Decorating For Christmas

We've finishing decorating the tree! Most of our little Christmas goodies are put out on display and it is really feeling like the holidays around here. Let me just say that my parents LOVE Christmas.... and most of the decorations we have were presents from them. I probably would not have all these cute little things without them! My mom hand-made several of my favorite things and I have some pictures to share.

I think our tree is very pretty! And this is the tree that Bill spent hours wiring all the lights onto so in the future all we would have to do is take it out the box, fluff it, and plug it in!

Most of the ornaments on the tree are from ones my parents gave me while growing up. My mom made us ornaments for most years so they are very special to me. A majority of the ornaments on the tree that are not from my childhood are now Winnie the Pooh (mine) and trains (for Bill). We have many angels too!

My mom made this garland for me and I love hanging it in my kitchen over the doorway.

The men have chef hats on!



Mom cross-stitched this for me last year. It has little charms and tiny jingle bells on it. I know she spent so much time on this. I had to use the flash so the details can be seen.

All the pictures are linked to their larger sizes.... beware! They are big!

As I said, she loves Christmas and that's a big benefit for me!!

My sweet baby Biscuit had to be in on the camera action! She loves having her picture taken and yes, she is wearing her Christmas bandanna!

I wonder what Santa will be bringing her this year.... she has been a very good girl!

I need to get moving on our Christmas cards and wrapping up gifts to get in the mail. At this point, I estimate that we have 95% of our shopping done. We are missing one thing for one family member to complete that gift... so we are doing well!

Bill and I have decided to support our area's local restaurants instead of the big chains around here. In the last week, we have found our two new favorites! One of which is an Irish pub that opened about five months ago. We took my truck in to get some work done and walked next door to the pub. We went inside and melted! This is what we have been waiting for!!! And the food? Both of us had the bangers and mash and every bite was heaven. Bill had a Guiness, of course, and I had a bloody mary. Yum!! We're going back tomorrow as we found out they serve a real traditional Irish breakfast on the weekends. How lucky are we?! It was just like being back in Ireland! When we are not doing Irish, there is our favorite Mexican place right down the street. The other place we found this week is an old victorian house that has been converted and it has a huge wrap-around porch. It has a lot of Southern Florida cooking and many seafood dishes. Bill is in heaven and luckily for me, there are some good chicken dishes on the menu!

I did time on the treadmill this morning. Go me! I got a very good workout using my heart monitor. I will have to do this more often and take Biscuit out walking for my cool down after the treadmill. She'll be happy not to be walked around the loop over and over but will appreciate getting out for a little while! It will be sad when everyone takes down their outside lights. It's so festive right now!!