It's that time again everyone! The holiday season has begun!

Well, I feel that the holiday season started earlier this season, and I'm not just saying that. I'm only saying that because I also work at two different retail jobs inside the local mall and it is VERY noticeable when the seasonal decorations come out of storage. I had to admit, it was a little comical when I saw the red and green drapery and the wreaths hanging from the ceilings in the mall a couple weeks before Halloween.

Having Christmas decorations up before Halloween? I think that's kind of pushing it, but having Christmas decorations up around Thanksgiving? Now, that's something I could relate with. All my life I was around people who loved putting up crazy Christmas lights and decorating the house with miniature village sets that sat on pillow stuffing to make it look like snow, and my family ALWAYS plays Christmas music all day on Thanksgiving. It keeps us moving I guess. Although, I really have been taking pride in how my twin and I put up the Christmas decorations for the past couple of years. I feel like we've really been stepping it up. It's a silly thing but it's our silly thing and we like making the house look cool for the people that drive by.

But last year was a completely different story! You see, originally, we decorate the porch with our LED color lights that wrap around the porch posts, then we'd change the color to a white LED light to line the roof top, and then we'd go along the side of the lawn and go through the bushes and plants and even cover the bigger ones with a light net before we wrapped a string of lights up and around one of the trees by the sidewalk. And just for an extra bit of fun we would plug in our white metal deer as well as an inflatable snow globe that had a penguin wearing a scarf and a hat who played in the 'snow' that the globe blew into it.

And, like I said, my sister and I were VERY proud of our work, but what we noticed is that the day after we finished all of our work, our neighbor, who had done the same decorations consecutively over the past five or so years, added another inflatable snow globe that had a carousel in it! So what did we do? We went out and bought a few more strings of lights that we used to light up the plants on the opposite side of our driveway. AND BELIEVE IT OR NOT, our neighbor goes and puts up MORE lights in his yard!

My sister and I were surprised! And so as a final strike, we pulled out the big kahuna... an eleven foot tall inflatable reindeer that tilts his head from side to side!! HE'S HUGE!!! And he's very difficult to not see! My sister and I feel that we won that decoration war and we are currently in the midst of putting together the decorations for this year. We will be having the big 'ol reindeer and the penguin in the snow globe as well as a brand new inflatable! (Here's a hint: He's twelve feet tall and loves milk and cookies!)
I hope all of you guys have fun this holiday season and that it fills you with as much happiness as it does me just to smell thee fall air and think of family. I hope you find inspiration decorating the house, playing in the snow (or just the cold weather, like me!),maybe you use this time to spread the love by doing charity work or just enjoy hanging out with people that you love! I know I am!

Happy Holidays from California!!!