The Christmas room

The Christmas room is a bit over the top but I love it anyway! It rarely fails to cheer me (even if just  slightly) when I am grumpy when I see it. We have hosted Christmas dinner every year since Alyssa was a baby (and before that we did it every year except for the year that Jacob was five days old). Hosting is one justification I have used to purchase Christmas things for the room that were necessary (wink, wink) to host festively :).

Last week, I shared my blue Christmas dishes. Those are the dishes that are in the pattern that I picked out at the bequest of my mother in law to start collecting back in the nineteen hundreds! A few years ago, my mother in law gave me her collection of Christmas dishes when she downsized. I loved her dishes and was happy to receive them! Before I had her dishes, I would use my blue Christmas dishes when we hosted Christmas for guests who sat at the kitchen table and then I would use my formal Noritake dishes for those seated in the dining room. I love my formal china- it's beautiful with the motif of a rose on it. However, getting to use festive Christmas dishes with a whimsical Christmas tree on it in the place of dishes with a pale rose was a Christmas hostess dream come true!!

The dishes are from a company called Nikko and the pattern is called Christmastime.

I don't remember how many dishes my MIL gave me. Whatever the amount, I have greatly increased that which she gave me in the pattern by buying more....The pattern is discontinued but was apparently quite popular. From ebay, one can (and I have!) purchased many additional dishes and accessories. Remember Craigslist? I have bought two things total off of Craigslist- a solid wood desk for one of the kids and quite a few Christmastime dishes from a woman in West Chester. (Since I just recently joined Facebook Marketplace and need nor want nothing in the pattern at the moment, I don't know what is all out there for sale but I would imagine there's plenty.)

I have purchased flatware in the collection as well as place mats- I love the complete place setting!!

Each place setting also has a glass tumbler and cup/saucer

A miniature Christmas tree is a centerpiece

A normal sized Christmas tree also seems like it should be in the room- so it is!

Peppermint and piping hot cocoa are two of the themes!

And of course, ornaments that remind us of the true meaning of Christmas.

A new Christmas tree skirt to match one of the room's themes...

And ersatz presents that I bought just last year at our town's Christmas festival

Along with probably the oldest item in the room- a craft my aunt made in grade school as a gift to her mom 

My aunt gave it to me- I wasn't sure exactly what to do with it- the Christmas room with the "presents" seemed as good a place as any.

 I bought this sign years ago for the kitchen- that it would be used in the dining room to explain part of the theme of the room was impossible to know at the time!!

Cafe Rineer- sweet and festive

One of the only changes I made to the room this year was to give this cabinet a festive glow up, lol. The cabinet has glass panels in the doors. IF everything in the cabinet was festive, that would be fine. But inside are boxes of various kinds of K-cups non festive coffee accouterments. I covered pieces of poster board with wrapping paper. It's a little silly but I like how it looks :).

Like last year, I decided that the photos I framed from pictures taken at a Clifton Gorge outing are no less pretty in a room full of red and green- Christmas trees and peppermint sugary goodness- BUT, they didn't fit in with the aesthetic. So I put bows on top of the frame where the nature photos are displayed. 

 If "If you build it, they will come" has a Christmas room corollary, it is, "If there's a surface on which to hang something festive, she will hang something festive on it."

A birds eye view of (part of) the room- to the left of the table are some items for the outdoor project. They are definitely not festive so they did not make the picture cut!

Merry Christmas (room) to all and to all a good night (I love the room at night especially!)

Linking up with Joanne for Talking about it Tuesday!