Christmas 2016

It's time for my semi-annual check in on the blog!  The house took a bit of a backseat this year for house projects, but there have been a few updates here or there, which I promise to fill you in on soon.  BUT.  First thing's first - it's Christmas.  So it's time to make everything sparkly and twinkly!  With a toddler-friendly twist ;) 
The house is a bit pared-down this year with work and baby and all, but it's still festive, and all warm and glowy, perfect for winding down with a nice glass of wine and a Christmas movie, which is what I'll be doing for the next 4 evenings.
Here's what I've got!

 Same gold tree, for the third year now!  And I'm still smitten :)  I'd link to it, but I recently went back on Amazon to find it and it's out of stock :/
Really digging gold on gold, with some bronze and copper tossed in there.  The tree is pretty much the same as it was last year, only this year the bottom 2-ish feet are all plastic ornaments.  And as a bonus, I didn't put hooks on them - I just pushed the ornament onto a branch, which turned out to be a happy accident - Bea tugs on the ornaments but can't really pull them off!  So that's pretty awesome.

 Not usually a huge fan of plastic ornaments, but they're not too terrible.  Plus, they let me still have my gold tree, so it's a fair compromise.

 The mantle and hearth this year are a bit different.  I'm a big fan of blown glass trees, bowls of ornaments, and generally anything dangerous to babies.  So this year I switched it up for my toddler [she's not technically a toddler yet, but she is SUPER mobile and loves sparkly things]. 

For the mantle, I got a gold plastic garland from Michaels that mimics the tree, and wired on a few gold plastic ornaments to bulk it up.  Then, because we live in 2016 and LED lights are available, I got a sweet battery-operated set of LEDs to make it twinkle, and all without having to have a cord hanging down, taunting a baby with its allure.
So I don't have my shiny glass trees out, but this way, if Bea gets extra curious [and if I'm for some reason not watching her, which is extra rare] and she pulls something down, nothing - neither decor nor her head - is going to break.

 Same goes for the hearth!  If she's extra curious and wants to play with stuff, the big ornaments are plastic and she's free to play with them as she pleases.  And it's still sparkly!  [yes, I know that's a big glass vase.  But it's *heavy* and I never really leave the room when she's roaming around, so she's not going to move it.]

 Bea's area [formerly baby jail, but it needs some rebranding, so we're trying to remember to call it 'play land'] has its own thing going on too!  Generally I love kitschy Christmas decor, so the living room has some 'grownup' kitsch, and *play land* has whimsical kitsch!  Plus it's easy.  Old-school gold tinsel garland, some super cute felt ball garland from Target, and some more of those battery LEDs, and the fireplace is fun!  The snowflakes are a 6-pack of foam from Hobby Lobby for $3, meant for crafting, but I thought it was fun for some bookcase additions.  And again, fit in the 'quick  and easy' category for this year.  [if you look really close, you can see that Bea was watching Fixer Upper.  she loves that show ;)]

 So that's it!  Not a ton, but it doesn't take much to make the house feel festive.

....but I'm totally thinking about more stuff I can add for next year!

MORE CHRISTMAS STUFF.

Our card!!  Five years ago I made my absolute favorite card:

 

 And since we've added a new member, we added to the card!  Introducing our 2016 Christmas card:

 And the back, for our family members who aren't as into Kiss as we are :)

Photo by the amazing Shannon Duggan :)