let the countdown to christmas begin!!!

after a very festive weekend to help us get in the mood, we are ready for christmas!
to start off, on saturday we put up the tree and decorated.

here's our 10' tree

we've had this nativity since 2000. it's starting to show it's age. each time i take it out of the box i have to glue someone's appendage back on. it just gives it more character right?

my favorite advent calendar made by my mom back in the day.

the girls personal nativity set. they love having it in their room.

the lollipop tree is another favorite i inherited from my mom.i love having the house all decorated!
on sunday after church we went to the festival of trees. they had a lot of creative, fun and beautiful trees. sadly there were a lot less then when we went a few years ago.
i took photos of some of our favs.

a tree with old skool toys and games

who doesn't love big bird?

surprise, surprise!
this was flower's favorite because it looked like a wedding dress. :)

frosty the snow man tree

peace and love tree

barbie tree

halloween inspired tree

wizard of oz tree

'green' tree-all recycled materials

my cuties

north pole tree...i loved the train making it's way to the top

candy cane tree...of course i love this one!

mexican tree with a pinata on top

a christmas story tree

i was salivating over this! anyone that knows me well knows how much i love candy canes(canes, sticks, soft, hard,chewie, mmmm)...but they have to be bob's! i'm very loyal. :)

we also ate a very average meal but we enjoyed ourselves.
when we got home we took naps until 6. after eating dinner, i made hot cocoa while kg lit a fire in the fireplace. then we curled up on the sofa, watched 'the santa clause' movie, sipped cocoa, and enjoyed our christmas tree in the dark. it was a really lovely evening.

there's the evidence of kg's cocoa in the mug flower painted him for father's day.

river liked the view of the fire. we liked the view of her bum with a cheerio stuck to it. :)

our stocking have to be on the wall this year or little river will pull them down.

on monday for family home evening we made several paper chains to make the count down to christmas that much more fun!

the girl's is red and green and big!

mine is red and white...like a candy cane of course! it's medium size.

kg's is red, white and green and tiny.we started our advent calendars tonight! we are pretty much done. we have gifts under the tree and now we wait. we've had miles building up for 5 years that we've never used and likely won't in the near future to fly. I was delighted to see that we had the option this year to use them on gifts. thanks to those we will have a decent christmas and i'm excited!!! bring it on.