You can just put the helmets up there from standing in front of the racks, some like the Stormcloak officer and a few rare ones you have to toss in place, so I never bothered trying to put them up there, some like the leather, elven and fur helmets do not sit that well. Braggen has his racks full, Aussie is a bit slack there she is not much into armor. I am currently having an argument with the Dwarven helmet, that seems to be another you have to toss in place, never realised that. I was sure Braggen had one up on display.

I have not got around to trying yet, but you should be able to put armor on top of the enchanting tower rack, the wall being round it has more space at the back.

Ok, you mentioned doing this before with your circlets. How in the world do you toss these things???! I think you deserve the championship medal for decorating, and patience! I know I run out of patience and sanity trying to do some of this stuff.

Grab a lot of what you want to toss, line it up and drop it, then correct where you stand according to where it dropped. The height you have the curser at can also affect where the object starts to drop from, not always logically either. You go too close the wall or a door the silly thing will drop behind you all of a sudden, so you cannot get too close to the wall. If you only have one like a helmet, pick it up without moving if you missed and then move a bit and try again. If you move, you are going to forget where you were so it will just be a guess when you try again. It is annoying that the helmets drop facing away from you, you have to get behind where you want it to have it facing the right direction. The dropping distance will always be the same once you have it lined up, moving the curser slightly will slightly change where it lands. So you can fill a bowl , basket or kettle up with something, drop a helmet or whatever and it sticks, you do not have to worry about going out the door, because you have not moved the object from where it landed.

The circlets had to be dropped in place since you cannot arrange them by hand, they just return to where you dropped them. They were a challenge because they bounced, it was purely chance where they ended up on the enchanting tower table, you just kept tossing them till you had enough where you wanted them. Then picked all the rejects up off the floor. There were a lot of rejects.

In between defending Morthal from Legendary dragons and chasing mad jarl's Braggen decided to decorate his outside areas at Heljarchen Hall.
http://s81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrhelSnackswithaview.jpg
http://s81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrHelbedroompatio.jpg


Yes the lavender is held up by magic! 140 lavender he had and they were all that size, I could not be bothered chasing the smaller ones.

Wow, looks great!! I haven't gotten that far at all, the most I've done out there has been to get tired of picking up the ever falling pie. I ate it. Yum.

Seriously it looks good, I love the ideas!

I just pick the pie and the bottle up and put them back usually.

Nice to know the links work, two browser updates and still photobucket is not working right for me.

Edit
Seems it was only the Australian users photobucket took exception to, everything seems fixed so here are some pictures of Braggen's armory. As suspected he does have a Dwarven helmet on display so either his is the exception (which is possible) or Aussie found a reject that refuses to co-operate. A PC player with more control over placement could probably put 6 helmets on top of each rack, 4 is my limit for the Xbox 360, these have been there a while and a few tipped up a bit, but they will do.
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrlvMArmory1.jpg
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrlvMArmory2.jpg

And last night the staves were put in the baskets, six seems to be about the limit before the lot topple over. Braggen's armory is very dark for some reason, so I was playing with some torches as lighting.
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrlvMArmory3.jpg

And it was Braggen who got the furthest on hiding the washing up, it was a variation on this one that I failed at on the third house, will let the houses reset and go back and try again now I have the picture.
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrlvMwashingup.jpg

Backroom at Heljarchen Hall, at least the table is set.
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrHelbackroom1.jpg

And having thrown all the sweetrolls on the floor looking for small sweetrolls, it was discovered there were four sizes, now I just have to work out where the smallest came from, which is why they are lined up there, so I can compare them when I return with more.
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BrHelbackroom2.jpg

wow ! you always amaze me !
I thought I had decorated my armory
but I didn't knew you could put helm on top of the shield rack like that. clever !

what does that helmet soup taste like ? shouldn't this go in the kitchen ?

those staffs didn't fall ? the dog never knock them down ?
I had him mess up quite a few display attempt

Braggen seems verry hungry, munch munch munch ... eat your veggies said parthunax ...

hey, you choosed the same spot as mee for the sweet stuff.
I put all sort of sweet stuff in that basket
I also got a big pile of apple pie on that crate nearby

when I got something presentable, I'll take pics

right now I just bought the third house after fighting an insane vampire
Had to drop from master to expert, he was too hard with my house rules
(I'm not allowed to put more than one perk on multiperks ... so not much dammage)
(guy seemed invunerable to paralysis and slow)

Anyhow, I cheated a little, by lowering the difficulty on the final fight
but I got the house, and the library...
so I moved all books there and it sort of destroyed my old decoration work
first house is now mostly an armory, and faendal and the bard live there

I haven't decided what to do with faendal riverwood house... assuming anything can be done since it respawn
maybe a place to display aimal pelts, like a hunting cabin of some sort

Since my experience with Meeko, no dogs are allowed in the house, Braggen's latest family so far just has the rabbit, Aussie's has the rabbit and Bran, but still Bran stays outside. The dogs have never gone near those baskets in the armory anyway, and the staves stay in the basket fine. Since those baskets are normally in the armory it helps with avoiding accidents with anything but a "stupid dog", who goes climbing all over everything.

It did not take that long to get the staves in there anyway, the most time was lost playing around with how many I could get in there before they tipped over onto the chest. I got the falmer one in there again by resting the prongs on the very edge of the weapon rack, and carefully tipping it into the baskets first. I had to be careful since I did not want to be putting the helmets back up if I accidentally knocked them down.

As soon as I enter the house, I tell Meeko to stop, - I learned the need to do that the hard way - most of the time I also tell my companions to wait
No family yet, but in lakeview I got Faendal as a stweard and the bard guy.
Actually Faendal may be the culprit for the fallen books

Still sounds like a lot of work you're doing. But I read your 'toss up'' method. seems interesting
When I get a bit more free time

Not able to play Skyrim at the moment, but the nice technical support person from Photobucket is trying to help with the Photobucket problem, so thought I would post the test picture here. This area is not finished yet and was just an early go at what to put in the storage wing. I will get back to it eventually.
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/potions-1.jpg

Can I just say: this is amazing. It takes me fifteen minutes just to place a sword in a display box, and then it's crooked. How do you do this?

Very nice work!

Well something like an elven sword, you could probably pop in there no trouble, pretty sure they have a nice firm grip you can just straighten the sword up against something and pop it in the case no problems. Something like an iron sword or a Dwarven one that hangs from the handle and waves all over the place while you move is not so easy. Line your bit of trouble up against the side of the display case at about a level where you want it, then slowly slide it along so it is level when it falls in the case, carefully line it up where you want it and then gently lower it in and let go. Hopefully it stays there and does not slide. If you have to try again you need to lift it and position the point first then rotate it with the handle so it is straight and try lowering it.

Or you can just give up trying to get it straight and cheat. Once you have it in the case in roughly the right spot, or even not, drop a small gem like an amethyst on the floor, pick it up and use it to gently nudge your weapon to where you actually want it. Be careful, your little gem is likely to flip your weapon out of the display case if you get too enthusiastic.

Obviously some demented game designer thought it was a good idea to have objects that wave around or tip upside down. A fixed grip on weapons, herbs, potions and just about anything else makes it easier to actually put it some where. Some things have a fixed grip, most do not. You get the hang of it, potions, crockery, containers, food and most weapons are easy enough to manipulate, but trying to put some lavender in a basket is likely to to drive you nuts. Obviously some developer was putting tundra cotton somewhere by hand and made sure that had a fixed grip, as do a lot of the other flowers and ingredients, but not the lavender. You have to be cunning to get the lavender in something the right way up, you have to balance it right way up over something bigger that you have placed next to your container, and then tip it in. A lot of trouble just to arrange a bit of lavender.

When I first got Breezehome last year the first thing I started was home decorating, it did not take long to work out it was not going to be as easy as it was in Oblivion. I have to admit, it defeated me, I did the potions room and put some potions on the shelves near the door, some weapons on the table and gave up. While the potion bottles proved exhausting (and they were the right way up at that point), it was actually trying to put a wooden plate on the potions table with a knife on top of it that did me in. In the end only the knife was there, I gave up on the plate, stalked off and lost interest in home decorating.

Each patch that came out, I would again try home decorating out to see if it had improved, strangely enough it was when everything suddenly turned upside down that I started to gain some interest. Once I got over the shock of my potion bottles suddenly hanging wrong way up. But still it was too fiddly for most things, I did most of Honeyside and lost interest, it was the tiny potions bottles that did me in, could not put any of them on display and the skooma bottles had me in fits.

At some point after that a patch gave most objects a cushioning effect that would make them settle better and not bounce, they seemed easier to place as well, and would stick easier, still it was too hard, I did a bit around Hjerim and gave up.

It was only with Hearthfire my enthusiasm actually fired up, there seemed to have been more improvements, and finally you could actually not only put your skooma on display, but actually get it to line up. I could think of a lot of improvements I would like to still see, but at least now home decorating is actually more fun, and less frustration. Now if only they would actually give us more homes that are set up like a player home and does not respawn all the junk if we are away for ten days. Why give us a home building DLC and then deny us the chance to really decorate them as we want to.

I have a problem with the Bard in my Lakeview home. I like to have my characters amass a pile of wealth. I usually make piles of gems and gold bars. On the new character that built Lakeview everytime I come home from an adventure I will drop gems on the floor and then exit then come back to place them in their pile and my bard will pick them up and come running up "hey you dropped this" giving me back some of my gems.

House carls never did this to me. I don't mind skipping the bard but since my stewart is Lydia (and likely still following some housecarl scripts) I am worried when I try the other houses I might choose a stewart that will do the same thing. Anyone else have this problem?

In all my thousands of hours spent decorating (mainly Oblivion, Morrowind not so much lol and of course in Skyrim), I have always placed my objects where I want them and then exited the house and entered it to do it again. I NEVER thought about just dropping the stuff on the floor, exit the house and then come back in to arrange it.

THANK YOU so much for this awesome tip. It saves me time, since I don't have to arrange things twice! Why did this never occur to me? LOLOL


LOL I had that happen to me a few times. Jordis, the housecarl in Solitude did that to me, when I dropped a pot I wanted to display. She also came running up to me, when I dropped some armor pieces on the floor, asking me if I didn't want those anymore, if she could have them.

I actually had the Bard in Lakeview Manor ask me the same thing, when I dropped items in my armory to arrange them. I told him NO, it's mine, don't touch it! LOL He never picked up after me though.

Well my bard actually chased me into the basemant to give me back a Gem once. LOL. Yea. Jordis would do that to me when I dropped necklaces or circlets but never with gems, weapons, or gold bars. I have the table upstairs in my solitude home covered in piles of gems on one character. The basment has a room full of gold and sliver bars along with silver and elvin swords (Hey.. they look gold). I am starting a new character now for this, another run at Dawnguard and to be ready for Dragonborn when it comes out so I am not moving any of my highlevel characters to a new home yet. I am salivating at the idea of filling some of those display cases with gems (new character is a bit too poor for more than a few right now) but if that Bard keeps up his crap I am going to have to invite him to visit the neighbor down the hill from my back porch.

After much fiddling and too much frustration trying to use a tall basket as a stand for staves, I gave up. Darn basket defeated me! I couldn't get it upright anywhere but right in the middle of the floor!

Soooo, I went to my good old standby, the big kettle. I got it next to a nice spot against a wall in the main hall, between two big support columns, and got 4 staves in it. Looks pretty good and the support columns on each side made it fairly easy to lean the staves against so they wouldn't fall over. I could probably get more in since the kettle is a bit more stable than the basket, but I was really tired by that point of messing with it! lol

http://i1273.photobucket.com/albums/y418/kestrelhawk/Skyrim%20pics/Staves.jpg

The colorful one keeps sliding over, but I will probably try to add another 1 or 2 anyway, so no problem.

I have a question. So I went to Alftand and four hours later I had 100+ dwemer ingots. My smithing is already 75 so I thought I'd try stacking them. Any suggestions on how to accomplish this without losing my mind.

I've never been able to stack them more than 3 high and that was doing it criss cross one row like |||| and the next row ----- but it seems that they do shift slightly each time you enter the cell (they load) and any stacks I had all eventually collapsed. I tried it on a shelf, floor, and table, no difference I could find. I did however find you can fill baskets with gold bars pretty good. That looks cool. Also those stactic bins in some houses. In the solitude home I grabbed all the food out of the ones in the alcamey room and filled those with bars of different things. Moon stone, glass... ect.


Edit: Note if you do use baskets only use ones you bring in yourself. Moved baskets from the house seem to want to re-set sometimes. Also drop the basket... Leave and come back.. then put the basket where you want it. Then drop the gold bars... leave come back... then place the bars in the basket. You might have to nudge some to get them to shift in the basket and fill the holes a bit.. I've also filled baskets with unsmelted hunks of gold and silver too and that looked pretty cool.

Try it with the big cast iron kettles. Works better than the baskets.

Thought about that... But I kind of like the look of the baskets more. I'll fill the kettles up with potion stuff though on my mage character. Witches brew for the win!

Only one of my characters went in for ingot stacking. I hate the task, ingots that skid around like wet bars of soap and have a mind of their own are too much for me. This pic is Aussie's Heljarchen.
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/AuHelcellar01.jpg

Braggen did his little mining display in Honeysdie ages ago, and I settled on just throwing some ingots on the floor. As well as having the nuggets in buckets. Sometimes a smaller space is better, it saves frustration! The only way I could get those ingots to stay still in Heljarchen, was to leave them no room to move, it took a while to get to that stage.

THAT is neat! I love it but I don't plan to even attempt it! LOL

I have the ore bins full, that was fairly easy, and have troll skulls on shelves,(though my troll skull display is nowhere near nice as yours!) as well as one full of mammoth tusks, one with pelts and horker tusks, and another with the 'snowy' pelts. Also some Centurion dynamos and other Dwemer stuff here and there.

All the times I did that bone collection cellar and I never really took many pictures even of the final version. Those goat horns look pretty good piled up on a shelf or in a basket, my antlers are still a bit scarce, but will put some of them on display eventually, I have horker tusks, and one small horker tusk I have no idea where it came from. Mammoth tusks, dragon scales and bones, dragon heart scales, chitin, fur of all sorts including those nice colourful Forgotten Vale ones. I acquired some mini bear hides the other day and put them on display with their full size versions, but I suspect they went in a smithing cellar, will eventually get some for the bone and fur cellar.

Most of my Dwemer collectables went in Braggen's Vlindrel Hall, although some have wandered into one of the new houses, mainly because of the nice big display cases. Pity the goodies in the Dwemer museum did not respawn, would be nice to have a full display in one of the new houses, but Vlindrel Hall gets them first since it is in Markarth. Aussie will eventually try her luck at raiding the museum and adjoining areas, her sneaking and lockpicking skills are not up to 100 yet, and she has no lockpicking perks which makes it a bit harder. I would probably go through her entire collection of lockpicks just trying to get all the cases open. She has yet to get into Calcelmo's tower or lab so could not do a clean sweep anyway.

I've not tried to get into Calcelmo's tower or lab either, though my sneak and lockpicking are getting pretty good for a warrior type. She wears light armor and gets so paranoid going through dungeons she sneaks a LOT! lol Of course, she is picking locks on doors and chests a lot also, so is about at expert level on both those skills. I didn't set out to do that, it just happened. I keep forgetting I can have Vorstag open things.

I would love to have some of the vale animal pelts, if she ever does that questline. My other character has, but in hindsight, I wish I had done that one's cellar just a little differently, to be better for display, so her vale pelts are on shelves upstairs in the main house. I would love to find some of the mini animal items, I didn't even know there were any! Well, I take that back, I do have a smallish troll skull, but I don't think it's the real small one like you have. It is smaller than the rest I have.

If you ever get the chance, would love to see a photo of your bone collection cellar.

So many possibilities.

Braggen missed out on a lot of display space just trying to get a bug free Hearthfire, I was losing it after three failed attempts and was not as selective as I should have been. And even on the fourth attempt some furniture vanished on me that I wanted, but nothing essential. He has no shelves vacant in his smithing cellar, so just resorted to filling the ingot trays, putting some baskets in for ingots and putting some armour and other items around the place.

The two mini bear pelts you can steal from the general trader in Solitude, I had my eye on them for some time, but never having actually put pelts on display before, was not sure they were smaller. They were.

I would think there are all sorts of different sized things around the place. Belethor has a mini roll of paper behind the shop counter, I am thinking some of the game designers stashed these things around the place to test out our powers of observation and see if we noticed. And if we did what would we do. Took a while before I noticed those bottles at the Riverwood trader, but then back then I was not collecting wine to put it on display. Now I walk into a place the first thing I do is check out if there are any unusual sized items in the place I could make use of.