up on the roof

Anyone else sing the blog title in their heads just now?

No?

Just me then?

Back to the subject at hand which happens to be the roof. If you've been hangin' round these parts for over a year, you know that hubs likes to decorate our roof in an unconventional sort of way.

With words.

Spelled with lights.

The first year, it was this:

which lead our neighbors to wonder if we were in some sort of cult.

We're not. This is pure shenaniganisms. Yes that's a word.

Last year, the roof attracted so much attention, our house appeared on two popular websites and friends of ours that frequent those websites called and texted to let us know our rooftop had reached celebrity status. Last year's roof looked like this:

Again, I assure you there is no hidden meaning behind this. We love Christmas. The halls are decked, the carols are blaring from the stereo, and there's peppermint creamer in the fridge. This is hubs at his finest. Well, he's pretty darn fine in a tux, but you know what I mean.

Moving on.

This year, hubs masterpiece is sportin' a hashtag.

Because he's modern and whatnot.

Oliver's first observation was this:

"That's not how you spell it."

Well no, it's not.

"Then why is it like that?"

Your daddy is being silly.

"Oh. Ok."

Do you have any idea how many times I've had to say, "Your daddy is just being silly"? If I had a nickel for each time, I could buy like a thousand pumpkin spice lattes, mmkay?

So, in conclusion, the writing is once again on the roof.

It's pure shenanigans.

There is no cult.

I like pumpkin spice lattes.

p.s. If you'd like to take a gander at the INSIDE decor from last year, click HERE. The decor from this year so far is laughable at best. I'm a bit behind, not to be confused with I HAVE a big behind.

2011 Christmas home tour

I'm linking up with Nester, Michaela, Kelly, and Thrifty Decor Chick, so here's my tree + the rest of the house I haven't posted pics of yet.

And the roof.

Let's not forget the roof.

Come inside, won't you?

Grab a juice box and make yourself at home...

This is the same wreath I had on our front door last year. If you look closely, you can see the dust from having been in our storage room for the past 12 months.

See?

HellomynameisMaryKathrynandIdon'tliketodust.

Moving on.

Into the foyer-

I added an 'M' ornament from Restoration Hardware to my berry wreath.

Kinda like it.

Watch your step,

toddlers crossing...

Book page snowflakes, garland, and a Nativity in the dining room-

and those trees on the table.

Forgot about the trees.

There's also tee-niny little white ones in the cabinet/hutch thing, along with a book page ornament and more snowflakes.

My fave nativity from Damdaco.

Taking a left and crossing back through the foyer, we come to the living room/playroom/office-

start snapping pics in here and this is what happens:

Like moth to a flame I tell ya.

Moth to a flame.

They're actually playing Deck the Halls.

At least, that's what page the book is turned to...

To the right of the piano is the mantel.

Loved (and still loving) my Christmas mantel this year.

More info about what I thrifted/made/spray painted on the mantel HERE.

And to the right of the mantel,

the tree.

Our first ever real not faux tree.

Yup.

No ornaments on the bottom half.

I live with a 1 and a 2 year old.

Within 30 seconds of opening the infamous red/green Christmas tubs, two ornaments had already been dropped and broken.

Boo.

It's okay- no biggie. It just lead me to not unpack a single one of these-

No Hallmarks this year.

No.not.one.

Okay I lied-

I just looked and there's actually a few that made the cut, but they did NOT come out of that tub. Must have been stored somewhere else.

My awesomesauce '12 Days of Christmas' tree skirt and the naked bottom half of my tree.

Let's just concentrate on the top half with the ornaments, shall we?

I scored that one at the ladies ornament swap this year.

Still need to blog about that...

Watch out for toddlers again-

The star topper hasn't made it to the top yet because I couldn't reach high enough and hubs was busy keeping the kids occupied in another room so we didn't have to trash anymore ornaments.

On the other side of this room is the sofa.

It's sportin' a brandspankin' new red pom pom throw from One Kings Lane. Do any of you shop from that site? Kinda like a deal-a-day type thing, ...almost.

I left the green chevron pillows and threw on the pillow I made from a Target dishtowel.

I kinda liked it better after I threw it and the dvd box on the floor though.

A bit more simple and clean looking.

Except for the pillow and the dvd box on the floor.

Backtracking to the dining room and into the kitchen:

A Christmas message and a countdown on our chalkboard,

and a Christmas card display on our cabinets.

Nope.

Still no crown moulding.

Soon...

very soon.

And now, if you'll follow me all the way down the back hall, I'd like to show you a little something in the bedroom.

No, silly....

get yer head outta the gutter.

I'm talking about my stud on the wall.

I even decked Moe out for Christmas.

He's super pumped about it.

Back down the hall and the last door the the right,

you're in for a treat.

It's the man cave.

Keep in mind- I let the hubs decorate in here.

It's his room afterall, and he did it up real good for Christmas.

This is the ONLY room with colored lights.

It's his room, not mine.

and with the lights on, ya know...

so you can see the Dumb and Dumber poster on the mantel a little bit better.

Yes, the lights go ALL the way around the room.

Staple gun, my friends.

Good thing he's freakishly handsome or I mighta had somethin' to say about that.

And now, let's go back through the house to the front door and out into the yard so you can see our famous roof.

That's right-

it was on a blog.

A blog that's not even mine.

A friend sent me the link on facebook-

(thank you Kayla)

Here it is if you'd like to see the post yourself-

it sparked quite a debate in the comments

My hubs and his shenanigans.

And for the record, let me say that 'meh' is in no way our attitude towards Christmas. We are Christians and definitely stress the true meaning of this holiday in our home. In fact, we rarely mention Santa Claus because that's not what we want our kiddos to be focused on at Christmas time.

It's all about Jesus my friends. 

The words hubs puts on our roof are merely for fun. Pure shenanigans. And again, just in case you missed it, here's last year's roof.

Merry Christmas friends!

Hope you enjoyed the tour!

The Angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good tidings of great joy that will be for all people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord."

Luke 2:10-11

My Merry Mantel (and other Merry places)

Hello friends!

Since my town has decided to turn into Forks, I've decided to post the

sub-par-rainy-gray-gloomy-best-I-could-do-under-the-circumstances

pictures of my mantel/foyer/various other Merry spots in my house.

Remember,

I went minimal.

It's the tree.

The realnotfaux tree which only happens to have one ornament on it at the moment.

And I'm okay with it.

Still haven't unpacked the Christmas tubs.

no.not.one.
(hence the absence of my homemade burlap stockings)

I'm okay with that too.

Here's what we've got-

Christmas in the living room/playroom/office

**the sun finally decided to come out after 5 days of rain so I've added a few good shots**

Fresh greens are actually the lowest branches from our totally real tree. It needed a bit o' trimmin' when we got it home.

Nutcrackers are from the hob lob and started out like this-

A quick spray of white, and they're pretty darn tootin' close to the West Elm version that comes in at a whopping $30 for the small size and $70 for the large. Mine were $2.50 and $3.50 thankyouverymuch. 

A red star from Target.

Love it.

I actually draped ribbon through the loop at the top and secured it to the back of the mirror with duck tape. Or duct. Because it was all I could find at the moment.

Sure nuff.

And just to keep it real, here's a shot of where the pink kitchen was at picture time. Had to move it to make room for the tree. It's no longer there, but it was...at that instant.

Besides the red star from Target, I either made everything on the mantel or bought it at the thrift store. The trees on either end are foam on top of wooden candlesticks (that I sprayed white) covered in book page cirlces-

I stuck the cirlces on with straight pins, glued the recently-painted-white candlesticks to the bottom, and boom.

Done.

As for the rest-

I had a spray paint fest, so to speak.

Nothing was safe.

If it was pretty and I thought I might could possibly use it somewhere, it was sprayed. Not to be confused with spayed.

The large candlesticks in the back were thrifted, the silver sleigh was filled with yummy treats and came as a gift a few years back. I kept it, of course, and now it's solid white and looking for a home. The gold reindeer were purchased at Michael's at half price, the stars are from the dollar bins at Target (except I'm pretty sure they were 2.50), and the pink vase came with flowers the hubs gave me a few years ago. All of these items are now a gawgeous, gleaming shade of white. Oh, almost forgot to mention those bust forms- they're not part of my Christmas decor...just needed a fresh coat of paint.

Here's Christmas in the foyer-

A white berry wreath on the Narnia door, white poinsettias from Michael's, my book page tree in a frame I already owned from hob lob, a huge honkin' M from JoAnne's, and my burlap tree from last year's mantel.

Christmas in the Dining Room-

There's actually a bit of Christmas in here year round as I decided last year that I would keep my Nativity out all the time. I just love it too much not to. I also didn't enjoy packing it back into the foam and the boxes after Christmas, so now- no more packing and we get to enjoy it all the time.

A Target star, recently-painted-white pears from Pier 1, and white trees from an artist I met at Dickens last night.

 Nativity by Demdaco

Back to the living room/playroom/office

Our tree currently has one ornament,

a sweet, handmade angel from the same artist who made the trees. She wanted one of my flowers, so we traded. Love that. Her pouch is filled with lavender by the way. (The Angel's, not the woman that made her)

I also used this on my tree-

What on earth is this called? This twine-like stuff that you unwrap and it becomes wide and ribbon-like? I have no idea what it is but I love it.

And last but not least, there's a wee bit o' Christmas in the kitchen as well-

I saw this idea on Pinterest and loved it. I already had the ribbon and this literally took me all of 5 minutes to drape the ribbon over the cabinet doors, tie it in the back, and cut it off.

Here's the inspiration photo:

Source: budgetwisehome.com via Mary Kathryn on Pinterest

Yay for already having 4 Christmas cards to display on my cabinets!

Boo for not having made my own cards yet.

Seriously...

boo.

Anyway,

that's a little tour of the Christmas in our hizzy.

Anyone else out there decide to keep it low-key this year?

Anyone else out there recently paint half of what they own white?

Anyone else out there with only 1 ornament on their tree, and totally ok with it?

Do tell...

p.s. I'll be linking this post to:

Beth's mantel party at Home Stories A 2 Z,

Kate's Holiday Crafts linky at Centsational Girl,