Compostable home decor

I am putting myself on a diet. A stuff diet. I just pulled together an enormous pile of stuff -- furniture, clothing, toys, gear, home decor, electronics -- that either we 1) no longer use, 2) have outgrown, 3) broke, 4) despise. Getting rid of stuff is not an easy task (and I'm working on a post that explains more about this). Thus, I cannot abide the thought of anything new coming into this house!

Which is somewhat painful because I'm a home decor junkie. I have a library of Domino magazines that I frequently pore over (not to mention the IKEA, West Elm, CB2 and DWR catalogs). I play this game, "If I could have one thing on this page, it would be ___." And I wonder why I can't get anything done. So as autumn settles in and I start thinking about cozying up the house, my instinct is to buy new woolly throw pillows and earthenware vases, but I will not cave.

Which is why I was delighted to find a bin of gourds at The Pumpkin Patch on Sauvie Island. What says Fall better than a gourd? And you can compost it when it starts to melt! That got me to thinking about other things, like interesting tree branches and pine cones that could be composted, too. Or a big bowl of red apples. A clear vase full of hazelnuts. I don't want my house looking like crazy nature woman, with bunches of dried flowers hanging up everywhere, but I think I can satiate my decor desires by using what I already have in a new fashion and add touches of nature here and there. Or am I turning into crazy nature woman?

Any au naturel home decor ideas you'd like to share?