My Christmas House

Welcome
to my Christmas House.

I had a goal to have everything up and decorated by the end of the week.
I meant Friday, but Saturday will do.

This is how it pretty much looks
every year...

This is the entry hall.
Yes, those are Santas underneath the picture of Christ.
If you don't know the book
"I Believe In Santa Claus"
you need to.
And when you do then you'll understand
why it is okay to me
to have Santa and Christ
together.

(you really can't see the Santas too well)

Then this is my holiday shelf by the front door.
There are four bears on this shelf that are for my four sons.
I bought them a long time ago
before I knew I would some day have a daughter.
Just "cute" stuff here...

(Oh, the white bear has a key around his neck for Santa to use to get into our house.
Of course, we'll have to put him outside on Christmas Eve.)

On top of the piano...

(Yes, that is music for "The Muppet Christmas Carol"
We really like that movie, one of the best versions of Dicken's story.
Go figure.)

This is our living room window.
This is where I put our various Nativity sets.
When we lived in Virginia I made a fabric Nativity.
I wanted the boys to feel like they could touch it
and tell the story while they moved everyone around.
I didn't want to have to worry about it.
Also, instead of putting a bunch of lights on our house
I just put a candle in the windows
like they do back east.
Keeping it simple.



This is where the stocking get hung
(not by the chimney)
with care.

(There are also some examples of the Scherenschnitte I learned to do in Virginia.)
(I loved living in Virginia.)
(Also, the stockings are really red stocking/socks. I sewed the boy's names on them.)
(Abbie inherited her stocking from Aunt Sadie.)


AAAAAAACCKKKK!!!

What is this picture doing here?

Oh boy! Jacob is not going to be very happy about his messy room
being viewed by others.

OH NO!!
It is one of our laundry baskets
spilling over
with dirty laundry!!

Get me out of here!
Show me something pretty!

Okay. Okay.

Here is our living room Christmas Tree.
This is the tree with ALL the ornaments on it.
Fancy-schmancy to 3-year-old-hands-using-ribbon-and-glue.

(I never thought I would have a fake tree.
But then I got older.
I'm all about keeping it simple[r] now.)

A shot down the stairs with the (fake) garland and bows.

This is the skinny "themed" tree in the family room.
I was the highest bidder for this tree a few years ago
at a fund raiser for our local
Children's Justice Center.

It is a cute snow-themed tree
and it fits nicely into a
small space.

Here is Aunt Sadie's hutch
(that is always how we refer to it)
with Abbie's gingerbread house and other things.
In the lower shelf I have my Christmas dishes
washed and ready to use.
Don't be too impressed...
A few years ago I was at K-Mart
(remember: we don't have many choices out here)
after Christmas
and they had these dishes marked down to
four bucks a set!
I bought two sets and now we use these for the month of December.
If they break...oh well!

OH NO!!
NOT AGAIN!

How does this happen? I want you to think that my house is all lovely
and beautiful.
WHY do you have to see the real-life photos???

*sigh*

"What's New?" You Ask

Why...

THIS!!

It is our Christmas present to our house.

I never got a present this expensive.

Speaking of expensive--do you KNOW how expensive garage doors are? I didn't. It was one of those things when the guy told me the estimate I had to act all calm about it and not yell "IT WILL COST HOW MUCH????", you know, like I'm used to spending that kind of money all the time.

Not.

I'm thinking my husband is in the wrong business. He could be hanging garage doors without dental school loans to spend the rest of his life paying back. Well, okay, we'll be done paying them back in about 5 years. But still, that's a long time since 1991.

Alright, enough of all this. We have a new garage door and we're pretty happy about that. Now we have to clean out and organize the garage so that our vehicles can go in there. Ideally before the snow flies. I love our house. But it has no storage. Except for the garage. Which is full of stuff. Well, not totally full, one vehicle could fit in right now. The point is, the garage has become the most convenient place to store anything that is not a vehicle but we're all about changing that.

Tomorrow.