Like many people, Christmas is my favorite time of year. The sights. The sounds. The smells. The traditions. It's just magical. I absolutely love every part of the season.
This year, though, seems different. Still wonderful, just different. It's strange to see Christmas trees, decorations, and lights in 80 degree weather, with palm trees and sunshine outside. Hearing Christmas songs like "Let it Snow!" or "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas" is almost comical. Don't get me wrong, Christmastime in Hawaii is great, but it doesn't feel quite the same. Nevertheless, I was determined to make our home feel "cozy and warm" for the holidays. The Christmas music came on (of course, with some Hawaiian additions), the decorations came out, and slowly, but surely, it began to feel a little more like Christmas.
This is our first Christmas in our Hawaii home, so it was fun to add new decorations and find new ways of arranging old ones.
[Side note: I use the fact that we had a winter wedding to justify the amount of Christmas decorations we have. A few people buy it...]
Also, I broke my own rule and busted out the Christmas decorations a week before Thanksgiving this year. Guilty, I know. Don't judge.
New additions...
Inspired by Pinterest, I wanted to "enhance" our string of Christmas lights for the banister lining the stairs. I've seen many variations on Pinterest, including tying tulle or ribbon in between the lights, and I love them all. But I decided to use some Hawaiian fabric that I found at a flea market. It took a while to complete, but I'm really happy with the way it came out.
Also, thanks to Pinterest, I added some Christmas prints to our decor this year.
Advent...
My mom started one of my favorite Christmas traditions during my freshman year of college. At the end of my Thanksgiving break, she handed me a huge box wrapped in Christmas paper. She told me it was my "Advent box." Inside, there were individually wrapped and numbered gifts - one for each day until I'd return home for Christmas break. Gifts included things like candy to share with my roommate/friends, decorations for my dorm room, snacks to get me through finals week and other small Christmas favorites from home. She continued this tradition throughout my college years (and for my siblings throughout their college years).
To my surprise, though, she continued making an advent box for us when we got married and moved away. For the past two years, Dan and I (and Sydney) enjoyed opening the numbered gifts. I didn't expect to get a box this year (for good reasons), but we were pleasantly surprised to, yet again, receive such a special. It's truly a labor of love. And I love the personalized notes on some of the gifts this year...
The paper chain Christmas countdown was also new to our home this year and another way to celebrate the advent season.
Our Tree...
My parents bought us our Christmas tree when we first got married. It's small and artificial, but it's been perfect for us thus far. Someday when we live in a house and not an apartment or townhouse, I'd love to have a real tree. But in the meantime, I love our little tree. This year, being in a new space, I really wanted to be able to see the tree from outside the front windows, so I put the tree on a small coffee table to give it a few extra feet of height. It's perfect.
This next picture is cheesy, I know, but I was really missing snow the other night so I downloaded an app that adds snow to any picture. It's even more magical now...
Ornaments...
When we first got married, we started the tradition of buying each other a new ornament for the tree each year. This year, we kind of went overboard and bought several "Hawaii" ornaments. In addition, we received a few ornaments in our advent box.
My mom couldn't resist the next two, both especially perfect for 2012: the "shave ice" daughter ornament and the doctor ornament for Dan.
The next ornament is one that I picked at our church's cookie/ornament exchange. I'm really thankful for the amazing women I've met through our church, and the party was such a fun evening. My ornament is extra special because my friend Lindsey had bought it, and I picked it without knowing.
This ornament is not new, but it was "rediscovered" this year and deserves to be featured:
Around the house...
I think next year I'll have to come up with something new for our Christmas cards. Our display is just too small. I apologize if your card didn't make the board. (It was kind of a first come, first serve thing) But the bucket contains the overflow cards and photos, and we feel incredibly loved by friends and family from afar, so thank you!
Gifts...
This is our first Christmas away from family, which meant gift-giving looked a little different this year. It required a bit more planning ahead since packages needed to be mailed to our families. So far, we have received several Christmas care packages from loved ones, and we feel truly blessed.
Another gift-giving tradition that I love is wrapping presents. Not just any paper will do, as I learned from my mother. My mom is the master wrapper. Each year, she picks a theme and each person gets their own paper to go along with the theme. She doesn't stop with paper, though. My mom beautifully adorns presents with ornaments and ribbon and bows to goes along with the year's theme. Then, on Christmas morning, each person has their own pile of presents. So without having to label every gift, everyone knows which gift is theirs.
On a much, much smaller scale, I continued the wrapping paper tradition in our home. For the past two years, Dan and I each picked out a role of paper for each other, but they had to kind of "match" each other color-scheme wise. Then we found ribbons and bows to match as well. This year, we used up some old roles of paper that I had bought from Target during their after-Christmas sale a few years ago.
[Note: I would not ever recommend using glittered wrapping paper. Our house is seriously a glittery mess, but at least the presents look pretty!]
And so, I have learned that no matter where you celebrate, Christmas is a special time of year. Just because things are new and different, doesn't mean they're wrong or bad. We miss our friends and family terribly, but we're thankful to be able to celebrate with them from afar. And we're excited for new traditions and Christmas experiences.
Merry Christmas!
Keep Smiling...
