This Christmas marks the first Christmas Daniel and I will share in our new home, so of course, we had to get a real Christmas tree. I love the smell and the life that it brings to the apartment. I had plastic trees growing up and I always wanted a real big one like in the movies or in the department store windows. Daniel, knowing that my American sense of design is “go big or go home”, agreed to the biggest tree they had. The poor guy had to carry it all the way home. Now if that isn’t love, I don’t know what is.

So, shopping for Christmas decorations is a challenge here in Sweden. They are not as commercialized as we are in the states so I had a hard time finding everything I needed. Luckily, I knew some items I wanted in the states, so on my trip back to LA I got the stockings. Stocking are a must, too bad we don’t have a fireplace to hang them on, but I knew it would be nearly impossible to find here and if I did find them, it would cost an arm and a leg. The mistletoe was a little bit more tricky, this I got thanks to my sister. She had to order it online since we couldn’t find it in stores. For those that don’t know the purpose of the mistletoe, you’re suppose to hang it in a doorway and when you pass under it with another person, you are suppose to kiss. It’s a sweet American tradition and a way to trick Daniel into kissing me. I purposely stand under it waiting for him to pass by… hehe! The tree didn’t come out exactly how I envisioned. The tree wasn’t as symmetrical as I would like it and there were a lot of gaps and spaces to fill. Also, you can’t find wire ribbon anywhere here so I had to make my own with fabric ribbon attached to silver mesh. If I had wire ribbon, this whole tree would have looked different. With that being said, I still loved the way the apartment looked. As we spend more years together, I’m sure my decoration collection will grow.