Marbles & the tree

Marbles the Elf is back.  I unearthed him from my Christmas crates and he is now making appearances each morning in preparation for Christmas.  This year though, we are doing it a little different.  I stole this idea off of a post I saw on FB.  Each morning Jack finds Marbles hanging out somewhere new downstairs with a note in his hands.  The note tells him something nice he should do that day - as a way to practice good behavior and learn how to be a nice person.  (I figured this would be a lot easier than this elf wrecking my house like he normally does on the Elf pictures that the internet offers.)

When Andy writes the note, it's something sweet.  When I write it, I'm usually telling him, "Dear Jack, Today is a good day to start putting your dishes in the sink after breakfast.  Love Marbles."  Now that I think of it, my new Marbles mission may have less to do with Jack becoming a better person and more with me getting some help around the house...
  

The weekend I unpacked for Christmas, we went to Lowes and picked out our Christmas tree!  Lowes is, no joke, my favorite store on the planet.  I would rather shop there than the mall any day of the week and twice on Sunday.  Especially the garden center.  And in the winter, all the Frasier firs lined up ready to be picked smell amazing!  If it weren't so cold, and if Lucy weren't recovering from her latest funk, I would have walked around for an hour out there.  But we had to get down to business.

Jack and Andy picked the perfect tree.  We needed a tall skinny one this year b/c not only did it need to fit in the corner, but I also needed to set a gate up around it so Lucy wouldn't eat the tree herself.

Jack got a big kick out of helping me hang the ornaments.  Except he put them all on the same branch.

Case in point. (He didn't seem to mind too much when I moved them around later :)  I just love that he wants to help period.

Our tall skinny tree - complete with Lucy-proof gate to protect both baby and ornaments.  

I think the sight and smell of a real tree with colored lights and personal ornaments is on my Top 10 Favorite Things Ever list.

The rest of the house is festively decorated.  At least, as much as I can with 2 kids actively destroying it in the process.

 My table - ready for the annual Glover-Brimer-Kersey Christmas dinner tomorrow! (Technically we are doing a brunch.  I finally learned my lesson last year.)

And our mantle.  With one lone stocking and a dino sticker on it.  I ordered Lucy her stocking back in November, but when I hung all of them up I didn't realize that Lucy could reach the stockings and pull them down - along with the heavy metal stocking holders on top.  So I taped the stockings up there and hers is the only one left right now.  I will need to find another successful alternative but in the meantime it's kind of funny that her angel stocking is still going strong :)