A Christmas Story

‘Twas the night before Christmas and if a mouse was stirring, he would been terrified by the amount of noise I was making. I swear, every Christmas Eve I do the same thing. I don’t know how to work ahead of schedule because I perform best under pressure. The way I run around, you would think that they change the date of Christmas annually and only tell you 3 days before. No…Christmas is the same day every year and every year I have the same routine-clean, shop, decorate, all happening the night before. I never have the cleaning lady Christmas week so I end up having some wacky schedule with her that only gets a small portion of the house cleaned.

On top of all of this, I also signed the house up for a major kitchen demo which started right after Thanksgiving. The goal was to finish by the eve of Christmas eve and by golly (get used to that phrase) they were done. So here, through pictures, I will show you how our holiday went. Let’s start with decor, this year the color palette was supposed to be blush and burgundy but seeing as though I started on Christmas eve, it was pretty hard to get those colors. So I settled for the reds, whites and the greens.

Here are the flowers. We host Christmas every year so I normally get huge arrangements from my flower shop but this year, I wanted to give the amazing florist in the farmer’s market a shot at it. I loved them.

The vase should have been wrapped with big banana leaves or something like that but I gave her my vases too late. I guess not everyone can function at the last minute like me. *sigh* I added cranberries to the vase thinking they would fill it up nicely but duh! cranberries float in water.

I spent the better half of the day getting the decor nailed down while mom did her thing in the kitchen. Here is what I did for the main centerpiece.

I didn’t want to focus on all floral centerpieces this year, so instead I ran to Crate & Barrel for inspiration. I thought this was so cute and since I was not dressing our usual big tree, I thought these ornaments would work lovely as a part of the decor.

Behold, this year’s tree. This is what you get on Christmas Eve from Walgreen’s. I walked right in and pointed to their tree ornaments and all. After I got in and set her up, 4 broken ornaments later, she was looking purrty in the corner. Now, this may seem like a waste but I am thinking ahead, because next year I can use this small tree downstairs in the family room and have it as the kids’ tree so they can partake in the decorating. Christmas is a big deal to me and while I like to showcase the kid’s ornaments on the tree, I really don’t. I have a theme, and the ornaments they make in school never seem to go with it. So now they can use this baby to have their own holiday.

So that was pretty much it for decor. Dinner started at 3pm and every year we eat at 3 but we really start at 4:30. Who knows perhaps I will take a hint and start next year’s dinner at 4:30? I purchased two new juice dispensers from Pottery Barn because these looked a lot more sturdy to me and for our summer shindigs, I need something that will not leak and look shnazzy on the food table. I like to use a lot of fruits in my drinks and while my previous ones are cute for display, the plastic spouts are very flimsy. On the new set, the lever is metal and when you dispense the juice you can feel the difference when you close it off.

So that’s it for the decor aspect. Browse the pictures, ask questions. I’ve included two videos for your perusal. I noticed something this year and I knew it was bound to happen. I said I was going to do things differently but I didn’t follow through. The kids are losing focus as to what Christmas is all about. M’khai got a coat and told Aunt Sandra he didn’t want it. He also complained a few times when Kayden got a gift. Next year, I will let them pick out a few gifts for under-priviliged kids so that they can start learning it is more important to give than to receive. Be sure to tell me how your Holiday was. Merry Christmas!

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Tagged as: christmas, Family, fun, games, giving, happy, spirit