♔La Petite Maison Blanche: Christmas Home 2023

Well at this moment I am packing the very last of Christmas away. A fine dusting of glitter and sparkles is coating me and the house, lol. About the time I get the last of the glitter it will be time to decorate for Christmas all over again. This year was very special to me as we celebrated with family after nearly 10 years apart. We hosted our grand children for the very first time and we have not laughed so hard in years! Watching my husband engage with everyone and play with our grans was an answer to so many prayers. Restoration has never been so beautiful. As I sit back and reflect on it all, I am amazed at how God's timing works. How His miracles happen and how He answers even the smallest of prayers. Admittedly I do not understand His ways at times, but I still choose to put my trust in Him in all things.

We also had beautiful times with friends and clients. I had so much fun making gift baskets, though it did wear me out more than it ever has in the past Christmases. The stores are so very crowded, and the older I get the less I want to be in crowds. I shopped early starting at the end of October and am glad I did. There was almost nothing left by late November. I had so much fun making the Christmas candles this year, they came out so elegant and the smell was the best I have ever created!

I purposed to slow down a bit each day and focus on the beauty of Christmas and what the real meaning is. I am so grateful for the virgin birth of Jesus Christ our Lord, His atoning sacrifice and His eternal love. Jesus is the true reason for Christmas. It is easy to lose site of that, but pausing to be still reminds me of that. I read a chapter in Luke each day and worked on a Christmas Advent devotional for part of the month. It still went by so fast and I wish time would just slow down at times and that we could rest and enjoy life more than we do.

It took me longer this year to decorate because my back and feet are worse than last year. I am so grateful that we are well this year. Last year's sick season was horrifically bad for us and our extended families. I was very excited to get to decorate the outside of the house with my Grandma's vintage Nativity set from Meier & Frank. It is a little worse for wear but still beautiful. She collected a new piece each year with my Mom. The Holy family was the first pieces she collected and it happened to be our first married Christmas in 1989. I miss my Grandma, but think she would be proud of the woman I have become and that means a lot to me. She wrote me a beautiful letter saying how proud she was of the way I was raising our daughters, the Mother I was and the woman I had become, years before she passed. I will always treasure that letter. I love to put out things at Christmas from our dear departed loved ones so it feels, somehow as though they are still with us at family gatherings.

I hope in the coming New year, the Lord blesses you with peace, hope, love, faith, health, comfort and restoration, especially for those in a season of loss or pain. Without further ado here is the house all dressed up for Christmas. I am inserting a couple of short videos links from my youtube channel at the very end of the post! Welcome in friends, grab a cup of cocoa and stay awhile.....

The dining room is my fav to decorate in the house. I know a formal dining room is old fashioned but I love it!

A few years ago my husband and I did a Christmas tree urn stand project and we use it every year. The rest of the year it stays in the breakfast nook corner with plats on it. I dropped it while moving it and nearly crushed my foot! Hazards of a serial decorator!

This gorgeous vintage crystal Waterford tree topper was gifted to me a few seasons ago by my Mother and I just lost the elegance of it.

I remade this Santa that was my Mom's with colours that where more modern and to my liking. Silvers, greys, blacks, whites and pewters are my favs. I remade this vintage 1970's madame Alexander doll into Mrs. Claus.

Vintage mirrors are so lovely. I like to imagine who may have owned it and looked in it before me. I used a vintage beveled clear stained glass from a piece of furniture in my childhood on the large mirror and the other two pieces and artist created for me. So pretty. I added snowflake ornament to them with hot glue to make them more festive.

My eldest daughter named the elves my Mom made in the early 90's Winky the elf. Well winky got an update from burgundy and gold to colours more suitable to my decor. Was fun remaking him, brought back memories of past Christmases.

Twas the night before Jesus came poem framed. Such a neat little poem to really get us to rethink our priorities.

Some of my Winter Elegance candles I made this year. I found these beautiful chenielle snowflake blankets that matched my pillows at Ross this year. I love Ross!

My Grandma's vintage glass trees. I broke one last year. So glad these made it through our move.

Fun having a real mantle to decorate. I found this gorgeous French 1950's cast iron fireplace grate. It was gold and I refinished it with white heat paint.

Fun decorating the kitchen too! I love vintage glass and crystal...and some more of my homemade candles.

I love hot gluing snowflakes ornaments to things to add some sparkle and glam it up a bit! This reindeer sleigh is very sentimental. I purchased it at an old store called Tiffany's our first married Christmas. It has been on every move with us and not a crack!

My Mom purchased this for me just days before Tuesday Morning store went out of business years ago on one of our Christmas special outing we used to take. She is now too handicap to do outings like that any longer. We have our precious memories that remain in our hearts.

These are vintage 90's Kirkland elves that my Mom and I remade and collaborated on together. We remade them right before my surgery in 2019. She was so worried about me and really wanted to make these to enjoy while in recovery that Christmas. It hurt her hands to sew the pants but she did it anyway. A Mother's love can never be replaced.

I am a Nutcraker-a-holic! I added this faux glass ones along with these deer to my collection this year from Ross.

They guard my glass and crystal cabinet from all thieves in December! They take their job very seriously.

And then there is my all white Christmas town I call Snowflake township. It is mostly town pieces my Mom gave me and two from my girls childhood. I painted them all white added faux snow and sparkle. Added green foliage.This is the church I added a lenox crystal tree with a light inside the church.