What's on your tree?

I love my tree! I am one of those people that like to get the tree up very early in December (OK, so it was late Nov. this year - but it was snowing!). It's fake anyway so I don't have to worry about it drying out. It comes down right after Christmas. This year I was smart and put it in front of a blank wall instead of the cluttered bookcases! It truly is more beautiful in person when it is turned on and all glittery than the photo shows.

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I have my favorite decorations... lots of birds, apples, shells and crochet snowflakes. We have little wrapped presents, cute boxes and musical instruments. There is even a wooden horse that I very artistically painted when I was about 3! Plus several ornaments that were gifts. It is all pretty durable stuff - those fancy glass ornaments always seem to break on me so I don't have any. SB wanted 2 garlands this year so I figured - why not? Never put 2 different garlands on before and I am happy I gave it a try - because I like the look!

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Having the tree up over the course of the month provides extra opportunity to add to our ornament collection. This year SB made that construction paper tree at school and proudly brought it home to adorn our tree. OK! There's room. One cold weekend we traced cookie cutters onto construction paper, got them cut out and then SB went to town with the white glue and shaker glitter - oh what fun! So, we've added those creations too - they are actually nicer than I thought they would be. A neighbor gave SB an ornament he admired on her tree. We were at a store and SB bought 2 small disco balls - who even knew that HE knew they were disco balls?! Then a friend showed SB how to make candy canes by twisting red/green/white pipe cleaners together - so now we have an assortment of candy-canes in various stages of being twisted together. We were at a friends the other night and she had the cutest little cross-stitched ornaments on her tree - maybe this year I will make a few here and there and next year they can be added.

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One night I spent a little extra time with my camera settings and took photos of SB in front of the tree - all printed out and sent off in the Christmas cards. I added text (his name and date) on the photos we used - this one is very similar to one we used but not exactly.

SB even taught me a lighting trick - focus the camera and then sweep the camera up and down as you take the photo and you will get some neat streaking lights in your photo. Just take lots of photos because sometimes the lights streak right across your subjects face, but we did get several fun shots. By having my tree up early - it was ready to go in plenty of time for those Christmas photos.

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I am thinking this weekend we will make those cinnamon glue ornaments... (the ones you cut out with cookie cutters and bake) but maybe not. We have that glorious thing called snow which means SB will want to be out sliding. Before it snowed we collected a bag of pinecones - we are going to spraypaint them gold/silver/or white (depends what the store has for paint), shake on a bit of that glitter we like so much and add them to our tree too. If we don't get to it this year - I will just put the bag of pinecones in the tote of ornaments for next year. We have plenty of ornaments. But of course - there is always room for more, especially the home-made kind!