The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

We don't believe in Black Friday Shopping (I mean, I hate shopping even under the best of circumstances, so fighting a lot of other crazy shoppers will never make it to the top of my To Do list!), in this house the day after Thanksgiving is always devoted to getting our Christmas decorations up.  So I was a little surprised when Craig announced that we were going to dust the light in our foyer!  I don't think... we've ever done this before?  It was an exciting endeavor.  And by "exciting" I mean "scary."  But it worked!  Clean lighting!

So, yeah-- this involved me hooking it with that long duster and holding it close enough for Craig to reach and actually wipe it all down.  What could go wrong?

Then Craig spent the rest of the day getting all the inside decorations (including the two fake trees) set up and putting away the stuff that usually goes in those places.  The farm where we got our tree last year wasn't opening until Saturday morning and Craig insisted we get there right as it opened up.  He was very worried about getting a good tree before it was picked over.  Bentley and Kendra decided they would rather sleep in, so we were planning on just taking the younger kids.  But then Kendra happened to wake up that morning at a reasonable hour (weird, for her) and decided she may as well come (yay!).  So now we were going to have to take cars.  And I could hear Bentley's bird making noise, so I figured he couldn't be too sound asleep.  I poked my head in his room and told him if he came along, I'd let him drive his car AND pick the music.  So Bentley and I listened to Kanye West while we drove to and from choosing a Christmas tree.  But I got to have the whole family running around the tree farm, which might not ever happen again (what a thought!), so I figured that was definitely worth a little bribery.

We ended up buying the tree I picked!  As is often the case, it looked a little scrawny outside, but MUCH bigger once it was in the house!  (Also, Craig took a branch he'd trimmed from the bottom and wired it onto that one slightly bare spot!  So tricky!)

I love that Colton is jumping in excitement here

Once the tree was up, Craig devoted his attention to all our outdoor decorations...

The kids really like getting out on the roof with daddy to string up lights!

And a few minutes were spent trying to make it look like the chickens were wearing this tiny Santa hat that we found amongst the decorations...

Festive Dolly

And then Sunday was spent putting ornaments on the trees!

So now we're super festive!  I also sent out all my Christmas cards that week, so now we can focus on the trillion Christmas activities we want to do and spending way too much money!  It's a fun time that I truly love.  Hope you're enjoying our holidays already, too!!!