Pre-Christmas Randomness.....

 To begin our random holiday post.....

Listen to Amazing Grace choreographed to this homeowners Christmas lights....

 Pretty cool, huh?

 If you are looking for some very cute gift tags...I found these reindeer ones here:

  I just printed them out on white cardstock, but you could even use printer paper if you wanted to.

 Having family over Christmas Eve, and we traditionally do just appetizers and desserts.

Baked Brie en Croute is a MUST; but I have been looking up some other fun appetizers too.

Spent the day yesterday making a boatload of homemade biscotti....

 Speaking of cookies...take a look at what this true genius/artist did with a bowl full of

cookie dough!

Click here 

Remember me talking about buying gold letters a while back at Restoration Hardware?

I had an idea for them when I saw them and here it is, below...

 The kids Christmas stockings have always been way too small, so I picked up some huge wool stockings at Bennington Pottery last weekend.

I looooove them.

LOTS of room for fun stuff.

My angel was looking rather plain, so I dressed her up with some fresh greenery cut off the bottom of our Christmas tree. (Yes, we finally got our tree! Pictures below)

 I did an impromptu photo shoot yesterday with Taylor and her two friends K. and H.

Aren't they so cute?

I picked Taylor up from college the end of last week and did a little shopping in downtown Burlington.

There was LOTS of snow, lots of slush, but lots of cute things to buy...

 We were lucky to have Taylor's friends K. and M. with us in Burlington...it made for a fun day and night.

Lots of beautiful homes are decorated for the holidays in Burlington.

 We also had K and M's mom's with us :)

We had dinner at a restaurant with a cozy fire in the lobby, which was wonderful and welcome after walking from our hotel to the restaurant.

Burlington is COLD, and it was snowing. Hard. 

(did I tell you that already? Ya..it was, and I didn't have boots! I mistakenly thought that if CT didn't have snow, then no one did..hahahahha)

Taylor and M strolling down Church Street.

 Took some pictures of the glass displays in the window of Bennington Pottery...

 ...and the ornament display at the front register.

Taylor thought this poster was awesome..lol.

Since Joe was home from college by the time we got back home, it was

finally time to go and get our TREE. Hooray!

Taylor and Mikko drove the truck.

 While Joe and Jim searched for trees, Taylor and I had fun.

Still looking...

After much debate, we found one we could all agree on. 

(either that, or we all just got cold, and the next one we saw we said "that one!")

Hauling it back to the truck..

 Joe and Tay (with Mikko riding shotgun) were in charge of delivering the tree home safely.

Off they go...

Until next year....

Next step, once you get it home, is Jim's least favorite part of a live tree.

Fitting it into the stand.

Ugh.

But Joe helped, and it went pretty quickly.

  Jim and I quickly hung the lights,

and got the angel ready for the tree topper.

She used to have a staff she carried, but that was lost several years ago.

We still love her.

Joe carefully adds her to the top...

 ...and next is the fun part...ornaments!

Meanwhile, I experimented with bokeh....

All is calm, all is bright....