Christmas Decorations

I thought I'd share our Christmas decorations from the year.  It's not too late, is it?  Well not for me.  I already told you about the little white dot garland I made.  I also made a pom-pom garland (yes, I realize everyone on pinterest did this already) out of some pretty blue and red yarn I had.  I swooped it around our railing (although the swoops had to be pretty short since a little boy can now reach them).

He really was that excited about the pom poms!

Next up I made this star.  It turned out a little wonky but I really like it and this could be adorable all year, I think.  Bonus: it was free!  I collected 15 straight sticks of similar thickness and length and grouped them into bunches of three, laying them out into a star shape.  Then I used some string and tied the five points together and tied the 5 center intersections together (it was really difficult to work with before I secured the intersections).  I wrapped the bunches with a ball of leftover yarn and called it perfect!  This was originally intended to be a replacement for the wreath I make every year to hang on the front door, because princess pine was nowhere to be found at my parent's house.  Something about a tough winter last year yada yada yada.  But then I realized how perfect this star would be on the wall in the stairwell so I hung it up there instead.

Speaking of the great outdoors, we didn't decorate it one bit.  We were the scrooges of the neighborhood.  We just didn't have time, energy, or willpower to do anything, so we skipped it.  I'm kind of glad we did!  

Along with the sticks I gathered from my parents', Dillon and I also gathered this tree!  It survived the 250 mile journey atop the car and is still alive and kickin'.  Those northern trees, I tell ya.

I love the fact that this is nowhere near a perfect "tree farm" tree.  And (last years) popcorn garland and homemade ornaments makes it even more home-grown.  I'm in love.  We weren't able to put a lot of ornaments on because of the lack of branches.  ahem.  Most of my beautiful vintage ornaments stayed safely in their boxes because of a pair of curious hands.

Very closely supervised tree touching

But I really really love this tree.  Particularly this ornament that was made by my sister using the picture from our Christmas cards on a wood slice.  She also took the photo-- she is talented! It takes some real skill to work with squirmy little ones.  Look at that face!

Lastly, I made some faux snowglobes.  I've been saving cool empty jars for awhile.  Okay, a long while.  And Dillon will be really glad to see them off our counter.  My favorite are the ones with the silver lids, saved from Archer Farms brand salsa.  I've been putting off buying bottle-brush trees because my son gets really crabby in craft stores.  Seriously no joke. It's tragic.  So I got creative with a tiny fake tree Dillon had from his dorm room and a strand of garland that we didn't use outside.  I just cut off a 2-3 inch piece with a pair of wire cutters, and went at it with a pair of scissors to create a cone shape.  I also trimmed some from the bottom of each tree to make a "trunk".  A little hot-glue was all it took to assemble, since I didn't put in any water.  Maybe next year I'll add some fake snow, but this year I like just the bare trees.  It matches the weather on Christmas.  No snow.  In WISCONSIN.  Not cool.