A Fresh Take

I rearrange. A lot. It keeps things fresh and new. However, it also usually creates a huge disaster that I barely finish getting cleaned up before I start another rearranging project/mess. 

With both of my boys having birthdays in November  before  Christmas, I knew we were about to have an onslaught of new toys. It was time to purge and redistribute. 

I purged and purged our school things and toys. I loved several things to their bedroom and decided it was time for the play room to be school room too! I wish I had before pictures of the 2 areas we combined, but I’m not sure you could imagine it anyway. 

Here is our playroom and school room. 

  
    
    
 
One pic of how I managed to pull EVERYTHING out and use every piece of organizational tubs and storage we own 😂

  
So it’s not this clean anymore, but we had room to add in new toys and have to make adjustments before Christmas. But it’s our place!

Inspiring Christmas

We had a Christmas open house for our church leaders & volunteers.  It was a good time to freshen up & change some things in our home. We had chocolate brown walls, and I’m kind of shocked at all of the “oh I loved your brown wall” comments we’ve received. However, the following comments are usually “but I do love this new color!”. Our first change was a new color for the front room! 

   
   
Then we moved and updated our “S” wall. It can’t really called that because I only returned one “S” and made it more of a Christmas wall this time. 

   
 
Next, we put our IKEA picture ledges back up but I went with more Christmas decor instead of pictures. Also, I added some festive banner and garland!

  
I still have a few things to add. 

I had purged and given away so much that this hand built (by my talented husband) furniture was completely empty! So it was fun to temporarily decorate with Christmas duds!

  
   
   

Adding to the mantle is always a delight! I change it up every year. 

   
 
   

These and are handmade stocking that my mother in law helped me create a few years ago. They are still a treasure to me 😍
 
I updated a beautiful shelf as well as created memories with my boys while we assembled our Nativity. 

   
 
And last, but not least, our front windows and tree!

  
   
 

Christmas Sharing

  
We started celebrating Christmas with a heart ache and a Christmas Advent Wreath tradition. 

A family we love dearly went to deliver their highly anticipated baby boy only to find out he was without a heartbeat & came into this world still born. We went to visitation to love on them and then headed home to light the first candle of advent. The first candle we lit led our discussion of hope. How fitting. 

The attempt at our serious conversation and bible time was tense because their Dadda was in bed feeling terrible. I found myself stressed and pushed to make this “good”. I finally took a breathe and realized they’re 3 & 5. If they walk away knowing Christmas is to celebrate Christ and the hope he brings, we are good. For your entertainment, here is the icing on the top of our cake of Advent Wreath candle lighting…singed hair 😳
  
Children don’t forget much. Sometimes it’s inconvenient, sometimes it’s heart warming, & other times it’s sobering. The boys love putting up our candy canes in uniform with our neighborhood. It’s a treat & the older they get, the more helpful they are, too! 

    

    
  

 

Moments like this help me take stock of what a joy our life really is compared to what we were looking at the last few years with our state of health. There have been moments I wasn’t sure my husband would be able to manage experiences like these. It also helps me realize experiences like this would not make or break our joy at Christmas. The people in these pictures and the Truth we esteem so highly that matters most.

A Celebration of Handmade

 

 I have to share these adorable shirts my boys are show casing here. 

There is a delightful vintage mercantile in downtown Wichita Falls, TX called Alley Cat. I have some beautiful handmade items left over from our sale this summer that were donated for our sale with the prayer we would raise some money to help with out medical bills. We did make a lovely dent in those bills, but could continue to use funds. I envisioned this sale based on my MS diagnosis and continual tests and medicines required. This sale happened before my husband’s diagnosis and surgery for his ankle even happened so we have used those funds, thankfully with God’s provision! 

So I paid a small booth fee and set up all of my items at Alley Cat! While I was walking through the 4 stories of antiques, handmade, & vintage delights, I came across a shop called “little h creative”. Oh my stars. These shirts were among the goodies. Prints, sewn items, shirts, galore. Go check her out on Instagram and Facebook!  I love having Christmas shirts for my boys that are easy and not over the top dressy. And they love dressing like some of their favorite young adults at our church and on our staff 😂

little h creative https://www.facebook.com/littlehcreative/