Our Home is the Winner...

Today was a big day for us!  It was the Northview Home Tour (http://northview.org/adults/women/christmas_home_tour/).  We opened up our home for a few HUNDRED people to tour and see our Christmas decorating.  All the funds went to support a local ministry called the Cyrus Centre which helps struggling youth. 

David and I (and our dear friend Jenn!) spent an entire month decorating, shopping, and cleaning.  It's been a blast (well for me, at least...David probably could've lived without all this work)!  We were quite happy with the results as we marveled and prepared for last night's pre-tour for the home owners.

Then, we started walking through the other homes.  WOW.  These houses were MANSIONS!  I'm talking 11,000 square feet of heated marble floors, hand finished venetian plastered walls, stone baseboards, arched metal ceilings, hand crocheted bedspreads from France, fireplaces in BATHROOMS, stone work on 40 acre mountain view lots, the list goes on and on...

So, by the end of the tour we officially designated ourselves as the WINNER OF THE BEST SUPPORTING ROLE: OUR HOUSE MAKES ALL THE OTHER ONES LOOK HUGE!

{What can we say? We do what we can!}

But, hey?  Someone's gotta get that award, right?  Honestly, it was so neat to see people enjoy our home and fill it with love and laughter.  It was especially touching to know that people felt cozy and welcome here - I think what they really felt is LOVE.

Thank you to everyone who shared our home with us.  It was a tremendous blessing to be a small part of a great project in our community!  If you weren't able to tour our home today, then let me give you a little personal one via blogland ;)

As you enter our front door, this is what you'll see...Welcome to a Winter Wonderland!

These pillows were made using iron-on transfers from Staples.  I purchased the images from Etsy.com at the Graphique store.  They're only $1!  

Here are a few views of the Christmas Tree.  This is a real tree - I think maybe the only real tree on the tour??  It's a Noble Fir from Ledgeview farms - we cut it down ourselves, and LOVE the scent.  I have to admit, it wasn't the easiest tree to work with, because it's not a very full tree.  But, with Jenn's brilliance we came up with some ways to fill it in using mesh bows, poinsettias, and glittery sprigs.  We love the colours!

The silhouettes are now donning Christmas wrapping paper as their festive backdrop.  We had to take down our coffee table to make this room work with a tree in it!  But, I love having it in the front window for all to see :)

We hung the stockings along the banister this year - I got each of them engraved with our names :)  The dangling black snowflakes are a symbol of the Earth's pollution problem...no, just kidding!  They just worked with my decor - lol.  They're actually placemats from Canadian Superstore with a thread through them ;)

Here's a view of the whole room as you're going upstairs:

Before we head upstairs on our little tour, though...let's have a look at the main living, kitchen, and dining areas...

Along the island, we served cranberry lime punch and chocolates.  We also had a little notice about my dear friend Kristin Erickson who has recently been diagnosed with cancer.  We raised money by selling bracelets during the tour to support her family of four children...over $130 in one day!!!  It was incredible to hear how many people ALREADY KNEW HER and had read her blog here: http://www.canadiankristinconnected.blogspot.ca/

The dining room was completely set with our nice china (which I bragged about how our family had given it to us as wedding gifts - thank you again!)  We put Mary, Joseph, Shepherd, and Wiseman on the name cards - lol ;)

The Living Room was definitely one of my favourite areas, because it really features the nativity scene, which was a graduation gift to me from my family (thank you!) David built the cresch for it himself, and even made the manger by hand.  So special.  

We have a DOZEN decorated Christmas trees on our huge mantel...I love how the nativity looks like it's sitting in the middle of a beautiful forest :)

I created the banner (thank you to so many friends for your consultation on this project!) using cardstock, modge podge, glitter, and my cricut machine.  On the other side, its says Happy Birthday! so we can reuse it over and over through the years :)

Cosmic Christmas by Max Lucado is our favourite Christmas storybook about the angel who brought Jesus' spirit to Mary's womb...so incredible!  Thanks to David's parents for this awesome tradition - we read half the story Christmas Eve and the other half in the morning.

This Oh Holy Night was a free printable that I found on pinterest and is available here: http://akadesign.ca/oh-holy-night-free-christmas-printable/  Yes, that's right: it's FREE and you just PRINT IT.  Thank you akadesign!!!!

And, a quick note about bathrooms...they're odd little areas to decorate!  I searched high and low for festive shower curtain and towel sets...but there was nothing out there!  So, I tried to work with what we had...Here's the front powder room in red and white:

The guest bath upstairs already has a letter theme going on, so I just added to it:

We simply dangled pretty ornaments along our master shower curtain and called it a day:

Alright...ready to head upstairs???

Our bedroom took on a feathery bird theme:

We did a wreath above our bed and also one on the closet door.  These were feathery wreaths I had originally bought for Halloween, but then added the purple bits to Christmas-it-up!

And, here's our romantic tree inspired by the new gift shop in town, Spruce Collective: http://www.sprucecollective.com/

I made these sparkling words with my cricut and more glitter!

Candles EVERYWHERE!  It smells so good in our house right now!

Ornaments dangling from the curtain rods:

More iron-on special pillows:

Now for the finale!  Evalie's sweet adorable room!!!!  We love her nursery anyway, but then dressing it up for Chrismtas?!  What can be prettier?

Her own little mini tree and dozens of snowflakes dancing above her crib:

THANKS FOR LOOKING!!!!!!  Now we're going to sit back, sip some tea, and enjoy our clean already decorated house for the holidays :)