Party at My House?

Despite most bloggers appearing to be relatively introverted folks (#Stereotyping), I think we can all agree it would be pretty amazing to have a giant blogger get-together this holiday season. Decked halls, Christmas tunes, yummy nibbles!

And just imagine the topics up for conversation…

Alas, not only does this idea come with some real-world limitations, this year I can’t even send out Christmas cards. But by golly I can bring Christmas to this blog space. And today we can pretend you’re all able to come over to my place for a festive party.

Years ago (admittedly before we added some of our current decor), a visiting family member – who keeps an incredibly cluttered house – sat in our the living room, gestured around and said: Is this what they call…minimalism? I don’t think it was meant as a compliment, but I’ve decided to take it as one.

I don’t go all out with decorations, but each year we add a few more things to the rotation. Since I know I have acquired some readers from The Frugal Girl, I’ll add in some comments about cost/thrifting. It is extremely rare for us to pay full price and/or buy new when it comes to Christmas decorations. I think the cost of decor is an underrepresented aspect of holiday spending.

LIVING ROOM/DINING ROOM

• This is our first year having an artificial tree upstairs. I don’t think I’ll ever look back. I petitioned to keep the real-tree tradition alive, but will now gladly admit artificial is so. much. easier. We bought this one for less than $30 at a thrift store last year.
• Each family member gets to open/hang a new ornament on Christmas Eve. Most ornaments are purchased in post-Christmas sales and then stored away to be gifted the following Christmas. I love our Christmas tree – the warm glow it gives to our living room, and all the stories and memories tied up in the ornaments.
• The star on top was purchased from the Dollarstore for $2 our first Christmas as a married couple. We recently upgraded it a bit by stuffing a small strand of twinkle lights inside (it doesn’t light up/is hollow).
• The tree skirt is a rectangular Christmas tablecloth someone gifted to us – I just “floof” it into a bit of a circle.

• I bought the faux evergreen on the mantle for $5 each years and years ago at a local hardware store. Because it was so inexpensive, it was a bit sparse, so I intertwined two of the evergreen swags to make it look more substantial.
• The white houses lining the back of the mantle are scrap pieces of wood my dad cut into simple house shapes for me. I painted them white before using a gold Sharpie pen to make door and window outlines.

• The stuffed animals flanking the fireplace were gifted to the kids years ago.

• Someone gifted us something (was it chocolates?) in a set of stacking glittery boxes years ago and I’ve used and loved them ever since.
• The watercoloured Peace was a thank-you card painted by a friend. It was far too beautiful to throw away!

• The red pillow covers are from IKEA. I don’t own any Christmas pillows – just covers. It requires a lot less storage space and it’s cheaper. The reindeer ones were from an online discount store. I think I paid less than $2 each?

• A neighbour (who loves gardening) gave us these dried pussy willows and we’ve had them on display year-round ever since. The raffia stars are from IKEA.
• The metal house was a $1 thrift store find and the bottle brushes were all gifted to me at various points. The glass tray they’re sitting on was a gift from my brother about 20 years ago. I only bring it out at Christmas time.
• The mini nativity was a gift from Belle last year (she bought it at a thrift store).

• On the door between our dining room and kitchen, there is a faux wreath I bought years ago and decorated with leftover odds and ends. Note the red hearts – those were a leftover Valentine’s Day decoration that I repurposed for Christmas. Hey, they’re red! There is also some fake eucalyptus which doesn’t exactly scream CHRISTMAS, but it’s green and I had it on hand. I leave my wreaths fully decorated and store them in a large bag.

• More glittery boxes. It’s really bugging me that I can’t remember what came inside of them! It must have been chocolates, right? Or was it bath and body supplies?
• The nativity set was part of a book Indy received at Christmas one year from his preschool teacher. I don’t have the book anymore but we kept the nativity cutouts. Belle set it up this year and thought to use painters tape to suspend the angel. It would never have crossed my mind and I appreciate the whimsy!

• I forgot to take a picture of the candles after the Christmas tree went up, but the candlesticks were a Christmas gift and the candles are inexpensive tapers from IKEA.

OUTSIDE

• The wreath was a Christmas gift to me from a friend who works in the floral industry! Free!
• The arrangements flanking the door cost less than $10. I had to buy the plastic buckets. My dad brought me fir evergreen tips + I cut some pine boughs on our property. The wired ribbon was given to me by…somebody?

• Another $5 wreath I decorated myself with odds and ends we had in the house. This year I did splurge on a new $2 bow from the Dollarstore. (The original bow was undersized, so I moved it to a wreath in our kitchen – see below.)
• The lights stay up year-round. John found two strands a few years ago for $10 at a thrift store and it works out to be the perfect number of lights to outline the shed!

BASEMENT FAMILY ROOM

• John and I paid $30 for this little tree at Zellers the first year we were married. It’s on the small side and has been relegated to the basement ever since we moved into a house. To manage clutter on the main level, as I’ve been wrapping items, I put them under/around the basement tree. It makes the space feel more festive, and it doesn’t crowd our living room.
• Almost all of the ornaments are homemade (many by the kids at preschool) or gifted. The tree topper is a felt angel Belle made in a church puppet camp years ago.

• My dad cut these nativity silhouettes from scraps of wood and I stained and painted them years and years ago. I still absolutely love them. I put them in front of a lighted diffuser on our bookshelf for some backlighting. I have a few wrapped gifts displayed on top of the bookshelf. This has less to do with style and more to do with practicality. These are items I do NOT want to get wet and I am perpetually nervous about Christmas gifts in my basement…

• This year I wrapped an existing frame in brown paper, added a blue bow from my ribbon scraps, and spent $4 on a wooden snowflake garland from the Dollarstore a month ago.

KIDS ROOMS

I didn’t get around to asking permission from the kids to take pictures of their self-styled rooms. Belle’s is VERY festive. She has little silver stars hanging off a faux plant, elaborately coloured pictures on her whiteboard and pegboard. Everything random I don’t use…she uses. Why yes, it is extraordinarily cluttered.

Indy also decorated his room independently. He’s most proud of the tree. We bought it for $5 this year at a thrift store. He’s chosen sentimental ornaments he likes/has made to decorate it. Those preschool crafts are resilient!

KITCHEN

• One final wreath. You know the deal. It was under $5, and I decorated it with bits and bobs.

• Years ago we made paperbag stars (they fold down easily for storage), so one of those is hanging over the sink. (Each of the kids also has one hanging in their room.)
• And then my absolute favourite Christmas decoration – an Avon scented wax figurine that was gifted to my parents the year they got married. My mom, knowing how much I loved it, gave it to me when I got married. Serendipitously, we found an exact replica at a thrift store a few years ago and I bought it so Belle can have one to take with her when she moves out and I don’t have to give up my original!

I don’t have any decorations in:

• Any bathroom

• Any room in the basement except the family room (nothing in the office, the laundry room) and, since we have company staying over for Christmas, I put a couple of small things in the guest room. I bought the gnome after Christmas last year (technically it’s a tree ornament) for $4. I was planning to give him away, but ended up gifting him to myself. The wooden tree I bought last week for $2 at a thrift store, and some faux red berries from the Dollarstore.
• The master bedroom.
• I don’t own a single Christmas towel or dishcloth. I own two Christmas serving dishes but I lend them both to my parents for their rental. I use a glass measuring cup as a gravy boat – I’m real fancy like that.

Oh, how could I forget! This final picture is for Nicole and Michelle. It’s a second gnome and I bought him last week at a thrift store for $7.50 after discounts!!!! Look how big he is!!! And he* has the important task of being extra festive since he’s the only decoration in our entryway.

*Help! I need a name for our gnome!*

Your turn.

• Do you decorate your home for Christmas? If so, do you go big, small, or somewhere in the middle?
• If you could choose one decoration from my home to have in your home, what would you choose?
• Do put festive decorations in your bedrooms and bathrooms?

Header photo by Brooke Lark on Unsplash