We have always been up north for Christmas. For ten years we've traveled north to be with our families and we're usually gone from the end of school to after the New Year. Last year was a small exception as we didn't leave until the day after Christmas.
Since we're never in town for Christmas, we've always been a little lacking on the Christmas decoration side. We have tons of decor but they're the 85% mark down on the $2.00 garland at Wal-Mart during the after Christmas sale. We have two trees. One is skinny, tall pre-lit tree given to us by my Mother-in-law when we moved to Florida and as of two years ago has a very bad lean in the top section (we didn't even put it up last year). The other tree we bought at an after Christmas sale at Target for $50 and opened it a year later to find that only half the lights worked. We still have our cherished family heirloom ornaments and our handmade stockings (make by my mom) but the rest are eight year old chipped Wal-Mart brand glass ornaments and plastic balls that look like glass (which was a good thing when Lallie was little!).
Don't get me wrong, our house is always decked out and looks nice but it's not well put together (as in nothing matches) and a little chinsey. We have a mixture of red, green, lime green, pink, blue and in he dining room we have a little gold and silver, with bright red on the stairways. It's just all over the place!
Well, this year, the whole family is coming to us for Christmas and we're even thinking about hosting a Christmas open house earlier in December (which means I've got to get on the ball!). So Husband and I have decided to step it up and rather than spending a ton of money on a new plastic tree (yes, we would do our research and buy a decent tree that will last), we're going to get a fresh tree and go all out on ornaments and decor. It's been decided to be one of our Christmas gifts to each other. That might seem a little strange, to gift each other Christmas decor, but it's something we've always discussed and this year, we're biting the bullet!
We've been looking around and found this setup at Frontgate and we are in LOVE with the ornaments and decor! We'll still put up our half-lit tree (we just won't light it) with all our our traditional ornaments, but we'll put these on our fresh ten or twelve foot tree in our two story room. We're going for a very traditional look with the golds and reds and I'm going to find some decently priced garland that hangs well (not the stiff wire kind) and try and make some new wreaths for the front doors. I have some other ideas we've gathered from Pinterest as well.
What do you think of this color scheme? I love it!
(All pictures from Frontgate).
Ah, my lovable and crazy baby brother, Chris. He is very photo shy and had just gotten out of bed. He's a paramedic by day and a talented pianist, rock climber (seriously, he can crawl like a spider on the ceiling) and teaching guide. He's just like my dad, a true renessaince man!
My aunt and uncle also got Lallie these drawing board things that are computerized and you can send pictures to your friends. Here are my dad and Husband drawing pictures for each other (not really, they both just happened to be trying them out at the same time. I don't think they even know I took these pictures! Ha.
