christmas and a CAMERA!

My hubby surprised me with a new camera for Christmas! ME...and a CAMERA. Need I say more? I almost feel bad for it. It's going to get wore out. Poor thing {ha}. So far I've started with the obvious subjects...my unsuspecting children. Needless to say, they allowed me only a few shots before putting their hands over their cute little faces and running in the other direction. Except for Rage. You'll be seeing a lot of him. His little monkey paws haven't figured out how to block Momma yet :)

Clearly this little guy is going to be my model of choice...

Because this one's tooth "hurts" ?

And well...this one's just NOT having it.

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SO I got busy practicing on my Christmas decorations. Talk about weird. I guess I didn't really realize our lack of decor until I started photographing it. We lost a few things in the move. The back of the moving truck actually flew open during transit and some boxes took a tumble. {booo}.

But that's okay. We've never had the money to really purchase anything fabulous anyway. I'm more about taking the odds and ends we have and just making them work. 

That's more my style...just winging it. 

Take this deer head for instance. Clearly it's high end, right? {ha} I think Derek was a little irritated that I fluffed up his "pride and joy" a bit with some ornaments. It's called making it work my dear. And this WORKS!

Then there's this cute little number. It's a soup can that I glued twigs around and then stuck a small cutting from our tree in it. {fancy, right?} A little burlap and some gold acorns stems, and voila!

I've actually been collecting twigs and cans for a fun little decor project at church...and I have to admit that I'm using more of them around here than I am saving! Seriously. I just can't help myself. I'm going to have to send the kids back out to the woods to gather some more. 

Another shot of my twig/can arrangement. Complete with dust bunnies and fingerprints -- this is my real, undusted life! You'll also see this green votive in a few pics. The kids move stuff around here on a daily basis...so there's no telling what will end up where.

The grouping in the pedestal vase keeps growing as well. It started off full of all silver ornaments, but it's been accumulating all the ones that fall off or get taken off the tree. It just keeps getting better and better, let me tell ya :)

RAGE!!!

Here's a shot of some berry stems that I stuck in a jar {why not}. And of course, a can full of twigs. And a few more twigs in the vase in the background. See...it's twig heaven around here. But seriously, go out to your yard and grab some. They're cheap...they'll fit in. Believe me!

There's the green votive again :)

The kids picked out these little trees at the dollar store so I couldn't say no. They like to contribute in the decorating process too :) The tree stems are a little wonky, but I can't win them all. Have you noticed all my stacks of books? It's sort of my latest obsession. Removing all the annoying dust covers and stacking up some beautimus book ends. {love}.

And here you go. One of my FAVORITES. Who doesn't decorate their tree with Hello Kitty sunglasses? Kids. They keep life interesting and full of the quirky best surprises.

Nothing like some garland to adorn our deer rack. The two together just scream MAN HERO. These next few photos have a story...

I even stashed a few pieces into the top of our kitchen blinds. It's clearly not my best work, but it does make me chuckle. And it smells great :) 

I finally hung my burlap wreath I made last year. Every little bit helps.

And this is something that's a work in progress. For the moment, this old frame is being used as photo collage for our Christmas cards (or mostly Christmas cards)...Rage's birth announcement found it's way up there too. Eventually it will be home to one of our family pictures from this year. 

Here is what is looked like before. And no I didn't scrap the artwork. This is totally my Dad, so it's now adorning his walls.

Here's our Santa Bell. Probably the one thing we have with meaning around here. It's a Gora tradition for the man of the house to ring this bell on Christmas morning. When the kiddies hear the bell, they can race out of their rooms to see what's under the tree. I think Derek's dad was still ringing this bell up until the day he passed it down to him. I remember that morning. It was a little teary. I guess it's sort of a rite of passage, this passing down of the Santa Bell. Years from now we'll have another one of those teary Christmas mornings when our last little one leaves the home. I guess Rigby will be the one to carry the torch.

Tradition. Don't you just love it? I do :)

And here's our tree. The star actually touches the ceiling! It's full of ornaments from our childhood and ones made by our kids and old cheesie beads and one string of burlap because I couldn't find the rest. But it sparkles and smells good and gets the job done. 

I guess my point is...embrace what you have. LOVE what you HAVE. Christmas isn't about having a perfectly decorated house or all the best things. So don't sweat it. The whole point is Jesus, right? He was perfection for us! What a relief! I'm doing my best to hold on to this truth, especially as I look around at all my Christmas decor [or lack thereof]. 

Now go gather yourself some twigs!