Looking like Christmas!

A few years ago I bought a small artificial tree. I like it fine, but I miss the charm of a real tree. We always had a real tree while the kids were growing up. Next year if it fits in the budget, I will have a real tree. There are lots of lights on this little tree!

 Looking into the dining room. There is only one electrical outlet in the dining room..and that is it by the window. So I've been putting garland up with lights, otherwise it's kind of dark.

My tree has no theme other than "ornaments collected through the years." I especially love the ones made by my kids.

 The pictures on the mantle are of the kids and of my grandparents on the beach when they were young.

The mantle is a mix of lots of things. The little elf on the right is always decorating something every year...sometimes the mantle, sometimes the bathroom mirror, sometimes the tree...

The nativity set is usually the first thing set up, and almost always on this buffet...so from year to year it doesn't look much different, but I still like it. Yes, found a way to run an extension cord around the corner for some lights on this too.

Here is the outside. I got that little Christmas tree at a friend's garage sale. It's rusty iron..I love it, and just threw a bunch of lights on it. I'm not crazy about the those blueish icicle lights...I like the warm white lights better. Next year I hope to figure out how to put the big colored lights along the roofline. I have all the lights on timers. I was so glad that this house has some outdoor outlets!

Thanksgiving Eve...

Setting the table, making deviled eggs and looking forward to having the family over tomorrow.

O Christmas Tree...

 I have been enjoying the tree for the last week. It's not a theme tree...it's all the ornaments collected over the years. Today Dad hung the light over the dining table. It's the one we had growing up...straight from the 1970s. I love it.

I like a tree with tons of lights, but the lights these days are so much brighter, so I put a dimmer on it. Dad showed me this trick last year. I don't know why I never thought of it....if the room is very dim, you can have it nice and soft. If it's day light, turn the lights up brighter. Love it!

Christmas Lights

There are no outdoor electrical outlets, but I figured out a way to run a heavy duty extension cord out to the porch. Then I was able to put some lights on the evergreen garland I picked up earlier. We are having Christmas dinner here, so I want everything to be nice and cheery! We had such nice weather today, so it was a great day for doing this kind of project.

 This stable was built by my brother-in-law and is very special to me. We bought the Fontanini nativity pieces because they are unbreakable and we liked that the kids could move them around with out worrying about breakage.

 This star was one that the great grands brought from Germany.

Happy Thanksgiving!

 We ended up having four for dinner because my sister came too! That was a nice surprise. This is the first time I've had anyone over for dinner at the new place.

 We made sweet iced tea, because that's the way you do it when your mama's from the south. YUM.

I didn't make near as many dishes this year because we had just a few of us, but we had turkey, dressing and the usual Thanksgiving type things. Since I was not having a crowd this year, I just cooked two turkey breasts...two because I loooove to have sandwiches from the leftovers. Cooking just the breasts was lots easier and faster than cooking a whole turkey. Mom made chocolate pie from grandmama's recipe too, which is my favorite dessert.

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving Day!