Daily news sites

Today is the day my friends. I'm thrilled to be able to play with 11 other great bloggers for the 12 Days of Christmas Holiday Tour and today is my turn to show you around.

But it's too cold to stand outside yapping, let's go inside and get warm with some gin hot chocolate.



Everyone in my family has a Christmas collection and mine is snowflakes. So you will see them all over the house, on lamps, doorknobs, wreaths and of course, the tree. Keep an eye out for them. It's kind of like a holiday where's waldo.






Each year the mantel gets something different (check out 2012 and 2011) and this year it told me it was feeling pink. So pink it is, with a little red and white thrown in. Can one ever get enough of ribbon at Christmas? (the answer to that question is no by the way)


My girls and I decorate a gingerbread house every year and this year's estate was extra sweet.




Herbie loves the holidays as much as the next guy so he pulls out his festive antlers for the season.




Amelia has already started her Christmas collection - nutcrackers - and she's off to a good start. Santa just might have a few other in store for her this year as well.





I can't wait for Christmas dinner this year so that I can put my fab new plates from B by Brandie to use. They really are beautiful plates and their colors pop right off the table. The patterns reminded me of snowflakes and you know I'm a sucker for mixing patterns, so these plates fit right in.





We spend just as much time feasting in the dining room as we do tearing into presents in the living room on Christmas, so we like to have the tree right where we can see them from both spots.



Christmas is about the lights, right? And what better time to appreciate the lights than at night. I know, I'm a regular Sherlock. So I give you... nighttime pictures.









Thanks so much for coming over. Anyone over the age of 12 knows what a crazy time of year this is, and I really appreciate you taking time out of your busy day to stop over and say hi. Be sure to check out all the other great homes that have been featured so far on the tour.

Day 1 - Evolution of Style
Day 2 - Shine Your Light
Day 3 - Dixie Delights
Day 4 - The Creativity Exchange
Day 5 - Dimples and Tangles
Day 6 - My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia
Day 7 -  Driven By Decor
Day 8 - Simple Details

And tomorrow Oak Ridge Revival is hosting!


Now who's ready for more hot chocolate?

Like sands through the hourglass, so is the mantel in my living room. The sucker is a revolving door of indecision. As my dear friend Linda says, I'm mantelly challenged. In fact, I've even got a board on Pinterest just for mantels - it is an obsession.

The bug hit again not too long ago and I changed it up after seeing what Bryn did with a client's mantel. I've got a collection of milk glass, why not put it to use.


This is probably the happiest I've been with the mantel in a while. Says the girl that will probably change the whole thing around next month.

I cannot begin to even count how many times I've changed this mantel around. This is the fourth mirror in 6 1/2 years, if that tells you anything. Psycho much?

I even found a few pictures of the evolution.










Thanks CNN Living for sharing my most recent mantel this week. Check it out here.

Is there a spot in your house that you change even more frequently than others? Do you have a mantel that you feel is never quite right? Want to place bets on how long before I change it all around again?

Last year, the Christmas mantel was all about the ribbon. This year however, I wanted to do something like...I had no idea. I never know when it comes to the mantel. I've accepted the fact that I will have chronic paralysis in this area- especially at the holidays. So I just thought I'd wait for inspiration to strike. And then I saw this.


My 5-year-old, Amelia, took it upon herself one day to delicately remove everything from the coffee table and do her own decorations. "Mommy I made you a centerpiece. Isn't it beautiful?" She comes by it honestly.

I am an encourager (and the enforcer, but that's a different post) so if she's got the styling bug, who am I to deny her the pleasure. So I decided that this year's Christmas mantel would be all about crafts ala Amelia. Eve would offer all the moral support that 20-month olds can provide.

I had pinned this last year and thought it would be a great jumping off point.

The Wool Acorn via Pinterest

Amelia picked out the color schemes and decided on the placement.


She would hand me a ball and say, "put that one there." I was merely the hot glue gun operator. The whole thing went really fast. I think we were done in about 4 Christmas songs (love Pandora). A perfect craft with little ones who don't have very long attention spans.


She did a great job I think. This girl has got some mad color dispersing skills. And she practiced great restraint  I would have been gluing balls all over those things. That sounded weird.


Of course, I had to get into the mix a little bit. My contribution - an pink ombre pinecone.


So with our pinecone Christmas tree village ready, we made some garland. And what kind of garland do you make when your husband works for Dunder Mifflin? A paper chain of course.

Again, Amelia was in charge of picking out the colors. We talked about red and green but she wanted her favorite color - rainbow. She's learning about creating patterns at school, so this was a perfect activity.

 An afternoon of quality girl time produced one colorful Christmas mantel.


The jewel votives work really well with the colors in the trees and garland.


Birds eye view.
Christmas is the ultimate kid holiday, so I thought this was rather fitting. And since I get free reign of the house the rest of the year, I thought the girls should have some input into how our living room should look for Santa's arrival. As Amelia pointed out, the fireplace is like Santa's front door to our house.


So, welcome Santa.


How about you? Ever put the holiday decorations into someone else's hands? Any good holiday crafts you recommend for kids?  Have you ever tried to explain to a 5-year-old that rainbow is not a color, but rather a whole group of different colors? Don't bother, it is a loosing battle.

I linked up to Clean & Scentsible and A Thoughtful Place.