When decorating for Christmas...

...some things turned out better than I had imagined. Like this garland. We're not doing a tree this year, since we're traveling for the holidays (and we have a very eager and destructive toddler around), but I did want to have some greenery around. And it turned out all right!

I ran to Michael's and got 3 of the cheapest, ugliest garland I could find. You should have seen the look on Vance's face when I walked in....Vance-the-purist-who-abhors-fake-plants. I don't like them either, which probably helped him trust me when I promised he wouldn't be able to see the fake when I was done. Then I ran over to the Forestry Dept.'s tree sale and got them to give me all bottom branches they lop off the trees. They were happy to let me raid the stash for free. I was satisfied with my $6 experiment, and I'll have the base garland to use again next year. I got some help from the Nester here...(although my decorating taste differs from her somewhat, I enjoy her fly by the seat of your pants ethic :)

An added plus is that Claire isn't going to be destroying any ornaments this year!

Some ideas, however, didn't really work. I thought it would be so cute to make a gingerbread wreath. It was cute..until a couple hours after I put it up. If you stand really far back and squint, you can see the essence of the idea.

but if you get closer, you see that the gingerbread didn't like being squished between the door and the screened door. Neither did the bow. Neither did the star that was originally above these two guys, who is now iced to the screened door with a rag-tag assemblage of greens ripped from the top part of the wreath. I think it's time to try something new...

Fortunately, the most beautiful and wonderful things about this time of year can't get ruined by anything I do...