Christmas is coming early at my house!

I love getting ready for Christmas.  For me the lead-up & preparations for the day are just as exciting as Christmas itself. 

Don't get me wrong - I can still get rather traumatised by the whole shopping for presents experience.  It all depends on the names I get for my Kris Kingles and how early I start shopping.  This year is looking rather good, however as of today's news it looks like I need to find something else for those kids who were going to get Bindeez!

Last year at the Kmart sales I picked up a heap of "Shabby Chic" Xmas decorations at bargain prices & I've been hanging out to see what the tree looks like with all my new ornaments!  You might think it's too early to put up the tree, but I've been waiting over 10 months!

The tree doesn't actually look as green in the picture & popping the lights on for a short time each night while we sit in the lounge really creates the atmosphere of Christmas - all my childhood memories of anticipation & excitment come flooding back.

There's a beautiful shop in Main Street Croydon (VIC Aust) called Bountiful Home.  It is simply gorgeous and carries many treasures - if you are ever in the area I recommend you pop in.  This year I decided to indulge & bought myself some Xmas Bird Ornaments - see if you can find them.  Here's a close up of one:

The one thing I am not so good at is writing out & posting Xmas Cards.  This year I vow to do better.  In fact I've even begun making them.  Here's the Shabby lot:

And since not everyone can understand my dream of a shabby christmas, I'm making some more traditional ones too:

When I was a young girl, I used stay at my gradmother's for the few weeks leading up to Christmas & help her prepare the food, cake & tree.  She passed away 10 years ago but I have many special memories of these times together. 

What do you do with your family at Christmas? Do you have any family traditions? I love to hear about them.

Love Corinna

PS - A special visitor - Steph announced it's presence by yelling "Look Mum - there's a really big bug"