tree trimming and pumpkin carving

Thanks to my lovely Mum, our house is decorated for Christmas!

I have noooooo motivation to decorate this year,

but Little Man had his heart set on setting up our little tree.

Mum very patiently lugged all of the boxes up from the basement,

supervised the chaos that ensued,

and even strung my lights and fragile ornaments

safely from the curtain rod like I did a few years ago.

It looks so nice now.

I regret being all Scroogey. : )

(Many, many thanks, Mum.)

And then the next day my dad carved the boys' pumpkins with them.

(Yes, the ones we purchased in October.)

I truly intended to carve pumpkins with the boys,
well, in October or November,
but it just didn't happen.
What can I say?
Some things I'm on top of, others...not so much.

Since the pumpkins were carved so late,

the guys opted for Christmassy designs instead of faces.

So fun, right?

Our holiday mantle/hearth is all ready for the winter festivities!

(And just in case you were wondering,

the fireplace isn't functional,

so there's no fire danger from all the stuff we have around it,

and the terrarium to the right contains hermit crabs.)