Call me crazy, because I am clearly nuts...

We moved in to our beautiful home, 2 weeks before our wedding, which is going on 4 years ago now.  We found a beautiful home in a small town between Ames and Des Moines.  We don't live on an acreage, but we have an acre.  Our home features a beautiful wrap-around porch and it happens to be red...so it may or may not draw attention to itself.

For the past 4 years, I have been ducking a local charity group that organizes a holiday home tour fundraiser.  First, we had just moved in to our home and were not unpacked, then, I still didn't have the Christmas decor worked out the next year.  Last year, it was held 2 weeks after the birth of my monster, 1 week after I almost died (OK, that might be a little dramatic, but still) and this year, I had NO excuse and they cornered me at work...  I had to say, 'yes'...well, I felt obligated to say, 'yes'.

Please, for God's sake, can I add one more thing to my plate?   I AM crazy.

So this year, our home will be decorated for an annoying amount of time.  I usually don't decorate until the Sunday after Thanksgiving (AND you're looking at the blog screen of a girl who rips the decorations down and puts them ALL away on December 26, every year.  This year, I might have it down by Christmas Eve with all this early decorating nonsense).  

So, I am challenged to make my home completely 'Christmas-ed out' by 4pm on December 4th.  Our home is beautiful, and I do love it, but we live here!! There are baby toys, my sewing and knitting stuff that will all need to be put away, that sticky stain of who knows what on my kitchen floor to clean, the windows to wash-we haven't taken them apart to wash since we've lived here.  My life is clutter, we live clutter...and I'm going to have to pick it all up.  Where's my mom?  WAH!  I hate picking up!  The though of all the cleaning, picking up, making and decorating, it's just too much!  It makes me want to cry, it's keeping me up at night... I won't go on.

So, the next few weeks, my blog (and I promise to stay on it) will be devoted to this project.  Oh, and in the meantime, preparing for a tailgate at Kinnick Stadium that my husband will be entertaining clients for, my baby monster's first birthday-complete with homemade Sesame Street cake, balloons, the whole she-bang, all while working and supervising Guyface, making 7 carseat covers I have on order and knitting my brother mittens). After December 4th, I'm hybernating until my Mama comes some time around the 21st of December.

Many of the things, I am making myself, using ideas from magazines, Pinterest (which I am still struggling to figure out) and my imagination.  Some of the things, my gracious neighbors are lending to me-thank you neighbors!  And the other things, I have collected along the way, or my mom has passed down to me when they downsized last year.

But still, I could really use some moral support and prayers for this one.  I've never done anything like it, and really want to make sure I do this lovely structure justice.

[I'm blogging while my baby monster is throwing scented pine cones all over my living room...at least he'll smell like cinnamon for the rest of the night]

Here are a few things I have been working on since Friday night.

I bought several different kinds of greens and some wired ribbon to make these.  There will be 4 of them on the spindles of my bannister.

Here's a closer look.

Shh!  Don't tell my husband, but most of the stuff you see here I bought-can we write this off on our taxes?!

My baby monster has been enjoying himself in here messing with all my stuff.  He turns 1 Friday =(

 Here is what I'm dealing with in terms of clutter...

This was an office when we bought the house, it has turned in to my catch-all room, literally.

Sadly, I will be making lots of trips up and down the stairs.  My booty will be tight by the time I'm done taking all these things to the basement!

See, cluttered mess, including girls drawing/art supplies... You can see I have already added a few Christmas things.

The living room, see my monster's cage? =)

My kitchen is FAR too small for my liking.  Too little counter space!

I cleaned the windows on the left and right, the center one is broken and won't open...can you tell?  Awful, cloudy mess, I sure hope Pella calls me back to set an appointment to fix this.  How embarrassing!?

My silver candlesticks are polished and my everyday knick-knacks are stored away.  I'm rolling up my sleeves and ready to get to work...as soon as I retrieve my monster from the dog's water dish!