Christmas Home Tour 2017

Merry Christmas y’all!  Today is Will’s last day of school before winter break so I headed over there for his party and realized that I had not shared the rest of our christmas decor with you yet!  Every year we add a little piece here or there to our stash and this year we already added a whole bunch with the pretty things from our JOANN Christmas tree and mantle.

SO if you want to see our Christmas tree – here is the link.

If you want to see our front door decor – click here.

And if you would like to see the mantle – click here.

Other than that, we have a sprinkling of festive Christmas stuff all over the house.  We think of holiday decor like tinsel….just throw a little bit everywhere 🙂

So our playroom has a few items up on top of their big toy cubby shelf.  Max is very handsy with the decor so keeping it up high is the only way to go.  I found the gingerbread house at Goodwill, the pompom tree I made a while ago (click here for the link), the rainbow tree was a gift from my mom and I painted it, and the stacked felt tree is old from Target.  I made the ornament garland a few Christmas’ ago and it is one of my favorite things!

The nutcracker and penguin are both goodwill items.  It’s amazing what cute stuff you can find at thrift stores and just need a little paint!  The penguin was so ugly before – think brown and yellow – and now he is crisp and festive!

In our foyer, we put our trees that flank the front door.  In general we don’t do much more than that….but this year we added some lighted garland on the top of the door (yes, I still need to hide the cord) and some cheap ornament holders in the shape of stars on top.  Also we got a zip lining elf in the mix 🙂

I still haven’t built a foyer table or painted that little alcove area….but I did manage to decorate the area with my little gnomes from HomeGoods.  I also popped the DIY Santa that I painted years ago on the wall along with a merry Christmas plaque.  I think this area needs some tweaking….but I have a couple days 🙂

If you want to see the DIY Santa post, here it is.

The big tree doesn’t have our sentimental ornaments because our dining room tree DOES.  It has all our popsicle picture frames and footprint wreaths and teddy bears and beaded candy canes!  It has mermaids and grinches and snowmen and santas.  It 100% decorated by the boys and literally it makes me smile so hard that my cheeks hurt when I see it.  Also, they made it very clear to me that they hope Santa leaves presents under BOTH trees this year 🙂

The areas of the living room that you haven’t seen are my french doors and cubbies that got into the festive spirit….

I love switching these shelves up for Christmas!  Almost everything is from Target or TJMaxx or Goodwill.

 

On the other side of the room is our big leather chairs.  I really hadn’t share these until now but they are OUR FAVORITE.  I got some plaid pillows from TJMaxx and added wreaths to the doors and garland for a final touch (again with the cord!).

The table also got a little switch with a poinsettia (my brother in law always gives me a couple $1 ones from Home Depot on Black Friday), a new little trailer from JOANN, and some trees from Target.  The lantern is from Pier1 and I use them all the time!  There is nothing better than turning on the tree, the garland lights and then a battery operated light from the inside of the lantern and watching it glow!

And yes, the chairs – they are recliners.  I had been watching them for about two years and when they went on sale, I pulled the trigger!  We are obsessed!!!  Jeremy said that he feels like he made it in life now that he has a dad chair 🙂  Here is the link to them.

Also – is anyone else obsessed with the three-wick candles from Bed Bath & Beyond?  I have tried a bunch of different ones and keep coming back to these as my standard.  I get them on sale and love the way they make the house smell….but I’m always open to alternatives.  I have a container of Scenticles that I need to hang….which by the way, does that name remind anyone else of a male body part?  Because I turn into a 13 year old every time I say the name out loud.

I have a few shelves with decor on them too….like this grouping of trees/houses/gnome.

Or the bowl of pretty ornaments and reindeer.

Our kitchen is still a construction zone so we just decorated around it…I’ll just show you our Christmas stuff because random appliances and drywall isn’t fun.

A new thing this year was adding a little berry garland to the top of my light fixture.  If it looks dusty….it is.

The boys put up window clings in the kitchen and they LOVE them.  I get annoyed at them every year (they don’t ever stick as well as I expect!) but the boys love them so they are worth it.  Also – they always get clearanced out after Christmas at Walmart for like ten cents for a sheet so if you remember, go get them at that time!

My shelves got a festive makeover and I feel super prepared this year because the reindeer food is ready to go for Christmas eve.  Don’t ask me if presents are wrapped.  But those imaginary flying mammals will be fed.

I moved my chicken wire picture frame thing over the hooks near our garage door and it was almost instantly filled up.  This was taken two days ago!  Now, all the christmas cards are rolling in and I am DYING over the joyful faces and funny cards and sweet families that are sending us all their extras!  If you want to send us your card, click here to read about why we do it and get the address.

Since our first floor bathroom was a big makeover for us this year, I wanted to add a little christmas cheer in here too!  I got a spray of ‘snowballs’ and popped those in a candle holder and used my favorite gold-hatted gnome in here….

I also added a couple gold glittered frond garlands and they instantly made things feel sparkly and festive in the loo!

But by far, one of my favorite things to set out is our nativity scene.  We got this little set last year and now we tell the christmas story for the boys and they are RIDICULOUSLY excited when they get to touch all the figures.  And we save baby Jesus for the end and they all just whisper and say the sweetest things.  LJ this year said “Happy birfday Baby Jesus” and I cried over the cuteness.

That’s it for our christmas decor.  I am a believer in the power of the tweak….so that will happen probably even after the big day 🙂 But for now, we feel more ready for the holidays and we can not wait to show you some very big purchases we made recently for our living room!  Yup!  Our Black Friday finds came in and we are super excited to share those!  They are basically my Christmas present so it feels pretty awesome to use them for family this holiday season!  Also – I have a super quick way to tag presents coming your way….so if you are a mom to a bunch of non-readers, this is for you!