Another collection I bring out every year at Christmastime is our Christmas picture books and music.  I don’t know about you all, but I always put away the Christmas books during the rest of the year so they are fresh and exciting to look at every Christmas  season.  That’s what my mom did, so that’s [...]

The Villages The first Christmas that  we were married, I started collecting those little lighted Christmas houses by  Department56, and over the years my collection has grown exponentially. I have collections from  both the Snow  Village and Christmas  in the City. Last year we were too overwhelmed with a new house and a new  baby [...]

One of my favorite things to bring out at Christmastime is my Christmas dishes. I have accumulated almost a complete set of the Spode  Christmas Tree dishes over the years.  The nice thing about these dishes is they are casual enough for everyday use and nice enough for company.  So I actually put away my [...]

Another one of my favorite family Christmas traditions is collecting ornaments. Every year I buy the kids each their own ornament. As they get old enough, I let them pick out their own.  I label them with the year and write a little note with them about how and why we chose that one.  It [...]

I can never say the word "tradition" without wanting to sing it like in  Fiddler on the Roof. I love hearing about people’s holiday traditions. So  I am going to start a series of posts sharing about ours. The Christmas Season in our family officially begins the day after Thanksgiving.  On Black Friday, when half [...]