Christmas Decorating Begins!

After thanksgiving, it’s countdown until Christmas time! The kids were very eager to put up Christmas decorations and mama will not disappoint. I was extremely tired that Sunday, but I guess the Christmas spirit swept over me and off we started the decorations! Just put a little Christmas music on and the energy just appeared. I had not one, not two, but THREE little elves on my side with big smiles and helping hands.

The first of course is decorating our tree! I have to mention, from the bottom of my heart… this tree is the same tree we bought as a newlywed all those years ago. We kept this tree all through the birth of our first, second, and third child! It’s no wonder it holds such a sentimental value.

The ornaments have upgraded though, that’s for sure! These colorful ones that we currently use are from Costco which is super extra heavy duty and maybe only one has shattered in the three or four years we have had it. They also had ones that were more monochrome feels with the gray and silver theme, but I’m just not into that. I love the fun and colorful traditional Christmas colors of red and green. Maybe for an office or a more formal setting, but since our kids are still young we are keeping things colorful Christmas time!

One specific VERY important ornament is the adobrale teddy bear that Keilani coincidentally picked up as her first ornament to put on the tree. It’s our very first special ornament that we got when we were expecting our first child. The teddy bear is wearing a bib that says Parents-to-be. . After almost eight years, it’s still in tact and cute!

The Christmas tree skirt is also an important part of the tree decorating! I don’t know about you, but the skirt makes everything complete because Christmas trees in my opinion looks really odd without them. This one is also from Costco and it could be a bit pricy when you look at them, I believe it cost almost forty or fifty dollars if I’m not mistaken. We got it a few years back and I haven’t seen it since then! It’s VERY thick and an amazing quality. You can see the little silver snowflakes sewn into them that makes it look so beautiful. Before there’s actually presents under the tree, I like to put random Christmas items like Santa hats and a cute Christmas chalkboard. We do not put gifts under the tree early until it’s Christmas Eve when they are sleeping because our youngest will open everything and say it’s Christmas everyday.

I love Christmas decor shopping after Christmas because of the DEALS. I found this at Walmart last year and thought how fun and cute it would be for this year. The kids would have so much fun changing the carrot nose to the dates every morning.

Since we live in a new home, we don’t have the same staircase to decorate this garland to so I decided to just make the kitchen a little more spiffy and fun. We have those wooden letters on top of our cabinets that says Love, Home, and Family and thought these would look so beautiful in front of them. I don’t have THAT much Christmas decorations but the few that we do like gingerbread man that keeps our remote company to a super adorable gingerbread man kitchen towel. Even the beautiful garland in the picture above was given to me by mother in law, and I plan to use them for years and years to come!

The previous home that we used to live in was a very well lit home with beautiful oversized windows, I was able to use that specific garland for the stairs. The house we live in now is quite a bit different and needed a much more spiffy decoration for the stairs. On the top right framed picture above was actually meant for the top of the fireplace which we don’t have now so this is beyond perfect for the stairs. Luckily, at the top of the stairs there is an outlet to plug this into… otherwise I would still have boring Christmas stairs. BRING THE LIGHT!Confession for today: I went to Walmart for waffles, eggs, and milk and I somehow bought two super girly Christmas stockings for my girls. Sigh. Mimi is the queen at spotting super cute things. I mean BALLERINA and PRINCESS TUTU looking stockings? HOW do I leave them at the store? My only gripe is that they didn’t have an adorable one for boys. Can anyone please point me to the right direction of some awesome boy Christmas stockings?

I smile in the mirror, look at myself, and think Wow, I am SO blessed. I count my blessings and thank my God because He is amazing and I love sharing that with everyone. Then, I look at my kids and see THEM smile and I’m speechless for words because something simple like decorating our house with Christmas decorations make them smile this much. It gives me pure joy and I just love how they want to help. We don’t go all out with Christmas decorations, we use second hands, items on sale from last year, and it’s VERY minimalist Christmas decorating in my opinion. The result though, isn’t so minimal because it looks beautiful, extravagant, fun, joyous, and filled with love from the hands of three very happy kids! Have you decorated your home yet?

Xo,
Livi