a bit of christmas

I thought I would share some of my Christmas decor.  I am always looking for the perfect mantelscape and have lots of ideas in my head but it never seems to turn out as I imagined.  Instead of greenery and red or white feathers and silver it is black and red with my angels.  I collect Jim Shore angels and usually hang them on the tree where no one can see them.  This year I decided to highlight them and show them off.  In the end I love how it turned out.

I wanted to give some of the angels height and originally I wanted to cut down some cedar 4x4 posts but when I saw the price I decided that wasn't going to work for me.  Instead I headed to the thrift store and bought two candlesticks and two small saucers all for a total of $2.50.  I unscrewed the middle from one candlestick, painted all the parts black, and set the plates on the candlesticks.  What a cheap solution and it fits better with all the other pieces.

The top of my fridge:

The kitchen windowsill:

  The nutcrackers:

The Story of our Nutcrackers 
This summer we visited Leavenworth, WA for two days and the kids (my daughter especially) had to visit the nutcracker museum.  My husband and I are not really enamored with nutcrackers but took the kids.  I did not know there were so many different kinds of nutcrackers.  We (the parents) still do not like all the shiny, glittery, fuzzy nutcrackers but appreciate the handcrafted ones.  The little guy in the top picture is in lieu of the ornaments I usually buy for my husband and I each year.  We bought him at the Christmas Market in Vancouver, BC.  He is small but totally cute and hand made in Germany.  The bigger guy I bought at Michaels.  He is made in China and is not the same quality.  He is my compromise with the kids.  They soooo wanted a nutcracker.  Every store we went into they would ask for one.  I couldn't find one that was not over the top, for us parents, until I saw this one.  He has a pretzel in one hand and a beer in the other.  The perfect "German" nutcracker.