Only one week left until Christmas. Commence freak out! If you celebrate Christmas, I hope that you have been able to get the ‘tedious’ things out of the way so you can sit back and enjoy time with friends and family.
There are lots of traditions that go along with the holidays this time of year. For me, none of them are allowed to start until after December 6, which is my dad’s birthday. But once December 7 rolls around it’s time to kick it into high gear, like the flip of a light switch. Get ready for picture overload!
Decorations
I was a bit worried about how I would get all of my decorating done this year, since I am out of town every single weekend in December until New Years. But with being sick all last week and not running at all, I was able to get most of my decorating done!
My favorite thing about decorating the house is taking out each item and remembering all of the memories associated with it. Even Larry the Quilt Lamb, who was an awesome surprise gift last year from my in-laws, is getting festive.
Marvin the Moose made an appearance again this year!
He hangs outside with the rest of our Christmas lights. We have two Rhododendron bushes in front of our house, and I think they look kind of tropical with the Christmas lights on them.
And of course we have our advent calendar. I love this one, because we get to reuse it each year, and you get to hang an ornament on the tree each night.
New additions this year included a Christmas runner for our dining room table, a light up tree (in the center of the table) and a train! I’m sure our guests won’t mind eating at the table as the train goes around 🙂
Of course the centerpiece of the decorations is the Christmas tree. Our tree is a little 4 foot tall pre-lit artificial tree. It’s loaded down with ornaments! I think nearly every branch is full 🙂 Maybe it’s time for a bigger tree?
Going along with the tree is our mantelpiece decorations, including our stockings (hung by the fire with care, yada yada).
And that about does it! Since this is already entirely too long, I am going to split the rest of the Christmas traditions into a second post. Tomorrow I’ll share about Christmas cards, cookies, and all those wonderful Christmas movies.
Do you put up a lot of holiday decorations? If so, what’s your favorite one? I love the tree with all of its ornaments, and I really like my new train.
Turkey Runner 
You got a train? I haven’t been able to set mine up since you kids were little. The dining room table looks like a great place. You guys won’t mind eating dinner on paper plates in the family room?
The house looks great. 15 dozen cookies done. More tonight. House decorated. Time to get out and do some shopping!
I got a train! 🙂 It’s not super fancy, but it’s pretty neat. I had it at Thanksgiving, but forgot to show you! (It was in the room where your gifts were hidden) Sounds like your holiday preparations are moving right along.
Nice decorations! That’s a cool advent calendar. I’ve never seen one like that before. My only rule for decorating is that we have to wait until after Thanksgiving.
I like that we get to reuse it year after year. When I was a kid we had this little mini wooden tree that was an advent calendar. Each night my sister and I would hang an ornament on the tree and on the 24th you put the star on top. You could also wind up the tree and it would play “Oh Christmas Tree.” I agree with you – anytime before Thanksgiving is too soon!
Very cool! Glad to see the moose is back. And I see no problem w/ a train on the table. 😀 I love holiday trains! Santa brought the kids one a couple of years ago as a surprise a few weeks before Christmas. It’s definitely one of their favorite decorations, but our whole family’s very favorite is our Lego village!
Marvin is back! Next year I want to get a solar powered spotlight for him so that you can see him at night, too. 🙂 I figured you’d be a fan of the train on the table! I love y’alls Lego village. I think I’ll need one of those eventually.
I love your garden flag with the cow wearing a Santa hat! It’s so festive! I put up a lot of Christmas decorations, but got so busy, that I didn’t have time to post a final “Merry Christmas post” with pictures of decorations like I’d hoped to… Perhaps next year!
It’s a good one! I’ll look for that post next year 🙂