Saturday, December 29, 2012

Holiday decorating and then some...

In spite of the still pink hallway (I have major color-choice paralysis), I've been busily trying to make our house more homey and put our stamp on it. I really enjoyed decorating for the holidays this year. But it did give me a sizable clearance-stuff-for-next-year wishlist. :)


Entry way. This is the first year I've done up my entry. I don't have a mantle, except for in the playroom, so this is kind of my "mantle" decor.  I love the Holy Family figure we have there. Its actually my only "adult" navitivy... must fix that. My in-laws brought it back from the Domincan Republic for us. It stays out year-round... but not on this table year-round. Behind the nativity I have 3 hurricane vases (the dollar store hand-made kind!) filled with gold & silver beads, candles, gold and silver mini-ornaments and gold & silver winter berry decor picks. I tied fishing line to some ball ornaments and taped them to the back of my mirror, the filled a glittery leaf bowl (a wedding gift that I love and have decided will no longer live in a box in the basement) with more ornaments. The tree and the little season's greetings sign were Target clearance scores. The "print" is a free printable found here. I printed it at home and stuck it in a frame and mat that we already had... without even removing the regular picture that lives in that frame. :) Next year I might use some garland & lights on here... we'll see.
 

Stair case. Please ignore the mess on the floor... I was still mid-decorating when this picture got taken. I wrapped & swagged the garland around the banister, strung it with lights (half of which burned out before Christmas... grr) and hung our stockings. Yes, there are only 4 there. Yes, Lindsey does have a stocking that matches, but her doesn't have a ribbon to hang it by and I never managed to go that 5 minute task this season. And I can't have any more kids, because I only have 5 of these stockings and I love them. After the stockings were hung I decorated the with pine cone decor picks, white star ornaments and more ball ornaments in 3 sizes (I might have bought a LOT of those last year or the year before on clearance... I think they were something like 25 cents per tube and I intended to make topiaries for my porch with them. Oops... at least they're getting used now!). I really like how this turned out. 

 Our tree. Its hard to see, since its dark and all lights, but I'm not a tree-prefectionist anyway. Once the lights are on I'm so over it (because I am a lights perfectionist). My kids help a lot, and its pretty bare on the bottom 18 inches, but it looked nice. We have a separate kids tree in the play room where they get to use all the ornaments that I'm over for my "pretty" tree. Anyway, I love how the tree looked in the very late hours of Christmas Eve. Oh... and does anyone want to share where they got the tree topper they love? I really want a star that lights up, but I haven't found one I like much yet.

On a non-holiday decorating note: we had family picture taken in late September and a few days before Christmas I FINALLY got our portrait gallery up. The clock in the center Brian got me for Christmas two years ago. I've always loved it, but didn't know where to put it. 


I like it, but I kind of think it needs something in the low corners... what do you think?

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