Well hello there! As promised in my Christmas decor rant post, here are my holiday decorations this year. I have gone very minimal this year, but the lights are actually hung on the house and the tree is up, with ornaments, so I’m calling it a success.
Let’s start outside, shall we? I took all my dollar store wreaths from two years ago and hung them on all the front windows. I actually really love the simple green wreath with the red bow.
I found this swag at Target for our front door. It isn’t quite as pretty as I could have crafted myself, but I could have never made it for the twenty dollar price tag either.
We and Thomas Michael Manis put up our tree in the dining room. It was really the only spot it would fit, plus you can see it from the street at night through the window which is really pretty.
I also added some garland and my red nutcracker to our dining table. Because we lack a mantle in this new house, the stockings are temporarily hung on the backs of each chair, but with only 6 days until Christmas, this might just be where they hang this year. I had big plans for a pretty DIY stocking hanger but never actually made it. Next year?
My sideboard has turned into our makeshift mantle/hold-all-the-decor table this year. Each child’s Lego advent is on there, Travis pulled out the mini tree and decorated it himself and stuck it there, and the few small items I brought out to decorate just stuck on the table. The lantern is filled with ornaments again this year. I actually packed it away with the ornaments still in it, so all I had to do was take it out of the box it was in and voila, instantly decorated.
Ikea has some of the very best fake holiday wreaths I’ve ever found, and for ten bucks each you just can’t beat that. I hung mine inside my big wooden shim mirror and added a red star ornament on top. I just used a command hook to hang it so I can remove the wreath after Christmas.
One tradition we have that we do every single Christmas is to decorate a gingerbread house. I always let the kids do it however they’d like, and they just go to town with candy and icing flying all over the place. The house this year wasn’t looking half bad (usually they end up looking terrible but then they get eaten anyway so who cares), but of course, right at the end the kids realized they had half a bag of icing leftover, so OF COURSE they had to use all the icing which turned a cute looking house into one that lived through a snowy blizzard. And then within an hour they’d eaten a third of the candy off already. One snowman didn’t even make it until the end of the decorating process before his head was eaten right off.
But, the main reason I haven’t decorated much this season (besides just being too busy and Ben being out of town a ton for work) is because my sister had a baby!!!!!!!!!!!
I have a brand new niece who is just the sweetest thing in the entire world. My baby is 9 and a half, so getting to hold a newborn has been the highlight of my year! She is the most beautiful little baby I’ve ever seen. Here she is at 12 hours old.
Just precious. I can’t stop staring at her. I’m so thankful my sister lives only about 15 minutes away from me so I can sneak over and get my baby fix as often as I can.
I hope your holiday is filled with lots of love and family. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.
Love your minimal decorations!
My sister only lives about 15 minutes away too and has two babies under 2 and I love that I can go get my baby fix…and then when the babies start getting fussy, I can leave! hahaha. 🙂 But I do help by changing diapers occassionally. 🙂
I am totally on board with an anti-climatic decorating season. Who cares what is on display? It’s the memories that you share with your family that are the most meaningful! Congrats and enjoy your family!!
Congratulations on your new niece; time spent with her and helping your sister certainly trumps lavish decorations. Next year….
This is why I have been reading your blog for years.
Your home is beautiful but it doesn’t look like a friggin magazine like OTHER big name blogs.
It is perfect and REAL.
Thanks for sharing and Merry Christmas!
You are one of my 2 favorite blogs, so I am here often. I have to say I am not having much luck following you, but anyway. You promote spray paint so often, I decided to spray paint some orthopedic flip flops I had to wear for feet problems. Didn’t work out, the flexing parts got all horrible looking. I remain thankful I have feet however, that’s what’s important. Then, we decided to do wainscoting 6 feet high in our spare room cause your kids bathroom (at the old house) was so nice and looked so easy. Well, our house has plaster and lathe walls and the room was worked on at some point (which is the reason we opted for 6ft high) so some of the room is sheet rock with very irregular studs. We bought the beadboard and then had to wait til we were both off and the boards got a big arch in the face from leaning against the house on the back porch (deck to the people where I live) It’s bitch to put this stuff up and curved like this is awful and is taking the 2 of us forever and I had to be a human clamp. It’s awfully rough boards too, I think I am going to have run my sander over them and praying for no repeat needed on primer. Your painting a straight line using tape idea worked great! for the ceiling/wall junction, cause the plaster is not exactly precise tuned. I am very grateful because I can hardly sleep if paint lines are crooked. Dirty dishes, no problem, but the paint job has to be good. But, I still think you’re AWESOME! I wanted to say Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and your family!
If you just covered everything in snow (does it snow in texas?) it would look automatically 1000% more christmas-y, so nothing you can do:) Congrats n the new niece, I’m expecting another baby here, so I’m looking forward to the newborn cuddles.
Jessica
Oh your little niece is so precious! Congrats!
Congrats on the new niece!!! I too finally became an aunt to a niece also! Brityn Nicole is exactly 2 months old today!! I even DIY’d her nursery!
http://minettesmaze.blogspot.com/2013/09/my-new-nieces-room.html
And I think your house is perfect decorated the way it is! It’s who’s in it that makes it warm!
Congrats!
Shelly from minettesmaze
Congrats on your sweet niece!!! Two of my three sisters live near — just need the other to move closer now. There are 12 little ones under 11 when we get together — absolute CRAZY fun!!! Your curb appeal is so pretty! XO, Aimee
Since no one eats them anyway…my DIL did this with her two daughters & they loved it!
http://bit.ly/1km1UaT
Love your decorations – they prove it is not necessary to go over the top – simple is often best!