Noel a la Maison LeJeune ~ Chapter One

My wish for today would be for you to join me for a walk through memory lane of Christmas past, enjoy Christmas present and be inspired by Christmas future...

Oreo has been waiting for you...

She'd love to sit on your lap while I tell you a little bit about how we decorate for the holidays.

It's such an exciting time of year for us when we anticipate celebrating with friends and family.

Our home is always welcoming and the doors are always open.

Toasts and cheers, stories and smiles, food and games, memories and good times are extremely abundant here.

We wouldn't have it any other way :)

All of our decorations throughout our home reflect our heritage and our simple Southern Cajun life which we are SO very proud of.

Old porcelain tubs filled with pinecones and poinsettias and tree bottoms covered in burlap...Simple is sometimes beautiful.

Most of all, I would like to think that our home reflects our appreciation of the reason that we celebrate this glorious season...

the birth of Jesus Christ.

You need not take your shoes off but I would ask you to leave all of your worries at the front door and come on in.

I promise to take your mind away from the holiday hustle and bustle and beg you to relax and enjoy yourself so that you can begin to experience first hand...

Noel a la Maison LeJeune

(Christmas at the LeJeune Home)

I believe it's the little details that make a house a home ~ don't you agree?

You won't find a fancy interior decorator nor any expensive ornaments here.

Sometimes, all it takes is adding a little red and green to your favorite everyday things and you can have an instant Christmas atmosphere too.

First stop is the Front Room or the "Library" as we call it.

Of course it's not massive like the Library of Congress...

But it's cozy and warm and it does hold our favorite reads such as The Man's love for aviation and automobiles, our son's love of military history and as for me?

Well, it holds our main computer and I just love to sit here and blog with you every chance I get!

I personally have a lot of inspiration in this room, it is one of the favorites of our home.

And using some of that inspiration, I hung our Christmas stockings on the old trunk with care, hoping that St. Nicholas would soon be there! 

Nestled in the corners and arranged on the shelves among the books, this room is also filled with gifts from friends, garage sale finds and family treasures from the past.

With these little treasures at my fingertips, I'm always inspired to be a little creative outside of my studio which can be so much fun, especially during the holidays!!!

I just love mixing the past with the present.

It's sort of like crossing an imaginary time warp and I'm always saying that I was SO born in the wrong era (but I cannot do without my modern day air conditioning...and my fast food!!!)

A whole family memory was created and enjoyed by all in just one little vignette that included my grandmother's eye glasses, an old world atlas (so Santa can find me), a vintage Underwood typewriter, a vintage-looking letter I made on the computer (to remind Santa that we've been good all year) and a few touches of red and gold here and there and ... voila!!!!

It feels like Christmas!!! I'm SO ready for Santa!!!

(I hope he finds me)

:)))

I just couldn't stop there, I had too much family treasures to leave out so I tied some green silk ribbon around some of my Dad's old Catholic school books that are from the 1940's.

And with that stack of books, I created a little vignette on the coffee table that included some more treasures that are truly dear to my heart...

Treasures such as gifts from friends who share their family treasures with me...old postcards and letters from their loved ones...they totally make my heart skip a beat! :)))

When all of this fabulousness was arranged together, I added just a touch of Christmas red, green and gold and it became totally holiday PRICELESS!

The red alarm clock was a flea market find earlier this year. I just LOVE it!

The feeling of old Christmas is certainly in the air in this room.

Since one of us is always in this room at any given time of the day, AND since it's the Front Room aka Library, we decided to put our "main" Christmas tree in here by the front door. It's nothing fancy, only a tall slim tree but it's filled to the brim with old ornaments from Christmas past.

Along with the Christmas presents, I love tucking some of my favorite vintage items under the tree to add a warm and cozy feeling. Some items are previous gifts, or garage sale finds such as the lovely octagon-shaped Holmes hat box, and some are sweet memories of special friends and family.

This beautiful pair of vintage children's shoes below and the altered silverware box under the tree above, (just to name a couple) were both gifts from my girl Lisa.

Incorporating the past with the present makes me feel like my loved ones are still here with me...near and dear to my heart :)

This beautiful China Doll was loaned to me by a very sweet friend of the family. Growing up, she lived in the same town as my parents and she now has become like a mother to me since my Mom has passed away 7 years ago. I found the old wooden child's swing at a flea market for $8. I cleaned it up (but left it all chippy), placed the beautiful china doll in it, set the precious pair of shoes near her and tucked an old "Night Before Christmas" Golden Book by her side.

She's so beautiful sitting under the tree :)

On a high ledge in the library, over the grandfather clock that my Dad bought for us as a housewarming gift when we built this home in 2003, I placed an old Samsonite suitcase filled with a "Santa" Golden Book and some vintage ornaments that I've collected over the years. The photo may be a little blurry, it's about 9 feet high and I tried to zoom in on it so you could see the detail...

The rest of the ledge is filled with fun little Christmas icons such as a metal sleigh, the three wise men's camels, a Christmas hat box and some other little treasures. It was so hard to photograph...sorry I can't show you the big picture.

Another little vignette that I put together was on the entrance table near the front door...it was SO simple.

Do you keep old Christmas cards that you've received over the past years? I do.

I taped one of my favorite old cards to the back of a backless garage sale frame and stood it up on an easel. I placed it on a metal tray along with a brass trumpet and bow, some "wish" tickets, a crystal vase filled with snowflakes and red glittery filler, a huge glass ornament that my MIL gave me YEARS ago, a vintage wooden carpenter ruler that I folded out into a star (loved the idea from Jane), and a vintage Railroad log book that I picked up at Homestead in Fredericksburg Texas while visiting and shopping with Anne earlier this year.

It's a simple vignette but it's cute. It's full of reminders of fun times and all of the wonderful people that I've shared inspiration with. It was just enough for the narrow table...

And not one thing is "new" on it...just all sweet memories!!!!

We had lots of fun over the past month decorating our home this year.

One of my sisters and a few local friends took a day here and there to come over and help me put my things out. I think the best part about the decorating was spending time together, reliving all of the memories, telling stories to each other and just plain being creative! We even surprised ourselves at times!!!! :)

In our home, the Christmas music is ALWAYS playing in the background, can you hear it?  :)

I hope you've enjoyed Chapter One...we are SO NOT finished experiencing Noel a la Maison LeJeune by any means!!!

We've only JUST begun!!!

~ Please stay tuned for Chapter Two ~

In the next post, we'll continue the tour to another holiday room.

Note: After much consideration, I chose not to photo the layout of my home and post it "to the world" due to security reasons, however...I do promise to show you all of the Christmas highlights and inspirations that we hold dear in the LeJeune home for the holidays. 

Thank you for stopping by for the tour...but please don't leave. Just sit back, relax and read a book in the library.

Make yourself at home :)