Officially Over

I have to tell ya'll - as much as I LOVE to get my Christmas decor up... I'm equally anxious to get it down and if our house didn't look so pretty in white twinkly lights I would have had everything boxed up and put away the day after Christmas, but since we were hosting New Years, I decided to leave it up for a more traditional length of time. I know that this is super-late, but so that in July when it's 147 degrees outside and I'm needing a little "Holiday Fix" I'll have something to look at to tide me over, here are a few pictures of what Christmas looked like at my house this year.

I LOVED how this looked behind my sink, but loved it even more when I switched it out with the apothecary jars that I got for Christmas filled with the TONS of gold ornaments I got on clearance the day after. I am super mad that I forgot to take a picture of my updated look, but it'll have to wait 'til next year! (a plus of leaving the Christmas stuff out was that I got to use my after-Christmas bargains for a week!)

Fireplace and tree in the kitchen/eating area/dining room (can you tell I'm not really sure what to call it?)

Ahhhh... Christmas bliss :)

What could make me almost as happy as a house full of twinkle lights?!?!? Seeing it all boxed up and ready for storage in the attic! Fresh, organized, clean start here we come!

The tree in our family room is fairly GIGANTIC and I honestly have no idea how it EVER came in the box we bought it in, because we've had zero luck getting it to even half the size it would need to be to fit back inside. Over the past years we've tried several alternative storage methods (no, they don't make tree storage bags big enough for a tree either this tall or wide... grrr) but this year I had a brainstorm. We took the tree apart in sections and then laid each section on an old white tablecloth. Then we proceeded to roll it up in the cloth as tight as humanly possible and Dave held it closed while I attached about 60 zip ties together and then put them around the wrapped up trees.

Disturbing looking body bag-esque appearance??? - yes.

Easy to put in the attic without getting your eye poked and arms all scratched up by the branches??? - Also yesNext year we'll cut the zip ties and unroll our mummified tree and it'll be ready to go. Unconventional but convenient... just how I like it :)