There are a whole lot of decisions that cause controversy at Christmas: which are the best tins of sweets to buy? Turkey or Salmon? Do you open presents on Christmas Eve or morning? Eating out or in? Dressing up or a PJ day? The list is endless. My answers are for sure: Quality street, turkey, Christmas morning, eating in and dressing up, just FYI.
But, perhaps the greatest cause of controversy comes from the great tree debate. There are what I call 'real tree snobs', who utter 'oh you don't buy those plastic ones do you, daahling?' in a derisory tone, and the people who take down the same battered but beloved fake tree from the loft each year. And then there's a whole lot of us in between.
I really struggled to find a picture of the Christmas tree of my childhood, so we'll have to settle with this picture of me and my sister as littluns, uncomfortably cuddled up with half our tree crammed in the picture with us. Up until this year, I've had the same Christmas tree. It was a little wonky, and there were no branches left bare because of all the decorations we've gathered over the years, but in my eyes it was beautiful.
This year, as I've mentioned to you all about 30 times (I'm excited okay?), it's my first year not spending Christmas at my parents' house, and it's the same for my boyfriend. SO, we had to make the biggest decision of the season: to go real or to go fake. As you can probably tell from the pictures at the start of this post, we went for real trees. And yes, that is a plural. I have a mini potted one in my office as well as our main living room one! Here's a list I've made for you all on the pros and cons of each type of tree:
Real trees - pros
The smell. Fresh pine is beautiful, and if you cut open some of the little 'warts' on the tree trunk, then the tree smells extra strong, mmmm.
It's something we should all experience having at some point in our lives. Neither me nor my boyfriend have so we were extra excited.
The novelty of going and picking out your perfect tree.
They don't end up on landfills.
You can grow your own if you're willing to wait seven or so years.
You get to choose the perfect size/shape for your home.
Real trees - cons
The spines are damn sharp. And itchy.
Needles dropping, everywhere.
The hassle of trying to get it into your car.
Heavy baubles can make the branches sag easily.
You need to water it.
Putting it into its stand without making it wonky is SO fiddly.
Fake trees - pros
You can use them year after year.
The loft ends up smelling like Christmas and bringing your tree down every year comes with lots of scent-induced memories.
It's a one-time cost for at least a few years.
You can get them pre-lit with fairy lights and even pre-baubled.
They're easy to pick up in all the local supermarkets.
The branches are easy to bend to support baubles better.
The spindles are soft and non-irritating.
They are always perfectly symmetrical.
Fake trees - cons
It's hard to get rid of them, even if they look a bit sad, because they hold so many memories
Pets just seem to want to destroy them. Why are they extra tasty?
They just don't feel as special as real trees.
Getting a good quality one can be very expensive.
I've tried not to just include the opposites for each pro/con set so that there's a good range of things here for you to think about. Let me know what you would add to the list, and whether you've gone for a real or fake one this year!
There's always that one person that goes a little overboard at this time of year isn't there? That person is always me. I could barely sleep on the 30th November because I was so excited about the start of advent, and I wandered into work in a whirlwind of exhilaration. You see, after weeks of pestering, my manager had finally caved, and agreed that I could wear my Christmas jumper and put on the Christmas music at the start of December. So, naturally I arrived in a Christmas jumper, Christmas earrings and Christmas mittens. I don't do festivities by halves.
My house is now fully decked out. Although, low funds at this time of year means there's about half as many Christmas decorations here as I would like. If every room in my house could resemble a Santa's grotto, I would be in my element. But, one thing has been seriously lacking in my life: a festive phone case.
Caseapp got in touch at the beginning of December, asking if I would like to collaborate on a Christmassy post with them, and of course my immediate answer was yes. I've practically been sweating with excitement waiting for the mail to arrive each day with the two phone cases* I ordered. Today was a good day.
Although they don't have the widest selection of festive phone cases, you can make your own using your own photos. I just wish I had taken photos of my little hamster sat in a Santa hat before I made my order (and yes, I do have pictures like that, hehe). Instead, I opted to pick two of their premade ones.
I went for the Christmas Everywhere design* first because oh my word, this is my Christmas aesthetic. It basically looks like a tacky Christmas jumper (my one true love), and now I officially have a festive phone case that matches my napkins for Christmas day. I am my own #goals.
My second option was their light blue marble* case. Although there were more obviously festive ones, I loved this one because it totally reminded me of a winter wonderland. All I need now is for the weather to get icy and beautiful too in the UK. A girl can dream, right?
*Although products in this post were provided to me for the purpose of a review, all opinions are, as always, my own*
Get 20% off your Caseapp orders with the code NOURISHMEXMAS20 !
Moving into my first home that wasn't a student home, or a parental home was such a massive deal to me, as you all know. I've been so excited about filling my home with stuff that I choose to have, and arranging everything in a way I like. Christmas is definitely the most wonderful time of the year, but having no festive homeware was seriously starting to grate on me a few weeks ago. I LIVE for this kind of thing you see, and what's Christmas without festive tea towels really?
Funds are a bit low at this time of year (note: moving house at the beginning of November makes Christmas shopping really tight on the ol' budget). So, I've been out finding gems in my three new favourite places: B & M, The Range and T K Maxx. T K Maxx can sometimes be a bit on the pricey side, but if you dedicate a whole lotta time, and a whole lotta trips to heading in there, then there are some shiny little deals to be found. Sometimes literally. I mean, what's better than a bit of festive sparkle?!
The burnt-out looking wooden tealight holder with deer cutouts is possibly my favourite thing I've ever bought. This was something that I actually picked up in Homesense, despite being more than a little disappointed in their overall range of festive homeware. Maybe I was just promised too many great things from the store, but after a scour around our two-story Homesense, this was the only thing that really caught my eye.
The Range, on the other hand, was a shop that I seriously underestimated. I'm going to be posting a Christmas tree decorations haul at some point in the near future, and that is going to be even more awash with goodies from The Range than this was, but oh my, did I love it. They've got everything, ranging from the glary in-your-face slightly tacky decorations (my fave), to chic, subtle ones, and everything in between.
I have spent so long this year looking for the perfect festive tablecloth for the big day. Everywhere seems to only sell plastic ones that are vaguely festive, but I really wanted a nice fabric one. Their tartan fabric tablecloth was absolutely perfect, and now what I really need is some matching bedding.
This little standing Robin in a Santa hat was just too cute to leave behind. I really wanted some bits and pieces that I could put on our sideboards and mantelpieces in the house to make everything look a bit more festive. We still haven't bought any little finishing touches for the house, so these are starting to make it feel a little bit more like a home. This is currently sitting on our dining room sideboard with the 'Christmas' sign which we'll likely be using as a little letter holder.
I picked up another standalone Christmas ornament in The Range, which I haven't got pictures of here (blogmas is clearly going very well for me), BUT I do show and mention in my festive decorations haul video which I'll be linking for you at the end of this post. My boyfriend picked out a little sitting polar bear wearing a scarf for the mantelpiece in the living room, which is much more 'his' room than it is mine. And finally, I got a little light up snowman ornament for my office/spare room from B & M. Me and my sister had these as children, so I hope she'll be as excited as I was to see it when it's sat in her room when she comes to stay over Christmas!
My final section of homeware picks kind of brings me full circle back to the first one, as it is Christmas linen. Now, although I don't have any Christmas bedding at the moment (I may have to shed a tear or two if I don't get some soon), I have stocked up on Christmas tea towels, hand towels and flannels. Because priorities. I may have told a lie earlier and the tea towels with Santa legs are my favourite homeware pick. Either way, it's a pretty darn close run game between that and the tea light holder. It's probably the least useful tea towel out there, but I'm giving a little thank you to the T K Maxx gods for bringing this absolute gem into my life.
On the more practical side of things, I grabbed a set of 4 festive tea towels that will actually dry things from B and M for £2.49. Another reason why B and M is the king of cheap Christmas finds. These are the little white tea towels with various Christmas drawings on that you can see poking out in some of the photos.
Here's my video of my Christmas homeware haul, which has a few extra bits and pieces that I didn't mention or manage to photograph for this post, so have a peek:
