Christmas Palooza 2012

Cousin Jodi and her family introduced us to the concept of Christmas Palooza, and we've embraced the tradition ever since. We opted out of Black Friday shopping, and enjoyed a day of decking the halls around our house. The kids woke up to our elf, Robert, who delivered a special letter from Santa...an idea I stole borrowed from here. We like the idea of mixing in a little bit of make-believe with the true reason for celebrating...Christ's birth. We enjoyed a special breakfast together and the kids opened their new Christmas pjs. We like to give them their pajamas early so they are able to wear them all throughout the Christmas season. (Again, thanks cousin Jodi for the idea!) They also got a new Christmas movie and book...we're loving our growing Christmas library!

Maren was quick to spot Robert hanging from the light above the table.

I love my Christmas dishes. This year we decided to get them out and use them everyday...not just for parties. I also collect vintage red goblets, and this year I added some miniature ones to my collection so the kids are able to enjoy them, too. (Well, Maren enjoyed hers...Truett still has tendencies to throw things, so he hasn't graduated from a sippy cup quite yet!)

And, a humorous collection of pictures of the children...

Finally...both kids smiling and looking at the camera!

Maren had her shirt stuffed with ornaments...she loved helping me with the trees this year. We have a smaller tree in the family room decorated with Swedish ornaments. We'll also put our handmade ornaments on this tree.

This is the first Christmas with our new-to-us hutch. I loved making it look festive for the season! I'm hoping to share a more complete tour of the holiday decorations sometime soon.

Maren decorated the bottom half of the bigger tree with kid-friendly (aka, non-breakable) ornaments and I put the more fragile ones near the top.

Truett mostly did this...

While the kids and I spiffed up the inside of the house, Brett lined our roof with lights. I love this time of year...the lights, the smells, the music, the celebrations and parties. I'm hoping to share some of my favorite Christmasy 'things' in the coming weeks. For now, I'm off to watch an afternoon installment of Christmas Curious George with the two cutest kids I know.