Christmas Tour! Welcome to our house!

Welcome to our home!

Notice the magic key hanging on the wreath? It's a special key to enter our home, that only Santa can use!


Ah, and here's our resident Snowman to greet you now! He and Reagan are great friends and they have tons of fun running (or being dragged!) around the house and playing with his buttons!


Since you're in our reading room, sit down and enjoy the tree and take in some of my favorite Christmas items--a small "USA" Santa ornament that my mom purchased for me in 8th grade (I was really patriotic at a VERY young age!), my favorite buttered rum candle bought at one of my favorite places in the world..a small Amish town that I visit every year, and a woodland Santa portrait I purchased at a yard sale for an astounding $1!


This tree is mostly red and white, with small white and silver churches that look almost exactly like the one that Josh and I were married in . Also on the tree is the silver heart ornament from the first year we dated (hmm, what guy wouldn't love getting a Christmas ornament from his girlfriend of three months!?), red tin birds (which Reagan loves to hold up and say 'tweet, tweet!'), and homemade applesauce-cinnamon ornaments with barn red homespun, that I crafted the first year we lived in our home.


Next stop, the bathroom, hallway and bedrooms. Here are some snippets from each!

In the bathroom, is another of our little snowman friends. I bought this one at a friend's shop one year during her Christmas sale...his carrot nose had me at hello! I fell in love with the snowman picture, which I just happened to find on clearance last year! Red looks so good with this color, I decided to go simple and just use red and white towels...it reminds me of a candy cane!




Our hallway is filled with pictures of our family and this year we added a small bookshelf for some of Reagan's books and puzzles. On top of the bookshelf, is a nativity from my mom. Reagan loves to abscond with the cow, but I always make her put it back. I worry about things such as lead poisoning....yes, I am OCD. The small tree is decorated with all of our personalized ornaments...several for Reagan, and some for the cats and Josh and I! Oh, and the S'more mom with her baby at the foot of the tree? Yep ;) that's me and Reagan! Usually Reagan's puzzle pieces are in a regular old basket, but since it's Christmas...everything went into this adorable (clearance find!) snowman basket! I love Christmas and clearance and those two together, well, it makes me happier than a clam at high tide. (yes, corny ;) )




And last but not least, there's Pooh. Pooh is a recent addition to our family this year. Reagan is slightly (um, yeah) obsessed with Pooh and I found him just sitting and waiting for us to take him home from a garage sale! He lights up and moves around. Needless to say, this is the high point of Christmas decorating this year!


On to Reagan's big girl room....but wait, it's snowing! Continuing with last year's theme, we have snowflakes falling from the sky! The smile on Reagan's face when she saw these were worth nearly breaking my neck on her stepstool.


Ah.....and the Pooh tree. I used snowflakes from last years tree, Reagan's new Pooh ornament and of course, yellow (for honey) bow and tree skirt. The crowning ornaments here are the Tigger and Pooh heart shaped wooden ornaments! Coupled with the Tigger and Pooh stocking holder, and you have one happy Pooh-lovin' girl! (And yes, in case you were wondering...the Pooh and Tigger ornaments were garage sale finds at ten cents each! And the stocking holder??? Brand new garage sale find at $3.00!!)


Next stop, our bedroom! I always try to put something on each door, this year was snowflakes and red ribbons! Our room is always blue and white, so I just spiced it up with red pillows, a red throw, red wreaths and berries! Wa-lah, a little Christmas happiness here too!


The kitchen isn't too overly decorated (well, ok it is, but that's normal!) I have a few Christmas items out..a large Santa cookie jar, a Christmas rug, various Christmas bric-a-brac (including a favorite snowman piece, pictured below) and of course my tree! I love this little tree! Reagan loves it too since she's obsessed with apple trees!



And lastly, the family room (I won't show you any pictures outside because, well, frankly, it's freezing!!). The family room used to be my pride and joy, completely done in patriotic red white and blue..it is now filled to the brim with nearly every toy you can possibly purchase! Here is our first tree together..a Charlie Brown twig tree. The applesauce ornaments, and rag garland are handmade.


The reindeer family that sits underneath the tree were handmade by my husband's grandfather to represent Josh, his mom, and his dad. Now they represent our little family! Reagan adores them and they're one of our favorite Christmas decorations.


This is my prize friendship tree! It's up year round with white lights, but it gets decorated every now and then for holidays. To celebrate Christmas, it's wearing a jolly red Santa cap! And I can't post a picture without telling you the awesome deal I got on it...orginally $170.00 (drum roll please)...I got it for $10 at a garage sale!


This is our mantle..which I'm still looking for a great way to arrange..oh well...


Well, that's our home. I hope you enjoyed visiting and seeing some of my favorite Christmas decorations and hearing about my great finds! Merry Christmas!!!

Some more Reaganisms for you!

The other day I was singing (loudly and off key as usual) and Reagan came up to me, put a hand on each of my cheeks, squished my mouth together and said "hush, mommy, hush". Nice. I get no respect.

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One evening we were trying to figure out what movie we wanted to watch. Josh had the drawer with the DVDs open and Reagan was looking over his shoulder. She suddenly got all excited and started pointing at one DVD and saying "watch Bobbi! watch Bobbi!" It was King of the Hill! We hadn't watched it in several weeks but clearly the show had made a big impact on her! LOL! Anyway, we did end up watching it and there was a scene in which Bobbi had done something particularly sweet. I said 'aww, that's nice', and Reagan said "awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Bobbi" very dreamily! LOL!

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I had mentioned to Reagan about something being very special (I can't remember what it was) and she turned, looked at me, pointed to herself and said "Reagan, I speshul". Yes, you are baby. Yes, you are.

Sadly, this might indicate more about me than Reagan....

The other day I was craving red meat (if you're anemic and a girl, you know what that's like!) As we were out looking at Christmas lights, Josh pulled up to a drive-thru to order a burger for me. All of the sudden, from the back, we hear Reagan's wee little voice saying, 'Mcfies and uh, coke, pease." Needless to say we just about died from laughter.

What was even funnier.....we were at Burger King! ;)

Warning: Shameless bragging to follow!

Reagan has poopied on the potty and is potty training herself! And today, in the store, while shopping, out of the blue, with no help from mommy, no number line, nothing...she counted to six!!!! I AM IN SHOCK. I have one of the smartest little girls in the entire world. Yes. I do. She's not even two years old yet. Wow. She's incredible!

"Oh God"

Isn't it interesting that when you hurt yourself sometimes, the only thing you can think to say is "Oh God" repeatedly? I'm pretty sure I broke my baby toe today (yes, Reagan, your mommy IS the clutziest person in the world) and I think I must have said "Oh God" about 35 times while hopping on one leg, cluthing my toe. And yes, this did freak Reagan out, but at the time, my primary concern was the fact that I was sure my baby toe was about to fall off.

Now, I'm not sure if "Oh God" is in response to the pain or a plea to the Almighty to deliver me from the torture I was experiencing. All I know is that God had many petitions before His Throne this morning....and a majority of them had to do with my baby toe. I'm not sure what that says exactly about my priorities........

My mail man is on the take

I talked with our adoption specialist (fancy word for social worker I think) about our adoption packet. It was sent out on the 19th of November. Never showed here. My package from Gymboree...hasn't arrived. A box of toys my family mailed out...hasn't arrived. A package from my mom...gee, hasn't arrived.

What gives? Is my mail man the Grinch??

Helpful household hints regarding lipstick and dryers

Per my title, today I am going to share with you some wisdom regarding cleaning lipstick out of dryers, which, for you, I have tested first hand.

Now, my first tip is to CHECK YOUR POCKETS. REMOVE ALL ITEMS. If you're reading this, I assume that you either, one, want a good laugh at my expense, or two, you are one of those poor unfortunate forgetful souls such as myself. If you are indeed one of those souls, here are some more tips that may come in handy to you.

Run the dryer with an old light colored towel, slightly dampened. Guess what? It'll actually attract some of that yucky lipstick mess!

And second, for what your towel doesn't attract, take a baby wipe and clean up! Easy peasy!

Here's an extra, no charge. If you are forgetful like me, you may want to switch to a lighter lipstick. Mulberry doesn't like to come out of clothing well.

Baby Esus

Reagan loves "Baby Jesus" and spends a lot of time staring at the ornaments and books with Baby Jesus, that are up and around the house. I normally don't mind, but she's taken to playing with a beautiful Waterford crystal nativity that Josh's parents gave us for our first Christmas.

I've been warning her away from it, telling her she can touch and look but to not pick up...that all stopped when I saw her picking up baby Jesus, loving on him and then having Mary and Joseph each stoop down to kiss him. .....Wow....amazing what our children can teach us.

Huge lingerie sale!

Take advantage and get yourself some nice undies for Christmas! Figleaves.com has 90% off on a HUGE portion of their inventory! Go girls! Go!!

One of THOSE weeks....

I am feeling swamped and decidely out of my mind. This week I've made over 30 dozen cookies, delivered batches of goodies and presents, fought my daughter to get her to sleep every night, spent nearly every red cent in our account on adding to Reagan's Little People empire, wiped up enough paint to turn the Mississippi into a rainbow, and am just generally exhausted.

This weekend we have three craft shows to attend--wait, FOUR!, two bake sales and roughly 12 homes to visit on the Christmas walk. The next day is Reagan's birthday party, making more cookies and preparing for Grandma to leave to go back to Texas.

I may spend the next week lying on my bed in a pool of drool. If I don't blog for a few days, send in the guys in white coats.