Deck the Halls

We have been thoroughly enjoying our Christmas decorations for over a week now. I got the itch early this year- or so I thought until I realized Thanksgiving was a week later, so really I could justify it- I was just on time! I LOVE Christmas decorations! Decorating for Christmas was always a HUGE deal growing up. My mom for a while had her own interior design business and decorating for Christmas was always to the nines. It was not just a tree in the living room, oh no, our whole house would transform inside and out. I loved it and it was always fun to get to help with the decorating process. In fact I remember my mom had several clients that lived in a Southwind, a very ritzy neighborhood here, that she was paid to decorate their houses for Christmas, and since I was out of school for the holidays, I would frequently get to tag along. Sure I always got the grunt work of "fluffing" every tree branch until my hands cracked and bled, but I loved it all the same =). Our house looks nothing like my mom's work, but it is just so warm and cozy to sit with all the lights on and a fire in our fireplace. I could just sit there all night, no TV or anything, just looking at the lights. One thing I was super excited about was this year Ryan's mom gave me her Dicken's village pieces. She had decided she wasn't going to put them up, and thought Hannah and I might have fun with it- and we did!! It just makes me want to shrink to that size and walk around. My grandmother (my dads mom) and my mom both have huge Dicken's collections and I have always loved to look at them , so now I am super excited to have a little collection of our very own! I wish that I could keep them up for longer than a month but I will just enjoy them as much as I can in the meantime.

Well, I don't want to disappoint with just boring pics of Christmas decorations so I will throw in a few extra for you. These were taken LAST week after we got home from church.

"There'll be much mistletoeing and hearts will be glowing when loved ones are near- it's the most wonderful time of the year!!"

Not the most flattering pic of Bennett- but how can you resist those big brown eyes?!?