christmas decor at comfy house

Hello friends! Thanksgiving has come and gone and it was one week ago today that Tim left for California. He had a good road trip, stopping at cool restaurants along the way in Oklahoma (Don Thomas in Pryor where he claims had the best biscuits and gravy) and Texas (The Big Texan Steak Ranch & Brewery in Amarillo), and making a four-hour stop at the Grand Canyon. Tim took photos of the Canyon with his "real" camera (he's a professional photographer) so I can't wait to see them when he gets his computer set up and has time to work on his photos.

The first few days after Tim left were hard. I had terrible anxiety the whole time he was on the road, but he was very good at keeping in touch with me. Then I was sad for a few days. But now that he's there and seems very happy, I'm feeling settled and relieved. Sure, I miss him...but I'm just happy that he's happy. 

Most of you that have followed my blog over the years know that I'm not real big on Christmas, especially since Phil passed away in 2009. Plus, with getting older, I just don't have the desire to decorate for the seasons much anymore. It's so much work and there's so much crap  stuff to store. I've been purging and donating Christmas decor every year for the past few years. We don't put up a big tree ~ too much work and no desire. We do put up a small tabletop tree but that's not decorated yet, so no photos of that to share right now.

Here's what I've done this year in the living room. I decided to go with with a natural theme...greenery, pine cones and touches of aqua, silver and white.

I may or may not hang some kind of banner from the mantel.

I love bottle brush trees and wish I had more, but I couldn't find any in the stores this year. Sold out early? These were some from last year.

Aqua baubles adorn the vintage pottery...

I saved most of the red decor for the kitchen...

When it came time to decorate the china cabinet, I didn't like the look of the dark wood on the back of the middle shelf. Previously, I had yellow and blue print scrapbook paper taped on the back. But, of course, that didn't go with Christmas decor, so I took it down.

 I tried a couple of different Christmas scrapbook papers and they didn't look good ~ they were too "busy". Then I spied aTrader Joe's bag with a simple Christmas design. It hit me - I could use that!

 OK, so I didn't measure and I didn't line the patterns up either, but I hope no one looks that close. ;-) It's funny...I'm a perfectionist in general, but not when it comes to things like that.

 Looks like I need to iron my table runner. Oh well!

 Looking from the kitchen into the living room.

The only decor in the main bathroom...touches of pink and green go well with the dark gray walls.

A little bit of decor on the dresser in the spare bedroom...

Lastly, the end of the hallway wouldn't be complete without my aunt's reindeer and sleigh that she gave me many years ago that she made in a ceramics class.

Thanks for visiting and have a wonderful weekend!