It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

We've been moving into our Christmas season here this last week.  We saw this post last week on The Simple Year blog and I suggested that Davan do something similar for us.  She did.

The final product. 

She started with day 5 because that's when she put it up.  It's my duty to open it each day.

For some days, she used cards that we have on hand.  Other days are legal sized envelopes.  Other days are envelopes created out of note cards or paper.  It's all very creative.

To make it still look like a tree, we put the envelope back on when we're done.  Then we draw on it so that it's clear it's been done and we see progress.

So far, for advent activities, we've watched "Families of Sweden" which is semi-Christmas-y because it has snow, we've played Ranger Hide and Seek to make Ranger's advent merry, we've gotten our tree, we've decorated.

We got a tree this year for the first time in many years.  For a few years in the past, we had an artificial tree.  We didn't love that, so we went back to a real one.  One year, though, we were leaving for a week at Christmas and didn't want to do a tree.  Davan still wanted to decorate, though, so we strung the lights up all over the house and then hung the decorations from the strands.  Davan loved it, saying that it was like being inside a Christmas tree.  I liked it, too.  And we were avoiding the whole using up of resources for a tree to toss out/cost of the tree/thorny issues.

This year, though, we're having company.  My parents and two of my aunts will be here for Christmas and Anthony decreed that we needed a tree.  I was a little ambivalent about it, to be honest, but now that it's here, I'm really enjoying it.  It's smells nice and is pretty.  It was a lot of fun to decorate.

We still hung lights all around the condo.

This cute snowman ended up being our tree topper.  We're pleased with him.

We got some extra branches from the lot for free and Anthony crafted a door hanging.  We plan on decorating it more and I'll post pictures when it's more fleshed out, but it already looks nice without the $25+ price tag associated with buying a store bought wreath.

So, it's feeling all Christmas-y here, which is nice.  In fact, I've got to go open the advent calendar for today before Davan has to leave for today's two matinees.