a glimpse of gilbert christmas

this last weekend, taylor and I finally decorated for christmas!

I had been anxiously waiting for weeks to pull out our christmas decorations.

this year, I decided to do something a little unconventional (at least in our home) and let taylor take the reins of decorating our home.

it was completely entertaining--and even somewhat surprising.

I had no idea he was so particular about HOW a tree should be decorated.

I guess he was really good at just following my lead the last few years, but this year there were rules to decorating:

we do one type of ornament at a time

you must back up and observe the tree before placing the item

the hook must be wrapped around the tree branch so not a single one falls off 

also, somehow we now have our love seat in our bedroom?

not really sure how that happened.

but I guess rearranging furniture was also part of christmas decorating in taylor's book.

but I told taylor, "yay! now you have a new bed in our bedroom!" HAHA

we ended up with tinsel everyyyywhere. which is not my favorite thing.

and I couldn't help but burst into laughter when I came out of the kitchen and saw that every frame had tinsel wrapped around it.

who doesn't want tinsel wrapped around every frame, right?

HA

it's horrible guys--but taylor loves it so much, I can't help but love it a little bit too.

but THEN, he came up with cute stuff like this!

hanging these little bells above the tv.

one of my favorite new decorations this year!

and this!

he put wrapping paper behind a few frames and put "from santa" tags on the inside!

I think he's more creative than I am--I would have never thought of this without pinterest. ha

oh, and don't worry--he chose the most kiddish wrapping paper he could find. HA

there were a few feminine touches along the way, but most of it screams "taylor decorated this"

and even though our house doesn't look very magazine material, I think I love it 10x more than I ever have.

we ended the night by watching a cheesy christmas movie on netflix while drinking hot chocolate.

pretty perfect night, if you ask me!

also--make sure to come back tomorrow!

I am teaming up with the cutest girls to give away a $250 CHRISTMAS GIFTCARD!

How awesome!

hope all of you are gearing up for the best time of the year!

and p.s. look what my students did today!

there are snowflakes EVERYWHERE!

and please notice the little trees at the front!

our goal is to have enough christmas lights so that we don't have to turn on the classroom light for all of december. it's happening!

happy december!!