What Christmas Looks Like at Our House: Part II

I hope all of you had a wonderful December weekend.

Mine was wonderful, but ended with a sick feverish child by Sunday night.

I hate all the yucky germs that get passed around during these cooler months.

But lucky for her {and us}, this was the first weekend we were able to enjoy a fire in our fireplace.

We've lived in our fixer upper for nearly 2.5 years now and this was such a sweet reward for all the hard work we've done around here since then.

It brings such a cozy feeling to our home, which is especially nice when you're not feeling well. :)

The smell coming from the fire is amazing too {reminds me of camping}. I'm looking forward to smelling it all winter long.

Okay, so besides the addition of a fire in the fireplace that adds to the coziness of what Christmas looks like around here, here's the 411 on how I decorated the fireplace for Christmas:

I kept it simple, using the traditional Christmas colors of red, white and green and then I decided that I liked the contrasting color of turquoise mixed in there too.

Using the same 1.99 roll of ribbon that I used here, I looped the ribbon across the mantel to add additional focus to the stockings.

The greenery on top of the mantel is from some fresh pine trimmings from our live Christmas tree.

{Do you do real or fake Christmas trees at your home? I love the smell of real trees!!!}

The two white vases, the statue of Christ {very appropriate for this special season}, and the white clock are staples on my mantle and are pretty much there for every season I decorate for.

The frames were a fun simple project I did a couple of weeks ago. I love the pop of color they add.

Both frames are from Michael's. I bought them at two different times, but each time I went I used a 40% off coupon to buy them. So I think they each cost me between four and five dollars. Not bad huh? I love the thin black lines of them and the simple white matting {all included, by the way}.

I filled each frame with turquoise scrapbook paper and then added a gold snowflake ornament to one and a white snowflake ornament to the other. {Both ornaments were bought after Christmas last year for like, pennies!} I didn't have to glue or tape the ornaments to the scrapbook paper to make them stay in place. Stuck between the back of the frame and the glass, they are held in there pretty snug.

As for our stockings, the kiddos each have one with their name embroidered on it from Pottery Barn, bought a couple of years ago on a fantastic Cyber Monday sale. The two plain red ones at either end were bought at the Dollar Tree several years ago for my husband and I when we were just newlyweds.

And that's that.

Simple + inexpensive + pretty.

Is your home all ready for Christmas yet or are you still tweaking it some more?

I'm pretty much done, minus one little project. As long as child number one isn't feeling too terrible tomorrow, I'll be back with part III of "What Christmas Looks Like at Our House".

~ Have a great day everyone!

Shared my mantle here: Home Stories A to Z