Lead Me: Cregars Do Christmas: Part 2

***Originally posted on cregarstyle on December 10, 2014***

Earlier this week I posted part 1 of this mini series with all of our outdoor decorations and I am loving showing off our Christmas decorations! Today I am excited to share our indoor holiday spirit. If my husband is the one who goes overboard on the christmas lights, then I am sure he would say I am the one who goes overboard on the indoor décor.

A little back story is probably necessary so you don't think I have an addiction. When I was a child, my parents gave my brother and me each either an ornament or a nutcracker each year. Our childhood home was filled with probably 16 nutcrackers and our tree was full of memories in the form of ornaments. After this last Christmas my parents decided it was time for my brother and I to take our ornaments and nutcrackers with us, as there would be no more Christmas holidays for us in that home. It was really the perfect transition because in 2014 my brother would move out on his own, Aaron and I got married, and my parents sold the house to migrate south to Florida (they aren't as old as they sound).

This year is the first year that we (Aaron and I) have had ALL of my childhood decorations to put up around the house. Our small home is now decorated with 10 nutcrackers: 7 that were mine, 2 that were Aaron's (gifts from my parents welcoming him to the family), and 1 that is a black lab for our lab/pit mix, Delilah. It may be nutcracker overload, but it just feels like home to me.

Our nativity scene between two nutcrackers

The year Aaron graduated and commissioned into the Army my parents gave him this soldier.

My husband is an avid golfer

Skinny Santa is standing next to an incense burner from Germany that blows smoke out his mouth!

Old world Santa next to our Delilah nutcracker

On the right is the first ever nutcracker I got from my aunt.

We also have some returning decorations along with some new additions this year. We picked up this "JOY" tea candle holder last year and this year found a "NOEL" one that is similar, but instead of candles has lights in it. Of course we have our garlands with multi-colored lights in there too. Our nativity scene is one my mother gave me, but is missing a manger so we are on the hunt for an appropriately sized manger to add to the mix.

We picked up this advent calendar on Black Friday this year and it has been fun for us to use. There are 25 ornaments that you can mix up, with the exception of the one for Christmas Day, and put on the tree in any order. Each day we turn over one and it has something for us to do each day. Some ornaments say "go ice skating" while others say "make holiday cookies" or "decorate Christmas tree". This will definitely be a fun tradition to do with our kids one day.

This cute Christmas tree used to be a spinning music box, but I guess at some point the music box broke and my parents removed it. Now its just a cute little statue (I guess that is what it would be called).

Last, but not least, is our tree! Being an Oregonian, it nearly killed me to buy a fake tree this year. However, we found a douglas fir, the state tree of Oregon (thank you Mr. Ragno's 4th grade class), on a major sale and figured we should pick one up since we won't always be able to purchase a real tree depending on where the Army sends us. We were also going to be doing some traveling on and off through December and wanted to be able to leave without worrying about the tree drying out and dropping needles. It was much easier to assemble than I thought. Or I should say, it looked much easier as I sat and watched Aaron assemble it.

Aaron strung the lights on it (multi-colored with some strands blinking) and I did the ornaments. Last year we didn't have many ornaments so we had added tons of candy canes to our tree to fill it up, but this year it was so nice to have all of my childhood ornaments combined with the ones Aaron and I had picked up over the last year. Here is a look at some of my favorites.