Christmas!!!! (Part 2)
I wrote my Christmas Part 1 post in November and promised to have another part to show all that we did to decorate Lil Blue for the holidays. Even though Christmas and New Years have both passed, it's never too late to enjoy the season and some decorations.
I was a little over zealous with my plans and ideas for what I wanted to do in the house. Once I got started, I realized I would have to scale back as things were already looking a tiny bit cramped and cluttered and I quickly ran out of space for all of my ideas. Originally, I wanted to hang a garland on our loft and down our ladder. We separated our Christmas ornaments so we could still hang our favorites off of the garland since we knew we wouldn't have space for a tree. However, we never got around to buying or making our garland and it was probably for the better. That might still be a fun option for next year but we had plenty going on without it for this first Christmas in the house.
We wanted to hang our stockings somewhere but had no space for them on our walls or any available area for them to be hung by our stocking hangers. So, since we shower at the YMCA and not in our own bathroom (that's another post but long story short, we have to haul in our water) we decided to fold our towels away and hang our stockings on those hooks in our bathroom. They brought some festive cheer to another part of the house and we liked looking at them through the doorway.
I really wanted to find a way to have any size of a real tree but we just couldn't make it work. Having a tree is important to me and adds to the festivity so I had to come up with ideas that wouldn't take up any space. I decided to make a felt tree that I could hang on our curtains. We have a large window in our "living room" with long white curtains. Our electric fireplace is right under this window and I thought it would be cute to enjoy the tree and the fireplace together. It was fun and easy to make and I have enjoyed celebrating with a tree in our home that didn't take up any space. I will post a tutorial later on with instructions on how to make this tree for anyone who is interested. And the best part, when walking up to the house at night, the tree was silhouetted against the window and we could pretend that it looked like a real tree.
Jordan and I made an Advent calendar a few years ago. We had different sized boxes and made 25 dioramas (winter-y and Christmas-y scenes) that are unveiled each day. We put magnets on the back of each box and stuck them to our freezer door. Again, we could enjoy a fun aspect of the Christmas season that we look forward to each year, without having to sacrifice space in our home.
I took all of our usual decorations off of our wood shelves and put up the rest of our favorite Christmas things. I hung sparkly star ornaments off each shelf, had our Nutcracker dancing girl garland strung over another window, snowflakes dotted our kitchen window, and I made a snowflake chandelier that hung on our ceiling just beyond our loft. We topped everything off with a light-up wreath on our stairs outside and called it good for this season. It was fun, cozy, and beautiful. I enjoy seasonal decorating and it was fun to see that we could still do that in such a small space.
Any of you thinking about tiny house living, rest assured that you can still enjoy the small changes in your home that make different times of the year special, without having to store too much or give up too much space. All of our decorations fit inside one tote that we can store in our family's basement. :)