Let's start with my favorite, and probably the most important decoration, the tree! I prefer an artificial tree because you can use it year after year and it doesn't shed needles. Plus with 2 dogs, a cat and a toddler, I think a real tree might put me over the edge. We picked up this amazing 9 foot, pre-lit tree from Superstore last year during their boxing week sale. Would you believe we got this tree for only $14!! If you are in the market for a tree I highly recommend looking later on in the boxing week sales, and checking out stores like Superstore that don't have to space to store the trees for the rest of the year.
At first I wasn't sold on the pre-lit tree, but now that we have one I love it. This is the first year that divorce papers didn't need to be drawn up before we got the lights on the tree! I also love that the lights are strung throughout the tree and not just on the edge of the branches. I do kinda miss having multicolored lights but I guess you can't have everything.
I love having an eclectic mix of ornaments on a tree. I've never been the kind of person that had a color scheme for the tree that the ornaments had to match. Growing up Mom had all kinds of ornaments including ones that Selby and I had made. Those are the ornaments that I think make a tree unique to the family and interesting. A few of those ornaments have now made their way onto our tree. Everyone has a "Baby's First" ornament, and I'm surprised mine hasn't disintegrated by now as old as it is. The gold ornament was a gift from an aunt and Selby has one very similar to it.
Roman's "Baby's First" ornament I picked up from a craft sale in town for his first Christmas. I also made hand and foot impressions that year in salt dough. It's a little crazy now to compare his hands and feet to these ornaments. How did he get so big so fast?! I'm sure it will just be a matter of time before our tree is full of paper snowflakes (like Grandma's) and marshmallow balls (like Mom's) and I really can't wait for that day!
Even the pets have made the tree! I ordered these ornaments from Etsy over the years as our little fur family has grown. When I ordered the ornament with Casper on it (our late puppy) I ordered one for each member of our family so we would all have Casper on our tree. Casper was an amazing dog and he definitely deserves the honor of being placed on the tree. Actually, Mom has two Casper ornaments! Unfortunately the lady no longer makes the ornaments or I would have her make one of Roman. I might have to send her a message and see if I can convince her!
Last year during the boxing week sales, Mom and I hit up a couple stores to find some good deals and I came home with a few things. I don't normally shop at Pier1 because it can be very expensive, but boxing week is the perfect time to go! I found a handful of beautiful ornaments for a fraction of the cost. When I find unique items I like to pick up just one to give the tree some interest. *TIP - when buying ornaments for a tree you want to buy 1 or in groups of 3. This will give your tree a nice balance.
Onto the entertainment centre! On the very top I have the beginning of what I hope will be a forest some day. For now if consists of a few foam trees that I made this year and a silver tree I picked up on sale at Canadian Tire years ago. This thing loses so much litter every year that I'm actually surprised there is any left on it. I also have my little light up reindeer and penguin on the top shelf. These guys are from an Avon catalogue years ago, and the only work sporadically, but they are cute none the less!
Now the nut family is actually out all year long but it does remind me of Christmas. When Selby and I were younger we would play a game at our grandparent's house called hide the thimble. Basically one of us would hide a thimble in the house and the other would have to find it. You might think this would be an impossible game but it was actually extremely easy. Why? Because we ALWAYS hid the thimble on the walnut's hat! We played this game all year round but something about my grandparent's makes me think of Christmas.
These three amigos used to live on the air conditioning unit in our apartment and would often get their butts frozen to the unit. I bet they think they are flying high now! The sparkle balls I made last year when I had all the time in the world because Roman napped three times a day and couldn't crawl. Man those were the days!
Funny story about these angels. I actually bought these angels two years apart at a craft sale in Regina. I must have really liked the angel because I bought the same one twice. What are the chances of that? I wish I could remember the name of the booth at the sale to share with you because they always had amazing things there. I actually picked up this moose there as well.
The elf and moose standing beside the TV were part of a boxing week bundle that we picked up at Canadian Tire years ago when John was working there. Most or the bundle was ugly (that's where most of the ornaments that got tossed came from) but these two were worth the cost of the bundles. We used to stand them up next to the Christmas tree but that just isn't going to work anymore with Roman running around. Luckily he hasn't touched them once yet!
Lastly we have Pingoo and his Associates. I'm pretty sure John is the one who named these bad boys that we found at Sears, if I remember correctly. They light up and change colors but like most things in this house the batteries are dead and I never remember to buy more. You would think with so many toys that take batteries we would have some somewhere. Maybe I should ask for some for Christmas...
Hanging over each of our front windows is a giant piece of candy. This was another project I completed last year while Roman was immobile. They are super easy and inexpensive to make and I think they look great. I bought a disk of Styrofoam and traced the pattern on a candy piece onto the disk. Then I painted it, wrapped it in cellophane, twisted the ends and tied it up with some ribbon. Viola, instant giant candies! You could even make smaller versions for your tree! We also have window clings on the front windows but they are a little hard to take photos of so you'll just have to trust me on that one.
The last of the indoor decorations are in the hallway. Here I decided to flank our Christmas card holder with Roman's snowflake paintings. The card holder was another project from last year (man alive I got a lot accomplished last year!) and it was super easy. I found the board with Santa on it at Dollarama. I painted it and hot glued three strips of ribbon onto the back. At Michael's I fond some mini clothes pins that I use to pin the cards to the ribbon.
Out into the cold we go to check out the outdoor decorations! Our display is significantly large than it was last year but we are nowhere near done growing. We want to be the Griswolds of Moose Jaw! John and I picked up the bow on the gate from Canadian Tire to hang from our balcony when we lived in our apartment. We didn't really have a great place for it here so the gate is where it got stuck. The tree silhouette was a boxing week find at Wal Mart last year. It has a stand that allows it to sit anywhere but John didn't think it would stand up to our crazy Saskatchewan winds so we wired it to the fence to make sure we weren't retrieving it out of the neighbors yard every other day.
I actually found these cute little devils at a garage sale! The snowman had never been taken out of the box and the penguin was only used inside. At $5 for the pair, how do you go wrong? The only downside is that because they are on the smaller side they tend to get stuck in the snow when the wind packs it on top of them. Not a big deal though. I just wanted out there and dig him out. Roman usually gets a kick out of it. We had the carousel last year and I was excited to see it again this year. Unfortunately it stopped working half way through the winter last year. I'm sure there is some way to fix it, I just haven't put that much effort into it yet.
You are seeing clearly. We have a Christmas tree in our front yard! This is actually the tree we used to have in our house, and the tree my Mom had for years before that. This time we strung it with outdoor lights and zip tied the lights and ornaments to the tree. John roped it down on two sides and it doesn't move an inch in the wind. A house down the street from us had a tree in their yard last year so I can't take the credit for this idea. What a great way to re-purpose an old tree!
I purchased the white wreath at a wholesale craft store last year and used twist ties to attach the ornaments and bow to it. This year the bow broke, it was from Dollarama and I'm impressed it lasted one winter, so John just zip tied it on while he was hanging it. The candy canes also came from the wholesale crafts store. To stick them into the ground, John ground down some 12" spikes, heated them in the oven, and stuck them into the bottom of the candy canes. Once the spikes were in the candy canes he just pushed them into the ground. Not only do they tie the driveway into the rest of the yard but they make navigating the driveway in deep snow a piece of cake!
So that's the tour! I hope you enjoyed seeing our Christmas decorations and maybe it will inspire your own display! This is the time of year to spread kindness and cheer and restore our faith in humanity (at least it is for me). John, Roman and myself would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, Happy whatever you celebrate!
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