Bieber's Home Christmas Tour 2020

Hello and Welcome! I really miss spending more time on here with you all but do look forward to this annual tradition over the holidays! To be honest, two days ago such a tour didn’t even cross my mind. It’s been a slow roll out of holiday decor and each year it feels like we use less, with more emphasis on the items that spark the most joy. But as I placed a couple branches of boxwood haphazardly straddling our bedside reading lights, I remembered how magical the little things feel to me, and even worth sharing on our cozy corner of the web.

So with that, get yourself a warm drink and come on in!

My style lean with this house is that narrow margin where cozy meets minimal. With three kiddos it doesn’t take much for our home to feel cluttered, so I just don’t decorate with a lot on the walls or around the space. What I do use has to carry a lot of impact and lend to the goal of a warm and inviting home. For Christmas the goal is the same! This rug came from our bedroom (I swapped the two rooms’ rugs), and the brass mirror from our family room downstairs. Immediate warmth!

Before we continue I should share, for anyone new, that I have a tradition of naming our tree each year based on a celebrity/character I think it resembles. We’ve had Rosemary Clooney, Paul Pheiffer and everyone in between. This year, I’d like to introduce you to ‘Marilyn’:

I mean, it’s uncanny if you ask me.

The layout is a touch snug to accommodate the tree, but I don’t hate it! This is home in every way.

I’ve slowly been adding to our kilim collection this last year as the colors and patterns breath so much vibrancy into this space! After adding a few touches of Christmas, they have taken on a very merry vibe, indeed! The pillows, coasters, and even Albus’ bed by the fire, all add to the warmth of this home.

Our mantle this year is my favorite element! It’s messy and wispy and so very ‘us’. We aren’t a formal household by ANY means, and I think sometimes mantles can look a lot more formal than the rest of a home. I wanted to keep it low key but still special for this very dear season.

These two…what a pair.

Quick stop in the dining room before we move on! It’s a light touch but I could not love this more. I think as I’ve grown into my own style and taken the time to collect pieces I love that work well for my family, I’ve used less surrounding decor. What I see below is the contrast of the rich chocolate leather dining chairs with the whitewashed table I refinished last Summer, and the saturated black china cabinet (another summer project). It feels like a cozy English pub with no extra fuss. The magnolia is the only holiday addition here (aside from the angels Shire arranged in the cabinet), and all this room needs to feel ‘extra’ over the holidays.

Come on down to our family room - a rarely shared space!

This is our play room and TV room, so we use this room hard! I think this is only the second time I’ve really done anything decorative with it for the holidays, but I need to replicate this every year because the kids have LOVED it!

These cafe lights are on pretty much all day. Sometimes I’ll notice a kid has brought their laptop down here to do virtual school under the lights. How fun!

Heading up to our bedrooms, let’s take a peek into Shire’s first! There is just something magical about her freshly painted mint green walls with the rich Christmas greens, reds and brass.

My sister graciously gave Shire her American Girl Doll tree a few years ago on loan, and it’s the number one item Shire looks forward to unpacking every holiday season. Such a special piece that reminds her of her Aunt.

I think it’s safe to say Shire’s room feels festive even without the garland or Santa pillow LOL! It’s definitely the saturated floral curtains - they’re always fun, but especially fitting at Christmas!

Last stop ( because NO ONE needs to see the boys’ room)! I swapped the living room rug with this room, so now this room has a gorgeous light blue kilim rug which I’m especially enjoying with the mossy green duvet and rust colors peppered around!

A swag of boxwood hanging from each bedside sconce is it for this space, but what a fun touch to add for a few weeks! Because it’s the only additional element for the holidays it feels more impactful.

Imperfect and asymmetrical, yes. But impactful, nonetheless.

That’s a wrap on this years holiday home tour! If you’re in the mood for a little trip down memory lane, here's 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015. I wish you and your family a very wonderful holiday season. I know much looks different right now from years past, and I won’t make light of the very personal struggles you have personally felt this year. But I hope that joy finds you wherever you are today.

‘May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow’
Romans 15:13

Thank you so much for coming by! This community is precious to us and we appreciate you so very much.

Much love,

Pinch of Merriment Home Tour

You know, I really debated whether or not to even take photos of our home over the holidays this year to share here - I feel like every year I do less and less out of preference for simplicity in this house! But Cate and I just love celebrating home in all its forms, be it a bedroom to call your own, temporary military base housing, or the home you’ve lived in for 35 years. This home of ours has gone through so much as our family has grown and evolved within its walls. And it dawned on me that sharing it here has been an unexpected way of documenting life as we know it! So I share our home today less for today, and more for the future, when I will look back on this chapter and remember how very good it was, indeed.

Since I just shared our main floor after the kitchen reno, let’s start upstairs in the master!

Just a swag of fresh garland from Trader Joes, ($7.50 for 15ft), and we’re done! Odds and ends from the kids tend to find our bedroom fast, so I really like taking advantage of the wall over the bed for one pretty thing, rather than adding more items to our surfaces.

And on our main floor we would like to introduce you to this years tree, Mariah Carey! Every year I have named our Christmas tree after a person, (fictional or real), based on looks or personality - we’ve had Paul Pheiffer from the Wonder Years, Rosemary Clooney…. This year our tree has been a total nut. It refuses to stand up straight and has fallen over, so if you look really closely you can see the fishing line my husband is using to hold it upright. It’s not even standing on it’s own accord!!!! I had to name our 2018 tree after the diva herself, (it’s lustrous needles sure are pretty, after all). And yes, I prepped that star before taking a photo and it was straight before I turned around to take the shot. You get the name now?

Other than Mariah, just a few little things peppered around this space. Most of it has either been gifted, or I found at a holiday craft fair our first year of marriage - I hit up every single one in a 20 mile radius that year, not even kidding!

I’m very excited about one little project I worked in this season - the bench of my dreams! After Cate designed and started making these to order last Fall, I have been eager to make one for our own home! I actually commissioned one for a design client who’s bedroom I was working on last Winter, but to finally have one of our own is such a treat. I love it! Cate’s very easy to follow tutorial can be found here for anyone curious.

Still getting used to this view! That deep teal island used to be an L shaped wall!

One of my favorite objectives when I am decorating, whether it’s my own home or for a client, is to create as much impact with as few items as possible. I’m not a stone-cold minimalist, but I sure do crave simplicity! It’s funny the things that strike our fancy, isn’t it?

Wrapping this thing up at the kitchen! Isn’t that where company always ends up? I have been loving it in here since we took down that wall, but not by myself! The best part has been using it together! Having this space to interact with each other and with guests is the gift that keeps on giving.

I hope you enjoyed the tour, but mostly that you were able to relax and take advantage of a few moments of peace while you were scrolling through! Those moments are hard to come by these next couple weeks but the Lord can use even the brief ones to rest and restore us. We invite you back on Monday for a tour of Cate’s holiday home, and then next Wednesday, December 19 I’m giving away TWO gift cards to a very sweet and talented friend’s home goods shop. I don’t secret well so I’d better jet before it all spills out. See ya next Wednesday, friends!

Thank you so much for coming by today!

*Have some shopping to do? Check out our gift-buying guide here!

*Need a Christmas tree skirt? Our favorites are here!

Celebrating Christmas ||Our Holiday Home Tour

Suddenly a great company of heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,
"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests!"
Luke 2:13-15
 

Christmas is our favorite birthday to decorate for. There is no other birth celebrated world wide, year after year, as Jesus' and it gives me butterflies just thinking about it! The Lord has given us so much to celebrate and that excitement inspires all kinds of creativity when we decorate in honor of His birth. This year has been much more simple but every bit filled with joy. There's been a lot less emphasis on DIY projects which has opened a lot more time to spend with family and friends. A solid trade off from my perspective! Still, our 'Christmas home' feels the most personal this year and is my favorite our home has ever felt over the holidays. It just feels like home, and not some big transformation as it's felt in years passed. I've been looking forward to welcoming you all 'in' today and I hope you enjoy peeking around!

Right behind our front door is the ol' thrifted spoon rack we made when we first moved in 6+ years ago. Above it hangs a framed print from Urban Outfitters and a small pair of trees. The entry way gets messy fast so this area certainly doesn't need more!

Heading down a short flight of stairs takes you to our basement family room! Some of the first pieces we found for our first Christmas together end up down here, like the wooden J-O-Y train and tin sleigh where we keep Christmas cards. Although my style has evolved and changed since 11 years ago I still get excited to see those pieces year after year!

Back up stairs to our somewhat open main floor! Quite a bit has changed in here since the Fall and our shoot with HGTV Magazine, (more on that another time!), and I debated how to combine a 'what's new' post with a Christmas tour, but we'll skip all the new stuff for now and save that for the new year. How's that sound?

Last year's tree was named Paul Pheiffer for it's tall, gangly awkwardness. This year I call our tree Rosemary Clooney for it's statuesque physique! Rosemary is the perfect tree for us this year as our decor ended up taking an unexpected vintage turn!

Well I said I wasn't going to go into 'what's new' but our vintage WWI army cot that I turned into a coffee table is hard to miss! This piece came up from the basement and suits the room much better spatially.

It's never really bothered me that we haven't had a place to hang stockings, but when I saw these vintage wooden accordian peg racks floating around I thought they'd make cute stocking hangers!

One of our first Christmas pieces was this advent which my grandparents gave us on our first Christmas. It's such a fun, tangible way for the kids to understand why we celebrate. They play with this set every day and I love to see their imaginations at work!

In the past I've stuck trimmings from our Christmas tree in every nook and cranny I could think of; it's fantastic free decor, don't get me wrong! But in an effort to stay truer to my style and decorate for the holidays in such a way that doesn't make me anxious over these weeks, I cut way back on the trimmings and focused on simple statements instead. A flimsy branch cascading down the side of the mirror here is the perfect whisper of the holiday coming and leaves plenty of room to breath. (Which, by the way, is all relative. I like a lot of room to breath in my home - it's an exciting time of life with lots of energy and chaos, but adding more 'things' to the mix makes me a little anxious.)

Taking a cue from Cate's recent eclectic Winter home tour, I spy a felt snowball! See it?

While I didn't share a series on holiday DIY ideas this year, I'm really excited with how our DIY Christmas tree skirt turned out! Our old tree skirt had begun tearing a bit last year and I looked for a new one in post holiday sales last January - nothing! It was the perfect opportunity to find or make something really unique but inspiration didn't strike until this past September when I came across a gigantic vintage Persian rug on Craigslist for $20! The reason it was so cheap was because it had been cut right down the middle, making two equal halves. While it was useless as an area rug, I loved it's colors and thought it would make a great Christmas tree skirt! After sharing to Instagram we've had the opportunity to collaborate on more attainable vintage inspired tree skirts with Etsy seller, IHeartNorwegianWood, who is selling them in her shop for anyone interested in something similar!

Moving on to the dining room!

Rather than garlands and lights as I've used in the past, I just hung up our kissing ball and filled in with some fun little pieces, like our antarctic friend keeping watch for snow.

Okay, quick side note: I love these Willow Tree angels below and they've been a slow growing collection over the years since I was little. Each angel represents a particular quality/characteristic, and girlfriend at far right is supposed to represent strength....it's never dawned on me that she looks more indignant than anything else! Hah!

For a simple table, I used a length of last years faux boxwood garland stretched across the table with collected vintage brass candle holders found over the year.

The rest of that faux boxwood went in the kitchen!

It doesn't take much for our cozy kitchen to take a festive turn, and a simple green and white plaid dishtowel from an antique shop finishes it off just fine.

Heading upstairs and our first stop is Shire's room! Last year I found this string of lights for $3 on sale and spray painted the cord gold. I'm not gonna lie, I thought it would be special to give her room a little extra glow for Christmas, but when I plugged this baby in I'm pretty sure the illumination from her window alone lit up the street! So it's a little bright....but she thinks they're fun!

Colin and Mason's shared room is just so much fun to decorate for Christmas - partly because it doesn't take much! The birch trees already look flocked with snow; it's kind of a year-round wintery looking room. Hah!

When Mason started asking 23 times at bedtime, (beginning in September), how many days until Christmas, I couldn't wait to hang this countdown in his room. It cuts our bedtime down by 37 minutes! Instructions for the DIY yarn wreath can be found here.

Our bedroom may as well be a tent plopped right in the middle of a Christmas tree farm because sleeping under this fresh wreath from Lynch Creek Farm tickles our nose every single night! 

Opposite the bed is a cozy cuddling spot where I love to sit whenever I've got a child in need of a snuggle. And whether we have a white Christmas or not, we've got snow capped mountains to enjoy thanks to the painting by my grandma!

That's the end of our holiday home tour! It's been such a joy getting ready for Christmas this year and getting to see so many others' Christmas decor styles! Thank you so much for taking the time to come by today; it's a treat to get to share our home with friends.