It's good to be home

Ahhhhh, Home. There is nothing better than being in your own space. O and I completed our journey Friday and spent yesterday cleaning up and getting settled. There was tonnes of mail, packages everywhere from family waiting for Christmas morning. While we were gone our friends unloaded our second sealift so that filled the entryway. And of course there's the unpacking of the suitcases with all the new clothes, toys and other stuff we got while down south. It's a big job and I'm about half way through.

My biggest priority when arriving home was putting up the tree and getting the house ready for Christmas. I usually have it up much earlier but putting it up before we left in November would have been a bit much. And with Izzy and Zazu (the cats) home alone for a month I didn't trust it to be still standing when we got back.

My favorite part about decorating the tree is the memories that each ornament brings. I have a few that were on our trees growing up that have been handed down to me like my baby stocking. Unfortunately my halo from my 5th grade Christmas pageant isn't there because after over 20 years on the tree my mother threw it out. I've never really forgiven her for that... but I digress. In the last few years we have started collecting ornaments from each place we've visited or lived to remind us of our travels. These are some of my favorites.

I bought this in Iqaluit last summer to mark our time up north.

These commemorate our 3 chrimstases in Shelburne NS. A lady there makes one every year for every member of the detachment. She even coordinates eye and skin color to make them look as much like each person as possible.

This is from our honeymoon in Australia.

From our trip to Hawaii a few weeks ago.

Today I'll keep working on getting things in shape. It's snowing and blowing outside so it feels like a lazy day so I won't be working too hard.