Woo-hoo! It's here - the Decorating for the Holidays blog hop started by
The Frugal Housewife.
The holidays, for me, are all about decorating. I don't celebrate a necessarily religious aspect of Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanza/Yule/whatever, but I love the season anyway. People are more focused on good feelings (not counting all the grumpy people I saw at the mall!), and the spirit is ready to be spread! Is it just me, or are there even more outdoor lights this year than usual? I hope so - I love to see them, and this is the first year my two-year-old is really taking notice of them too :)
That being said, our only outdoor lights are a small ornamental maple outside our front door being strung with colored lights. I do make sure our tree is visible out the front window though - don't want the neighbors thinking our lonely outdoor lit tree is like Charlie Brown's Christmas Tree!
Our indoor tree is artificial and pre-lit. I suppose we'll re-evaluate if we need a 'real' tree when our daughter gets old enough to know the difference. I imagine as she gets older the ornament variety will expand as well - currently most of our ornaments are penguins (or as my daughter calls them, pingos). We don't have a lot of other decorations out anymore. Our coffee table has been on the front enclosed porch since you-know-who started walking. Her 'playroom' (otherwise known as our living room) doesn't need another piece of furniture in it! When we have less risk for knick-knacks and such again, I'll probably start bringing up my TONS of
Partylite decorations from the basement again.
I also have one kind of favorite way to display really current stuff - like the cards we receive. We have double french doors that lead to our enclosed front porch. Over the door that doesn't open, I have two finishing nails, each with a long piece of red curling ribbon tied to it. These are where I tape our cards. It's fun to see them up all the time and be able to browse through them without them taking up much room.
The last thing I have to share is a tradition I heard about this year from another family (and now I just wish I could remember where I read it!). Someone said they start putting out decorations on November 1, but just one small decoration at a time. Her kids had fun each day trying to find what the new decoration was, and by Thanksgiving and Christmas things looked festive without an all-at-once effort. I definitely want to do this once my daughter is old enough to participate.
I hope you enjoyed hearing about my family's holiday decorations. Please head over to
Tips & Treasures, the next blog on the hop!
