A few Christmas photos

I'd like to say I've been too busy to blog, but in thinking back over my days they have been fairly normal, well, except for that pesky Christmas shopping.  Today I decided to post my long awaited Christmas decorating photos.

Up until last year my hubby liked purchasing and decorating a Christmas tree about two weeks or less before the big day.  For some reason that all changed last year and he got the tree at the beginning of the month, just like he did this year.  While Darcy and I were at her soccer game the first Saturday in December Tom took Madison and brought home this tree.  The tree sat empty for over a week because with school and soccer Madison didn't have time to do the lighting, and Madison ALWAYS does the lighting on the tree.  I did add the hat for some decoration, and I thought it quite lovely during the day.

Eventually the lights got put on and then the ornaments and then the presents were put 'neath the tree.  Our living area is quite small and now that we have the flat screen on the wall we were unable to put the tree in the corner of our living room.  So we put the tree in the dining room...where everyone has a tree.  But in our house the living room flows into the dining area and so we can see the tree all the time.  That room use to house the tree anyway back when it was still an extension of our living room.

This year since the dining table is right smack dab in the middle of the house we began using it as the wrapping table instead of the pool table in the Steelers room.  Darcy worked hard at cleaning the area and making it into what she calls the "wrapping station".

Each year we change the outside of the house.  When the kids were little I insisted on a candy theme with lollipops and candy canes and gingerbread men that Kelly made.  Eventually the gingerbread men bit the dust and the lollipop colors lost their shine and no one was interested in fixing either so the candy theme was retired.  Plus the Steelers flags that hang outside my house from September to February need to be incorporated into the decorating.

One of the things I insist on is that the house has to look good during the day as well as at night.  I dislike looking at the dangling white icicle lights on people's houses, the dead blow up objects in a heap on the lawn, and the empty animal structures that you can't quite see in the sunshine.  While it all looks festive and beautiful in the evening, it looks awful and depressing in the light.

So I have my wreaths and a few other items (Kelly calls my bags "Santa's trash") that are a delight during the day.  Tom put the lights this year around the top of his little brick structure and added two light up figures on our poles.  I would have put them on the two that aren't hanging flags, but he did it while I was gone.

My neighbor a few years back bought some cute magnet decorations that she puts on her garage door.  I didn't like the price of them so I went to the craft store and made my own.  The decorations died last year, but the lettering was still intact and I thought it all went well with my Steelers magnets.  I think next year I'm going to do all my Christmas stuff in black and gold; the ribbons on the wreaths and the lettering on the door.

One of Tom's traditions is poinsettias.  He gets them every year and then plants them around our house.  None of them have bloomed after that, but at least we are recycling.

Not as decorated as we usually do, but I thought it simple and tasteful.  Now I hope I get some more Steelers flags for Christmas so that each pole has a flag for next year!!