Christmas at My House

I have had the GREATEST time this year decorating my house for Christmas!  Last year, we didn't get the chance to do anything...certainly, not putting up our tree.  So this year, I didn't want anything to be left undone.  I even decorated my mantle for the first time.  ;o)  Enjoy!

If you see a lot of people saying that it's difficult to take a good picture of a Christmas tree, they are all correct!  I can't remember how many pics I took of mine before I decided this pic would do.  :o)  Our tree doesn't have a whole lot of rhyme or reason, except that there are several blue ornaments (hubs and my favorite color).  There's a lot of snowmen ornaments, in addition to several Star Wars ornaments to satisfy my Star Wars addicted husband.  See these posts if you haven't heard what I've had to endure all of my married life when it comes to Star Wars.

One of my co-workers gave me this gorgeous beaded ornament last year (when I had no tree to put it on), and it was one of the ornaments I was most anxious to hang on the tree.

My mother-in-law hooked me up with this awesome University of Memphis ornament for my birthday last month.  I have been a Tiger fan my entire life, and I love it that there are now ornaments available for all us crazy Tiger fans!

This was our first ornament for our first tree after hubby and I got married in 2002.  Super cute, don't ya think?  :o)

This one is from our cruise to the Bahamas in 2005.

This is one I made this year thanks to a really great tutorial for fabric balls.  I decided to turn mine into ornaments, and I love the way they look on the tree.

This was my first attempt to make a beaded ornament like the one my co-worker gave me last year.  Not bad, but I think hers looks better.  :o)

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Wait up....I'm not done!!  There's a few other little decorative things I've put up around my house this year.  Check out this little "vignette" that I created for one of our side tables....

I love snowmen, and I'm slowly building up a collection of them.  My mother-in-law will probably always have me beat in quantity, but I'll catch up to her one of these days. *grin*

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One more thing!!!!  My first attempt at decorating my mantle.  I can't tell you how many times I changed my mind on this.  I didn't have a lot of extra money to spend this year for new decorations, so I tried to use as much stuff as I had on hand.  My final cost on my mantle was about $7.25...woot woot!  :o)

 The green garland was a steal for $1 at Goodwill.  Yep, believe it.  :o)  I wrapped it with 2 rolls of ribbon from Dollar Tree.  I also added some snow-painted pine cones and red birds to the garland.  So far, I'm up to $5.25.

 The stockings we've had for several years, and I think we'll be switching them out for something a little nicer next year (hopefully).  To jazz them up, I snatched up some cute glittery letters at Wal-mart for $1 each.

My little snow-covered buildings I've had on hand for several years, and I almost tossed them a couple of years ago.  So thankful that I didn't do that because I really like how they look with the decorated garland...reminds me of a logging town near the woods right after it's snowed.  Ahhh...  ;o)

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So, that's my holiday decor!  It's kind of a mixture of every color in the world, but I did the best I could with what I had.  I tried to tie it all together with "snow" elements....the snow colored tree garland, the snow on the pine cones on the mantle, and the snowmen on their snow blanket on my table.  ;o)

Did you do anything different this year?  Or maybe something REALLY cost-effective?  Do share!

Oh, and I'm linking up to my first linky party ever for crafty stuff...I'm such a newbie!