We decorated the little Magnolia tree in our front yard with food for the birds to celebrate the Solstice--borrowing heavily from the episode of Little Bear where they celebrate the Winter Solstice by gathering with friends for a feast and putting out food for the "snow angels"
The next morning a solstice gift was on the porch--a little wooden cheese house with toy mice
(the cheese house was from Hearthsong, but it's no longer on the site)
This year we have an artificial tree. It was a difficult decision for me--we always had a fake tree growing up and I swore when I had my own place I'd always have a real one. But they are just getting so expensive and it's getting hard to justify the cost when we are trying so hard to budget things. It's really a lovely tree, it doesn't look fake at all. And I bought some pine roping to hang around the windows for the Christmas tree smell
Every year since I was born my parents would make or buy and ornament. Unfortunately, because of being handmade many were fragile and haven't survived. This is the one my mother made the year I was four, it's made with the styrofoam from a meat package
Stellaluna is hanging from the tree as well
I'm not sure how old these ornaments are, my mother gave them to me when I was in my teens for the little tree I had in my room. The one with the church and "silent night" is starting to grow translucent, I think it might be 1950's
The Harry Potter scarf is finished, I just need to finish a few details on the cat and dog families. It's probably going to be the thing where I actually have more to do than I think, but it still should be completed by Christmas.