Christmas time is here again!

And I have all my decorations up! Last weekend we went and picked out a beautiful Frasier Fur, my absolute favorite not only for it's traditional Christmas look but because of it's heavenly smell. Saturday night we lighted and decorated said tree, and it looks so beautiful!

Every day we plug it in and it makes us smile. I love Christmas time. As I was unpacking ornaments, each one brought a bigger smile to my face. I have started collecting old-fashioned glass ornaments. No, they aren't real Christopher Radko ornaments, but I love them all just the same. I actually do own two CR ornaments, but the rest are knock-offs from Hobby Lobby and various places.

We use the old-school multi-colored lights like our family used when I was a child, about 1,100 to 1,200 of them. Last year when I was lighting the tree, Dave thought I was perfectly insane to put more than 200 or 300 lights on the tree....until he saw the finished product! The funny thing is that last year he thought our tree was the most beautiful one he'd ever seen. Well, when we looked back at pictures of the tree from last year, we realized that our tree was really short and stumpy. We're still working on a suitable picture to post, but so far the camera simply cannot capture the immense beauty of what we see in person.

In addition to our gorgeous tree, I have decorated the front door with a garland with red poinsettias, giant red ornaments, and candy cane ribbon. Last year I made a lighted wreath for the front window. This year I embellished it further with sparkly flowers and peppermint candy decorations.

At this time last year I signed up for 2 craft shows and made Christmas wreaths to sell. Well, I had tons of stuff left over for wreath-making so I pulled out my favorite things and made a gingerbread man wreath for the back door. It turned out adorable!

Now I'm browsing eBay for a vintage ceramic Christmas tree. You've seen them, right? They were really popular in the 60's and 70's. I adore them and can't wait to get one. Actually I would like to have 5 or 6 or 7 and create a little lighted forest with them. But for now I'm just working on getting 1.

Now it's time to go sip some eggnog and listen to the Christmas music channel while working on my gifts-to-buy list. Ahhhhh....Christmas time!