Larry, the singing dancing skeleton, is a big hit with the neighborhood kids.

When Brian and I first got married it became apparent very quickly that we were incompatible when it came to one thing...

Holiday decorations.

You see, Brian grew up in a home and a neighborhood where everyone decorates like its Disneyland. There is literally bumper to bumper traffic in his neighborhood during the holidays because the lights are so awsome.

I grew up in a home where we usually had a Christmas tree, but it was always nailed straight into the floor. That's right, straight through the carpet and into the wood floorboards. (We obviously didn't want to be bothered with picking it up and redecorating it every time it fell down!)

So when Brian asked, "Aren't we going to decorate?" my perfectionism resisted. What?! I have to plan and coordinate decorations for every holiday!? What if it's not perfect?

So I came up with a plan.

"Brian. You do it."

So he did.

Then comes Ashlynn. And bless her little soul, if she didn't inherit Grandma Caroline’s gift for decorating. When the first of October rolls around, I can always count on her and her daddy pulling out the boxes of decorations I have accumulated over the years and “decking the halls”!

I find it a relief because I love the look of being festive, I just don’t want to have to make any decisions about how or where to put the festivity.

This year, I tried to help out with the decorating, though, and I’m pretty sure I’ve thrown everybody off (yeah, I’m starting to get puzzled comments from the neighbors). I don’t like scary things at Halloween because it scares my kids. So I chose “Nightmare before Christmas” style, and “decked the halls” with black, purple and orange for Halloween.



I used electrical tape to cover the red stripe in the candy canes.



This was Ashlynn's idea, to put Toot and Puddle, our ceramic pigs, with some fake pumpkins.