Hello everyone! I hope you're enjoying the month of December so far. It's only day six, and I already feel like it's passing by too quickly. This is the time of year that I look forward to all year long. I'm sad when it ends, and then summer comes and melts us all away with the heat. It's actually warmer today, about 80 degrees, but it should be back to the mid-sixties in a few days which to me is the best weather possible!
I'm lacking on recipes because we've still been eating a lot of random meals. The other night I fixed my spaghetti and meatball recipe (found here) and the night before we had chicken pot pie soup, I also have a recipe for that. I've been working on Christmas decor around the house, so I thought I would share a little home tour with you. I'm not completely finished with the house, but this post will focus on my family room and dining room. Nothing too fancy really! I follow so many talented bloggers on Instagram, and honestly sometimes the beauty of their posts gets me down. I feel inadequate knowing my home will never look as beautiful as theirs. I don't have the money to buy all the decor items, and I don't have the skills of an interior stylist. But I'm here to show you that you can still decorate your home on a budget, and you don't have to go overboard. Comparison can be a horrible thing. Instead I want to focus on how cozy and beautiful I've made my house for my family to enjoy, and I hope it brings you some enjoyment as well!
The family room is where I wanted our tree to go, it has 9 foot ceilings and it's a pretty large room at 500 square feet. My husband and I bought a 6 foot tree years ago, and when we put it up last year it looked oh so sad. We knew this year we wanted the biggest tree we could fit in the room! We went with this tree from Home Depot, which I bought online when it was on sale so it ended up being $189 total. So far we're happy with it. It's large, so fluffing it takes a while. I really like that when you attach the next section of the tree, it lights up automatically. So you don't need to search for the light plug and plug in each individual section, there's just one plug that goes into the outlet. We didn't add additional lights, with 850 lights we thought it looked bright enough. There is no better lighting than a dark room with a roaring fire and a well lit Christmas tree. That's my idea of perfect lighting!
The Happy Holidays banner was given to me by a friend, and the majority of the ornaments are from Ikea along with the wrapping paper. The tree skirt was a clearance find from Target for a couple dollars years ago, and the flower and berry picks are from Dollar Tree. The gold garland is from Dollar Tree, and there is some red bead garland from Ikea at the bottom of the tree. I didn't get enough to go up to the top of the tree, but I decided to leave it on. It doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful.
The stockings are from Dollar Tree, and the fleece blankets were $4 each at Ikea. They're big and super warm and cozy, I picked them up in red, white, and gray. Great for offering to guests.
You can see I ended up swapping out the decor on the bookshelf. I started with nutcrackers, the little snow scene above, and the centerpiece from my table, along with a few little lanterns from Ikea. I ended up using the large glass container and the lanterns for my table, and for the bookshelf I kept the snow scene which I added a few little gold sparkly balls to along with some silver pine cones. The adorable print is from House of Hargrove, there are actually two side by side that make up a little village. I love them.
I hung wreaths that I got at Ikea over the blinds on our dining room window. The wreaths are quite plain, so I hung them with gray ribbon that has a nice sheen to it and added some candy cane ornaments to the wreaths. When I see candy cane ribbon I'm going to buy it and swap it out for the gray ribbon. For the table scape I kept things incredibly simple. I have silver chargers, lanterns that were $5 from Ikea, and for the centerpiece it's another charger with ornaments and a little snow scene. I also have my nativity scene displayed on our buffet. I kept that space plain and did not display additional Christmas decor, because I don't want to take away from the beauty of the manger and all of the details.
Thanks to Pinterest I was able to get some ideas for my chalkboard. I also added a little snowflake garland from Dollar Tree.
The center piece is easy to pull together. I used a silver charger, a glass jar that I filled with Epsom salt, pine cones, and an LED candle, then I used extra ornaments around the outside of the jar.
To change things up a bit on my living room picture ledges I only used items I had along with a free printable from Lucy over at Craftberry Bush. For the fall I had placed shimmery leaves in the smaller photo frames, and I kept with the same idea by using two silver snowflake ornaments I already had. In my other frames I have a Christmas picture of my daughter, and a watercolor picture I painted of a snowy tree. I also decided to display my nutcrackers on the picture ledge for now.
On my hallway picture ledge I simply added this Christmas tree banner that I got from Dollar Tree. I love the little touch of holiday spirit that it brings to this space.
That's all I have for today! Thank you for stopping by. I hope I have provided a bit of inspiration for how to decorate on a tight budget!
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