Operation Christmas Decorating

Operation Christmas Decorating has begun at our house and right now, there's so much to do! There's boxes to keep Abigail out of, for one thing. She dumped a whole container of ornaments out last night, but fortunately, they were unbreakable ones that I'd gotten for their little tree last year and she's such a good girl, she picked them all up and gave them to me. Jamison, on the other hand, decided he was decorating "all by himself", as he put it, and gathered up a bunch of stuffed animals, some Christmas themed, some not, and lined up several rows on top of my piano. Such a character! The following picture sums up his level of excitement:

Jim and I got the garland with lights hung around the garage yesterday. Sounds like a simple task but it was anything but. I remembered that some of the lights were burnt out at the end of last year's season, and had purchased replacements. The idea was to unwind the old lights and wrap the new ones around the garland and wreath that hangs in the middle. Remember I said it "sounded" simple. After about an hour of attempting to untangle everything, Jim came into the kitchen dragging his project behind him, looking somewhat defeated. The solution? I took a pair of scissors and cut the rest of the lights off! Done and done! I suggested that it was easier to wind the lights after the garland was hung up, but he didn't think so and set to doing it his way. No problem. As long as it got done I was fine with that.

Well, he ran into problems and somehow got the garland longer on one end than on the other and the wreath was backwards so that the plug for the whole things was no longer on the side it needed to be on. (Jim normally has a colorful vocabulary for things like this, but kept his cool LOL!) OK, hmm...let's run the garland through the wreath so that the sides will be switched. This worked, however, the short side was now shorter and, I hated to say it, looked really bad. Bless his heart, he tried so hard and we make an excellent team, never losing patience with the other, so I rigged up a temporary solution so we could plug it in. I found more lights and garland in my stash, so tomorrow I'll extend the short side a bit and it will be good to go.

Anyone who has little ones in the house knows that flexibility is key to keeping things sane. Since the family room is now the play room, aka the room where things fly through the air and everything gets touched and played with, I decided not to do my usual mantel decorating with all the glass and breakable items. Those will go on top on my piano, the Santa collection has been moved from the piano to the small sideboard in the dining room and their little tree and stuffed animals will decorate the fireplace mantel. This way, they have decorations where they spend a lot of their time and, hopefully, everything will be safe :::keeping fingers crossed:::. I'm also thinking of making changes to how I decorate the banister. Normally, I wrap garland and lights around it, but since Abigail is just getting to where she can master walking up the stairs holding onto the railing, I hesitate to put anything up that may impede her and therefor be dangerous. I'll be sure and post pics of my solution once I come up with it and give it a try. I have a bit of an idea for it.

In the meantime, I dug out a couple of mantel pics from Christmas past to share, as I feel so behind in getting everything done and posted. Hopefully, the current decorations will be photo ready in a day or two. Have a wonderful day and if you're decorating too, have fun! xoxo, Leena



2005-Angel Theme. Bunting made from gathering the center of a fan folded antique lace tablecloth, securing with a rubber band, then "fluffing" it out into a poof and stringing beaded garland along it. I made the wreaths from grapevine ones, painted gold, then added gold angels and white ball ornaments, along with white and gold ribbon. Wish I had a better picture of them, sorry.

2010-My pink tree! This was a pink and white theme-white garland, white lights, white angels and Fleur de lis, pink candles, huge pink and clear "diamonds", white and mirrored candle sticks. This is most of what will go on the piano this year, with a few changes to keep it new and different. I always have to change something-isn't that what decorating's all about? :)

 This post is being shared with From My Front Porch To Yours mantel link party and My Uncommon Slice Of Suburbia Mantel Block Party. Be sure to click the pics on my sidebar to join in on the fun! Great inspiration and Christmas decorating ideas!