that makes them look better, the one most flattering to them. If the less flattering one is organic, their organic concerns are overruled by what they look good in. As the textile industry continues to develop fabrications that are eco-friendly and also fashionable – that whole thing will move forward and there won’t be a difference.

Luanne: How do you scout for the furniture in your collection?

Trina: All the furniture in our own home is vintage. We opened a residential store here figuring that in Palm Springs, it’s easy to find vintage patio furniture. Stylistically, it’s more interesting to me than new patio furniture. It’s easy to find vintage Brown Jordan but most of it has webbing, making it hard to upholster. We have located upholstered pieces not by famous designers, except for one set by Bob Alexander, who you might know if you are a decorator or collector. We get a lot of metal pieces and have them painted with a shiny enamel paint finish that is very durable and comes in great colors. It looks like new once the upholstery is on the cushions and should endure outdoors.

Luanne: The desert sun can be grueling. I remember when I was growing up and we owned a home in P.S. We’d store the cushions indoors.

Trina: That’s what got this whole thing going..this idea of we want fabric by the pool but the 100% cotton canvas in the apparel line really fades. The P.S. sun is so strong it fades in one day. The Schumacher fabrics go through a wear test equivalent to sitting up and down 15,000 times (we both laugh). They really test it out that way!

Luanne: They could have just had my kids come over. They’re hyper-active. Who is your decor clientele – who’s interested in procuring the vintage pieces you’re refurbishing?

Trina: Mostly, there are the people who live here who have bought and restored Mid-Century homes. Then, there are the architectural tourists who come to look at the homes. This time of year, there is a new crop every weekend because of all the local events. The Palm Springs Modernism Show just happened.

Luanne: Were you involved? Did it get around that you have the new home store?

Trina: Yes, we did a thing called the Trina Turk Guide to Palm Springs, an extended postcard listing all of the Mid-century shops.

Luanne: It seems you are branching out beyond Palm Springs, opening a new store in Burlingame, Calif. and other cities.

Trina: In Burlingame, we will sell mostly apparel but also carry some items from our home collection, pillows and home accessory items like scented candles. We see a lot of possibilities for things we can do in that area. The prints could be applied to wallpaper, rugs, many different things.

Photos: courtesy John Ellis

You know the feel of your boyfriend’s really worn, totally weathered and super sexy leather jacket? Kinda like butter, right? That’s what I think of when I see the recycled leather handbags by Hoakon/Helga. I think of butter.

Well, not exactly. But Hoakon/Helga bags are really soft and sumptuous to the touch, not to mention ultra-hip and eco-friendly. Handcrafted using vintage and recycled materials, no two bags are the same. Click on any of the designs shown on the website and you’ll get a gander at all the past bags created in that design.

Gone are the days of looking like every other lady with a logomania luxury bag. What a relief!

Another noteworthy fact about these leather bags is their price, which is not only reasonable but remarkable. A mere $85 for the Willow, my current favorite, as well as the Monarda.

So, if you’re intrigued by the repurposed possibilities and are in the market for a handbag, check out the entire Hoakon/Helga collection, and then shop for your favorite at the Etsy store.