I love Christmastime!

I LOVE decorating for the holidays. I love turning on cheesy Christmas music, fixing a big cup of hot chocolate and decorating the tree & house. I'm also a sucker for gift-wrapping. Not sure why I like to wrap presents - I'm sure it has something to do with my tragic upbringing as an only child (just kidding mom and dad). Anyway, we actually did our decorating a couple days before Thanksgiving as we were going to be out of town that day.

We bought a new tree this year - finally. Our old tree was actually one brought to this country on the Nina (or the Pinta - can't remember which) and then passed on throughout time - finally ending up at Chris' Dad's & Stepmom's house. They graciously gave it to us and we - being the tightwads that we are - were more than happy to take it off their hands. This is one of the those trees where you have to attach each branch individually cutting up your hands and arms in the process. I literally never put the thing up without cutting myself - lovely way to start the holiday - a blood sacrifice to the Christmas tree.

So we bit the bullet and bought a new one. We shopped around (of course - remember - we are tight wads) and ended up actually getting our tree from Big Lots! LOVE Big Lots! We got a great pre-lit tree with multiple light flashing settings for MUCH less than the other stores were charging. And the great thing is that it only took me about 5 minutes to put the tree together - amazing! It would have taken me at least an hour to get the old one together.

So here is a picture of our decorated tree and an ornament we got for our family this year. Hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.