Frecklize the World | Party inspiration | Menu Ideas | Decorations | Recipes: Holiday decor, greenery and more

I just love the smell of a fresh Christmas tree inside of the house. This year we began decorating much earlier than usual (we started the day after Thanksgiving!) simply because our December looked to be super busy and hectic. Well, it's fair to say that December has proven to be both hectic and fun, and I am thrilled to have the house decorated inside and out.

Starting with the outside of the house, my sweet husband hung a pine garland wrapped with lights around the outside of our front door and also put little white lights on the boxwoods at the bottom of the stairs.

This year I opted to go with a square boxwood wreath on the front door to mix things up a little bit. Recently I have gotten a kick of making my own big red bows.

I think the key to making your own big bows is having really good quality wired ribbon. It makes the whole process so forgiving, since the wire in the ribbon lets you adjust the bow once you are done making all the loops. Here are step by step instructions (with pictures) on how to make big bows.

This year, I decorated the tree with all of my favorite ornaments, which mainly consists of a lot of different gold, green, red and silver balls. Over the past couple of years, I have acquired pine cone shaped ornaments of all kinds and a variety of Santa Claus ornaments as well.

My favorite decoration, other than the Christmas tree, is the mailbox. I know this might sound silly or strange, but growing up it was a big deal to have the mailbox decorated with pine fronds, loads of magnolia, pine cones, and of course a big red bow on either side. The mothers (including my own mom) at my elementary school used to sell decorated mailboxes as a fundraiser for the school. When my husband and I moved into our home a couple years ago, my mom came over and gave me a tutorial on how to decorate the mailbox. This year was my 2nd time to decorate it on my own, and I think I have finally gotten the hang of it!