It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas...

I couldn't pass up the Black Friday weekend sales (usually I steer clear of shopping due to the crowds) but I was tempted by JoAnn Fabrics' pre-lit Christmas tree sales (they were offering 7 foot trees for $35 that were normally $120) and 70% off ornaments so I at least made a trip for that and came back with a ton of stuff. I'd been wanting to get a new tree for a while since the one we had been given by my grandma was falling apart, old, and a total PITA to put together (not to mention half the ornaments were probably used when my mom was a kid...). Naturally, when I came home Jayden was curious about what I had bought so when I told him about the tree he just couldn't help but want to put it up.

Knowing full well that our holiday season this year (as is the case with every year, but even more so this year) is hectic I knew I wouldn't otherwise be able to get around to decorating until the week before Christmas and I wanted the kids to have more time to enjoy the whole Christmas spirit so I decided to put together our new tree yesterday and have the kids help me decorate. The tree is much thinner than it looked and it's not the greatest but for $35 and the lack of space in our apartment it works. The kids don't seem to mind and once you add the bazillion ornaments we have it fills in the gaps and doesn't look so wimpy.

Seeing as my hubby is not a decorator and I'm 7 months pregnant and just not in the mood to decorate a ton in addition to having an extremely curious toddler, I didn't decorate much. We have our tree, stockings, some lights, & a stuffed decoration thing. I'm debating on putting up our Christmas village, but seeing as our tree has already been attacked by flying basketballs and almost every ornament has been licked or re-arranged courtesy of Jaxson, I'm a little nervous to put out the ceramic village I've had since I was a child celebrating Christmas. I'm not quite ready to test the waters with his level of curiosity just yet. Hopefully the tree is still standing with the ornaments intact by the time I get home. :)

Both boys wanted to get a picture in front of the tree. Jaxson cracks me up because when we take pictures we tell the boys, "Say cheese!" and Jaxson lifts his chin, smiles a toothy smile, and squints his eyes (we call it his "Cheese Face"... hilarious every time!)

Looks like we will need new stockings next year as Owen will be here and we now only have our one cat, Kimahri. :)