Christmas at My House

No raindrops on roses or brown paper packages tied up with string, but around the house at Christmas, these are a few of my favorite things.
The nativity scene above I scavenged at Macy's at a post-Christmas sale several years ago. One of the wise men lost his arm, but with a little glue he's good as new.

Today in school Luke and Sean made gingerbread houses. Luke dropped his walking home, but we repaired it with hot glue and I bet you can't tell! Yesterday at the Amish Market, something told me to buy peppermint sticks at the candy store. I grabbed seven of them. Two of them saved a little boy's creation today, replacing exactly the ones that broke in the fall. Five are left, two to tie to presents for niece and nephew and three for stockings. Behind them on the radiator is where I keep all of my favorite cards from years gone by...and people gone by. I like looking through them once in a while and remembering.
These are three of my favorite ornaments. I love the embroidered heart and always put it near the top. And the birds...I just like birds in my tree, the more the merrier.
This blurry picture is the mail receiving station...pictures that people send of their families lay there for us to look through...a little card holder that came free with a purchase years ago...a new Longaberger letter basket...it's more the happy things that come through this room than the things in it.
Last year Luke started making these toy soldiers on long skinny boxes that had held new sets of silverware. We have more and I'm waiting for him to make more this year. Aren't they happy little fellows?
This is the ornament that I received in Kindergarten and have hung it on my tree ever since. It also began a rocking horse ornament collection that I add to whenever I see one I especially like.
Another birdy.

And another nativity scene. In this one a different wise man lost his head in a Sean/Ruby incident. This one also came from that Macy's sale, I think I paid less than $15 for the two together, but that's the way I wanted it. I want my kids to have memories of picking up the pieces, looking at Mary and Joseph's loving faces, the peaceful animals, the wise men who came from afar and the babe who came to save.