The Joy of Decorating

We put our Christmas tree up last weekend but because I left for training on Sunday night, I only had time to put the lights on. Today (a week later) we finally found time to decorate it. I am SO glad that we did not decorate it during Emma's nap because she had the best time helping us decorate it. She was giddy from beginning to end! In our heads we had pictured decorating a tree with a toddler would turn out to be a complete disaster, but instead we all laughed the whole time. And to top it off we finished the decorating in half the time that it usually takes us since we had Emma constantly handing us ornament after ornament before we even had time to put the last ones on. Seeing the joy on her face really put us in the holiday spirit!

Emma found a few special ornaments that she didn't allow us to actually put on the tree until the very end (a cat, a Mickey Mouse, a cowbell {Go Dawgs!}, and an airplane). It was funny watching her put up an ornament as she tried to hold on to three or four other ones at the same time. We did end up having a TON of ornaments at the very bottom and then a very bare middle section...Josh and I filled that part in once we noticed it. Here a couple of pictures of Emma putting up a few ornaments at the very end -- we didn't have time before that to get the camera out!

Emma LOVED this nativity scene set:

She's still playing with it while I'm decorating the mantel:

Mantel all finished - complete with "Bob" and his Santa hat!

These are our stocking holders which my Mom made, aren't they adorable?

And the finished product: