Christmas Around Our Home 2017

While my kids would have loved for us to truly douse the house in Christmas everything, I prefer a lighter touch when it comes to Christmas decorating.

In fact, I’ve already donated 5 bags of stuff this month because all the extra decor out for Christmas is making me twitchy. My closets are looking nice and tidy though!

The mantel in the living room we never use is decorated with some greenery, ceramic trees and one of my favorite projects of all time – a DIY wood dove.

I can see the mantel from the doorway though, so it’s not a complete waste.

I made a wreath from yard clippings for our dining room.

Okay, fine. They weren’t clippings from my yard exactly.

I shamelessly clipped borrowed them from an area that I hope am supremely confident belongs to all the neighbors.

Remember the wood slice from this post?

Well, it’s currently sitting on top of our shoe cabinet with an embroidery hoop wreath.

The greenery on the wreath dried out in about 3 seconds days, but that’s okay.

And, no, I just do not have it in me to unscrew those jars to straighten the trees inside. Fake snow is only slightly behind glitter in terms of craft supplies that I avoid handling at all costs. I told the kids we’ll pretend the wind is blowing REALLY HARD inside those snow globes and that’s why the trees are leaning.

Moving on. Here’s the centerpiece on my dining room table.

The clippings in the pitcher are from a tree in my backyard. I swear!

The little plant by the sheet music trees is real and I’ve kept it alive for probably 9 months.

It turns out remembering to water your plants is really helpful. Go figure.

This DIY Christmas bunting from a prior year is a whimsical, colorful break from the quiet tones of the rest of our holiday decor.

The sign the bunting is tacked to is a work-in-progress. The wood came from the wine rack we ripped apart, which is why you can see the x-shaped markings.

I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing with this project, so it’s just been sitting unfinished for several months. Eventually, I’ll figure it out.

In the meantime, I’m sharing it because it’s a good reminder to me in the midst of the hustle and bustle to just stop and focus on what’s important. I’m a lot happier when I do that instead of getting hung up on the inconsequential annoyances of the day.

P.S. If you missed it, here’s our 2017 Christmas tree and our 2016 Christmas tree.

You may also like this post from 2015 about our dining room shelves decked out for Christmas.