From Pinterest this year I discovered a fun, new way to display Christmas cards. I strung up a wide red Christmas ribbon up and down each of the cupboard doors and taped the top and bottom to the back. As the cards arrived throughout the month, I simply attached each of them to the ribbon with a clothes pin. So decorative and easy when anyone in the family wanted to remove a card to read or take a closer look.
My Christmas stockings are a staple! Several years ago I assembled each of them from a kit, they are precious to me! Someday I hope to have a fireplace mantel downstairs, but until then, I hang them from the dining room bay window, over the table.
This is the coffee table in the upstairs family room. I really adore this centerpiece! Nearly every night I light the five candles, sit on the couch with some Christmas music playing in the background, and enjoy the flickers.
This room is my Christmastime pride and joy. A few years ago I convinced Kent that I needed my own formal tree to decorate and display, he agreed. My tree is strewn with gold and burgundy beads, ornaments, and bows, and drips with gold tinsel and icicles. It is topped with a large golden bow, and cascading sparkly ribbon. I also add evergreen garlands and white lights across the piano, and down the banister. This room is elegant and beautiful, I get compliments from everyone who comes to my door. It makes me so happy!
Several years ago at Girls' Night Out, my Mom gave me my first lighted Christmas village house, and thus begun my collection. I add one or two new ones every year, and am now up to eleven, carefully displayed at the base of my Christmas tree. I love each of them, and every year I look forward to picking out my next addition. I have several charming houses, a fire station, a school, a gas station, a winter carnival, and my new one this year, a veterinary office. Can't wait for this collection to continue to grow, year after year.
Here is a view of the other side of the entry room with the picture of Jesus, and two sconces topped with a candle and garnished with holly and a gold bow to match the ones on the tree.
Here is the tree downstairs in the family room, complements of Kent and the kids. This is where we display all the homemade and various random ornaments, collected through the years. This is where we pile all the wrapped presents. Nothing fancy or elegant about this tree, but it has its place. Christmas decor would not be complete without it!
On the computer desk...an assortment of some of my favorite Christmas knick knacks. Many of them are Super Saturday crafts collected through the years. Of course, there are other crafts, ceramics and wall hangings displayed randomly all throughout the house, but this is my largest grouping of them.
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Now, on to the outside! It is mostly Kent's domain, but I like to add a few touches of my own. This year seemed to get away from him, and it was suddenly too cold and icy for him to get up on the roof, but he did get a few lights and lawn decorations set out. I always string colored lights up the bannister, place wreaths on all the outside lighting fixtures, and add a couple of favorite additions, like this lighted wooden lamp post I picked up a few years ago at my favorite boutique, the Blue Goose.
For years now, I have wrapped the front door with a shiny foil door cover from the dollar store, and topped it with a pretty Christmas wreath. I've had several neighbors--adults and kids--comment on my fancy Christmas front door.
And that is a tour of my Christmas house. The end!