spending: money like most of us, December is a very expensive month duhhhh. I just ordered Vivian all of her toy presents at Target (I know you are shocked lol) and I added a few festive items for myself too. I am also spending as much time as I can with my loved ones and with my daughter, especially. I am so busy these days and work is crazy during the month of December so spending time with them and less time on Instagram and Insta stories is indeed what this time of year requires. Not everything needs to be documented on Insta stories. I am putting my phone down a lot more these days.
choosing: to be more present. That goes parallel with the above prompt (#2). I am choosing to live the moment rather than take pictures all the time, take mini videos for Instagram, check my Facebook often or read a lot of blogs. I am choosing to be happy and take some time for myself when needed.
sending: nothing actually (not yet). I spent so much time and money on Christmas cards last year. This year I think only our close relatives and closest friends will receive some personalized cards. I will remember my other friends, blogger babes and other virtual friends by writing them e-mails or sending them a virtual post-card instead.
singing: along to Christmas tunes and the new songs by Taylor Swift's new album "Reputation". Each song is so good and each sound is so catchy. I can't help but sing along to the songs I have already learned the words too. I hadn't bought a music album or CD in ages. But I did buy Taylor's new album and I love it. Sorry not sorry.
I mentioned in the beginning of this post how much I love to decorate for Christmas. Today for my look-back portion of these Currently posts, I decided to take a walk down memory lane visiting ALL the Christmas Home Tour posts I have done since when I started blogging in 2012.
This was my first year in Albania after living in Michigan for 14 years. I had only been in Tirana for a month so we had only had our apartment for one month and we still had a lot to furnish and decorate. This year I bought every decoration from top to bottom brand new. The tree was in purple, red and gold. I love those red+gold velvet poinsettia flowers and my ornaments were mostly balls in red and purple but there were also bells, Christmas trees and other ornaments. For the top of the tree I made this huge red mesh bow that definitely stood out. The large bow for the top was made of 100% tulle. I think to this day that is one of my most favorite tree toppers I have ever done. I usually do a few trays, bowls and glasses filled with ornaments. For the coffee table - to which I added a beautiful festive embroidered table cloth (as you can see from the 3rd photo above) - I added a silver tall bowl with red glass ornaments in and around the silver tray there is decorative little evergreen branch. On the bookshelves I have two little snow-globes and three glass bowls one of which has red+gold balls, one has gold bells and the other has purple balls. Later on we purchased a real poinsettia plant which added to the decor of our living room.
Such a special Christmas for me personally as I was almost 9 months pregnant - my first pregnancy. I was lucky to have such a big belly on such a special holiday. My Husband Piro and I even wore matching red sweaters and black pants on Christmas day (last photo). Because we were expecting a little girl, I decided to do a white+pink tree. Almost all the ornaments were new and this was the first year in our new home in Albania. As you can see the tree looks completely different than it did the previous year. The top of the tree had a frosted glass white star and towards the top of the tree I added the very first pair of shoes that were purchased for Vivian: her baby pink Mary Jane shoes. Her little shoes were placed next to an angel and a little heart and these 3 little ornaments on top of the tree represented our upcoming baby girl so well. Vivian had brought so much joy for us in 2012 when we found out we were pregnant and the fact that 2013 would start off with her birth was a huge plus. Vivian was and is our biggest blessing! As always I use red trays+jars, candles, ball ornaments, jars filled with ornaments, glittery branches, evergreen branches, snowglobes and bows to decorate with.
This was the Most Special Christmas of all because it was Vivian's very first Christmas and our first Christmas as parents. This year we bought a lot of girly new ornaments for Vivian. She had a few Baby's First Christmas Ornaments on the tree and a lot of girly ornaments. With Vivian's ornaments I went for a candy theme. The cotton-frosted ornaments were things like cupcakes, candy canes, wrapped candy, cotton candy and more. The top of the tree had a glittery tall gold star. Vivian's first stocking was a Baby Girl's First Christmas stocking in baby pink. The coffee table had a silk embroidered-in-gold tassel square table runner with a clear vase filled with a few evergreen branches and tied with a green ribbon, on each end of it were a gold-orange and a red-orange candle. Of course all the shelving got some decor too. Most of the little glass vases and mini glass balls were filled with tiny red+gold glass ball ornaments. I also placed those gold+red velvet poinsettias around the living room and the kitchen and there were a few furry reindeer around the living room and kitchen area too. Our personalized Christmas cards were placed on the refrigerator and a small porcelain rust red vase filled with poinsettia flowers was on top of our kitchen table.
This was Vivian's second Christmas - she was almost 2 years old - so I opted for a very small, out-of-reach tree. We bought this small 3 feet tree which we put on top of the Entertainment Area. I put an angel on top of the tree and purchased several tiny and miniature ornaments, a lot of which were hand-made and some of them were wooden mini ornaments - so cute. The entire area got decorated with a long embroidered red silk table runner underneath, surrounded by family photos, a few Christmas-tree-shaped candles and mini ball ornaments. I added a few gold glittery butterflies and some velvet bushes to a couple of my flower vases. Every shelf of our bookcase got a little Christmas decor too and I even displayed a few of our Holiday cards on a wall in the living room.
This was my first year back in Michigan - after 4 amazing years spent in the capital of Albania. We put up two Christmas trees at our home, this year, and our main tree was white. All the colorful ornaments glisten on the white tree which has clear/gold lights. There were many different colored ornaments on the tree but they were mostly purple, green, teal, royal blue, lavender, pink and teal. On top of the mantle we have Santa+Mrs Klaus on the middle surrounded by two Small Vintage Holiday Horse Carriages, the Red+Gold Ruffled Silky Trees on the left side, a tall Blue Nutcracker and the 12 days of Christmas set of Nutcrackers on the right side, while on the bottom we have a little teddy with a wreath, a snowman, a Merry Christmas sign, the Black+Cream Porcelain Vase and our Winter White Santa Klaus. The little green tree is in our dining room and it is a small 5 feet tree which has a lot of our meaningful ornaments and a lit star on top. Even our faux green plant got decorated with a red velvet bow and two red velvet poinsettia flowers. The side coffee table has all of our frosted glass decorations: tree with miniature green+red ornaments, reindeer candle holder and santa candle holder. Off the side I have a vase filled with different colorful mesh chiffon and velvet poinsettia flowers which I filled with red+green ornaments.
This was our home last year, totally decked out as you can tell. I went for a colorful tree but mostly with traditional colors: red, gold and green. For the top of the tree I added a few flocked evergreen bushes which have pinecones also. It looks like a dust of snow on top of the tree. For the tree skirt I chose a classic red+green velvet tree skirt. Over the mantle I added a part of my little collection of Santas and Snowmen and on the bottom of the fire-place we have the red velvet skiing boots, a little red wicker basket with 3 Christmas stuffed animals, a deep glass bowl filled with small red, silver and green mirror ornaments and (on the left side) as usual we have the black set of porcelain pieces: tall vase (with woodsy branches), matching bowl and little dog. The side coffee table also has a little glass bowl filled with pink, turquoise, silver and purple little glass ornaments, two red+green present-shaped ornaments, a few family photos and our two large snow-globes.
I hope you enjoyed my Holiday memories of Christmas Home Tours from the past. Part one of this year's Christmas Home Tour will come this Thursday on December 7th. So come back to see how I decorated this year, what I added to my ever-growing collection of Christmas decor, how I decorated the main tree and the mantle, etc. I will also be joined by a few of my favorite blogging friends as it is part three of "The Holiday Series". It will be such a special post so I hope you come in and take a peak at my home.
