Decorating our Christmas tree.

It's the 1st of December and what better way to start out the month than with all the happenings of our Christmas tree decorating night { smile }  

We've been doing this since our little Prince's very first Christmas.  Each year we invite the grandparents over for dinner on the Saturday of Thanksgiving weekend and we all work on decorating the tree whilst talking and watching the occasional holiday movie, USA Network permitting... { Did you know they don't play holiday movies all the time on Thanksgiving weekend?!  Jeesh, how dare they! } 

Seeing as how I can hardly contain my excitement about how our tree turned out this year, I'll start with showing you a picture of it...  taa daa!

Now you'll have to wait for all of the details...  On to the food and grown-up hot chocolate!

Appetizer

I ended up making the Greek layer dip I mentioned in my "And moving on to the next holiday..." post.

Quite yummy!  And sooo very simple!  

Recipe/Guidelines/Tips for making...

1 package of your favorite hummus (or you can make it from scratch if you prefer)

1 cup chopped kalamata olives 

1/3 cup of cucumber minus the seeds

1/4 cup crumbled feta cheese

**I used the hummus for the bottom layer, then topped it with the olives, cucumber and feta.**

{ Remember...  you can use as much or as little of the ingredients that you want and you can add whatever you please.  The original post I found for this dip included red pepper and fresh dill, I left them out to make it to my taste. }

Dinner

Roasted Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese Croutons

Again, yummy!  Here's the recipe if you want to try this!

Last, but not least the Grown-up Hot Chocolate with HOMEMADE marshmallows!!

Rich and creamy, sweet-delicious hot chocolate with a touch of marshmallow vodka, topped off with a homemade Bailey's Irish Cream marshmallow!  { Both Dad and hubby approved. }

My marshmallows definitely tasted like marshmallows, but they didn't quite reach their fluffy potential and rather than making an entire second batch we used them and they were wonderful...  definitely a must try!   

Here's the recipe in case you want to try making them yourself (remember to substitute Bailey's for the beer in the recipe) and let me know how they turn out for you!  

AND FINALLY...

 all about our Christmas tree!!

Ornaments

I picked the majority of them up at Michael's on Saturday morning for a steal...

 50% off plus an additional 20% = AMAZING!

My color inspiration for our tree came from this single "ornament"...

{ I think they're meant for putting on wreaths, but Mom worked some magic and turned it into an ornament instead. }

I absolutely LOVE the brown, the orange, the blue and turquoise...  I instantly knew these would be the colors for the tree!!

I love to use glass balls { if you couldn't tell }, ribbon for the garland { this year I found some glitter encrusted ribbon to use }, and this year I just happened to have a piece of material that matched wonderfully that I used to cover the base of the tree!

Then came the time to put all of the decorations on the tree, Mommy had a special little helper/assistant...

And then came pictures of us all in front of the tree...  

The only thing left to get to make this Christmas tree perfect is the matching/coordinating wrapping paper that I saw as we were leaving Michael's { wink }

Of course I'm just kidding, I know that's a little overboard...  right?!

When do you put up your Christmas tree?  I know there are people out there who put it up on the 1st of November and then some wait until Christmas week...  where do you fall in this vast spectrum?