Food for my Soul

Why does it seem that the holiday season seems to go by WAY to quickly? I purposely unplugged (at least for the most part) and just enjoyed the season, my family and "the reason for the season". 

I have no doubt you are sick to death of everyone's Christmas decorations, ....so you can continue to look or come back in a few days! ha! Notice my 98 cent Black Friday poinsettias?  When clustered together they look like a million. (At least in my humble opinion.) I had them all over my house and they still look lovely. I usually get rid of them the first of January. 

I brought in my red checked chairs out of storage because I knew I would need all the seating I could get at Christmas. I like the chairs in this room, so I think I will save up and get them reupholstered and keep them right where you see them. 

My Mom brought me back this very primitive Nativity from Bethlehem. I have shown it before, but it is always worth showing again. It is so basic and unadorned that I just love it. ....And especially for the fact that it came from Bethlehem. 

I love this little Nativity inside a dome. I look for unusual Nativity's every year. This year my Hubs and I want to make a huge one for our yard. 

 One of my New Year resolutions for 2012 was to actually wrap the Christmas presents. For too many years I spent most of Christmas Eve night up stuffing things into bags. This year I actually got it done. And before Christmas Eve!!  I realize there are a lot of sacks in the pictures below, but if you will look there are also a lot of wrapped gifts as well. Believe me, I did SO much better and I intend to do that again next year. 

 Miss Leightyn was obviously the star of Christmas this year. She was so interested in everything and actually would "oooooh" each time she got a present. Of course, the attention was on her! 

 We had four generations here to celebrate Christmas. Isn't that what Christmas is all about? It was a perfect day. 

 In case you can't tell, Leightyn has everyone (including my parents) wrapped around her little finger. 

 The rest of the pictures are just snapshots I took around the house as I was waiting for our Christmas guests.

 This is the dining room table, set with my (original $15.99 per plate) birthday gift from last year that we got for under $2.00!!

 One of my favorite decorations this year was this simple chalkboard. I had the chalkboard already and I copied (yes, straight up copied because I LOVE it SO much) from The Lily Pad Cottage and her original chalkboard. I ran off a picture of her creation and one of my students copied it for me in under an hour. Oh my word. Didn't she do a great job?  

 I also pulled the bookshelf part of this out of our storage. It originally had a bottom to it, but it has gone to "hutch heaven". I kept the shelf part. The Hubs and I got this for a wedding present and it was bright yellow at the time. And I loved the bright yellow. Then when the bottom part of the hutch "died" I painted these shelves black (this was waaaaayyyyy before blogs) and paired it with a black dresser for one of my boys. Then this month I pulled it back out and painted it with ASCP Old White. I put wrapping paper on the back, just for some Christmasy spirit! 

(See that little door in the picture?  That leads to my dish closet. I LOVE that dish closet!) 

 If you look closely in any of the kitchen pictures you will notice the construction (and in some cases DEconstruction that is going on. Ignore it!) 

 I made this Santa for my oldest (30 years ago), so he has to come out each year. (He as in Santa, not my oldest!) 

 My Hubs made us both eye doctor appointments in January. Now I understand why he made one for me. I swear this looked okay in the camera! (Sorry!!!) 

 Every single year my sister gets me the "official" ornament from the White House as well as the Oklahoma "official" ornament. Believe me, I have some beautiful ornaments! 

I know I am looking forward to 2013.  I was born on the 13th day of the year (yes, the big day is coming right up), and I have always loved the number 13 for that reason. Plus, if 2013, is half as good as 2012 (when Leightyn was born), then I have nothing but good things to look forward to.

Thank you for reading each time I post. Thank you for your sweet comments. Here's looking forward to 2013. Happy New Year!

Linking to:
Wow Us Wednesdays
Metamorphosis Monday