It’s Christmastime here in our tiny apartment. I’m used to having a whole big farmhouse all decorated in greenery and snowmen. But here, we have neither greenery nor snowmen.

What we do have is Christmas spirit! Or rather, I have that and Hubs just plays along to make me happy. Don’t get me wrong, he had fun decorating our tree, but he certainly wouldn’t have fretted too much if we had decided we didn’t have room for a tree.

But…never fear, because Christmas is here!

Ta-da!

Yup, that’s our first Christmas tree, folks. I’m proud we decorated frugally, so I’ll share what we learned in this adventure.

First of all, make stuff yourself! Like these trees! (That I’ll post about later!)

Yup, I like paper crafts. And pine cones, from my parents' yard at home, in our fruit bowl.

It’s part of the little scene on top of bookshelf #1

Candles are from my mom's unused decor box. They're several years old, but certainly still look pretty.

And the nativity set? Another tip, “re-use.”

I bought this YEARS ago during a sale of wood-carved products from Bethlehem at my church. It's all we have for now.

I also have a tree like that on the shelf in our living room.

I got the idea from here.

With our "love dove," candlestick, and our freshly printed free subway art, of course, see how we re-purpose?.

The print is from here.

And I HAVE to show you the adorable place mats my mother-in-law made for me. How adorable are they?

Sooooo cute!

And our second kind of paper trees, the folded ones I made, and I’ll post about, with our growing collection of Christmas cards.

It's a wintery forest in our pass-through! Oh, and there's the poinsettia that may or may not make it until Christmas...

I got the ideas for the trees from the mothership, Martha, of course.

And we also have stockings! But as the title of this post suggests, we had a bit of a dilemma when deciding where to hang them, as we have no fireplace.

But we got a shelf from my parents’ basement. (It’s a wonderland of usable stuff down there, though my mother’s probably horrified I’m admitting how much is down there. Sorry, Mom!)

Hubs painted it white, and I sanded it down to give it that vintage look I like. It’s old enough to really be vintage, it just needed a little love.

The stockings we made for each other. He made mine several years ago. I made his a few weeks ago.

See, we can even make our own stockings! His is made from an old pair of jeans. And since we don’t have a sewing machine and Hubs would have FREAKED if I’d tried to smuggle it home, I had to sew it by hand, which took…awhile.

Here’s the whole look that greets you when you come in our front door by the kitchen now:

Decorated with candles and a free picture frame (from the church) to which I added a cute Christmas scrap-booking paper I already had, and a framed, free Christmas printable.

Print from tatertots and jello.

Closer look at the frame. Love it!

Cute!

There, our stockings are all ready to be filled up with fun little gifts.

And in the spirit of giving, I’m going to GIVE you all a little tour of our tree.

Here's our initial ornaments. I can't remember where or why we have these, if they're from you, thanks!

Here we go, a cute little “S” I got from the church I volunteer at.

You'll also see the red swirl ornaments Hubs picked out for us to buy, and a preview of the paper hearts I made. And the craft ribbon I had that we used as a garland.

Here’s one I made last year at school.

It's glow in the dark!

And the ornaments from my childhood that I collected as a kid but that haven’t been hanging on our family tree in a long time:

I have the whole series of these little books. They open and close and have such cute little scenes in them.

Oh, and you want to see the ornaments I made?

My paper hearts! I love how they turned out. I'll post instructions soon.

Here’s some more…

I bought this one ($2) because it reminded me of "happy wife, happy life." Or a happy hubs... (It went with a matching Merry Christmas one, but I liked this message even better than just wishing a Merry Christmas. I'm wishing y'all a Happy Everything!)

Oh and just to make sure I represent,

Am I happy Pujols left? Nope. But can he do what he wants? Yup. Besides, my man Molina is still there! And that's all I'm going to say about it. Oh, and don't forget the edible decorations, the candy canes!

It makes my heart happy to have our tree up and looking so festive. Who cares if our ornaments and decorations are a bit skimpy and we only spent 5 bucks on our tree. I say it’s beautiful!

Happy home.

16 Thoughts on “Our stockings are hung…by the kitchen with care…”

  • I’ve been following you for awhile now…just happened to stumble on your blog. I absolutely love it! You and your husband remind me of my finace and I. We are college seniors and will be graduating in May and getting married August 4th. I love at how frugal you try to be with everything, realizing that while you don’t have much, you still make such a happy life for your husband and yourself. It’s just a reminder to me that starting off in marriage may be financially tough, but we will get through it just like y’all.

    LOVE the placemats and the paper made Christmas trees! You always come up with such cute ideas! Also love the STL cards ornament. I’m originally from an hour south of STL. Always look forward to reading your blog, and hearing the realness and honesty of your life and relationship. Thank you!

    • Hi Christa! Thanks so much for reading and the great comment! Welcome!
      I’m glad you can relate! I know being frugal isn’t always easy, but we’re doing our best. Best wishes as you get ready to begin your marriage!

  • Everything is so cute. Love your tree, all the papercrafts. The placemats are adorable and love your stockings. Everything looks so sweet! Killer title of your post too!

  • Looks like you did a great job and probably get it under the budget you were initially concerned about. Also, love the paper crafty decorations. I did similar things our apartment too. Looks great!

  • Absolutely Gorgeous!!! Love all the homemade stuff. Jealous of those that can do things like that and really don’t have to put any effort into it. Just comes naturally.

  • Love the stocking you made for Wyatt. It is very “manly”. I am happy that the placemats worked in to the decor. They were very fun to make. You are so talented in the decorating department, Wyatt is very lucky!

  • I see you are very excited and proud, as you should be! It all looks great. The paper trees are very cute (I like the ones made of squares best) and I LOVE the paper hearts — can’t wait for you to post instructions so I can make some for decorations! Maybe I could send you some paper bits I have and you can make some for me, too! I have a bunch of cut-outs that are pages from books (abridged readers digests, no good novels, I promise!).

    • I’d LOVE to help make these! Please let me help any way I can. They can be strung together to make garlands, or just strung on their own with fishing line or something. I just set mine in the tree because I didn’t know what else I’d want them to be used for.
      And I like the square trees best, too. But they were more work…I have stuff to make two more…if I want to…
      Thanks!

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