12 Days of Christmas! I Christmas House Tour Video & Giveaway. {CLOSED}
Welcome to the 12 Days of Christmas!
I am SO excited to share with you guys that every day for the next 12 days, I’ll be vlogging (think day in the life, waaaay oversharing, Q+A videos), sharing the video here on Crumbs (and on youtube!) and holding a giveaway of my favorite things!
Here’s a peek at some of the Christmas decor in our home. So sorry if I make you nauseaus with my shaky camera skills and poor editing – I’m still learning! There are a few things I left out because I have constant #mombrain and either forgot or wasn’t able to get it together in time. Things like my favorite mini Lenox nativity set (I have no idea where to place it this year, since Max will shatter it), the Pottery Barn Kids advent/Christmas countdown calendar (that is sewn completely crooked but I refused to send back because I opened it ON the first day of advent and was determined to have a cute calendar… ), our favorite Christmas pillows and outdoor lights, etc. I wanted to wait until everything was perfect, but if I waited, I knew I’d never do it and I’ve wanted to make videos FOREVER now.
The first year we were married, Eddie surprised me and bought a tree, decorated it and made his man cave apartment a winter wonderland for us. It was actually the second tree he bought, because the first was waaaay too big, but final sale. So we ended up with two trees! That year, we put up two trees and bought lots of ornaments at Michael’s and Joann’s. That’s where the majority of our ornaments are from, along with a few Martha Stewart from Macy’s that are about eight years old and some new ones from Michael’s this year that I bought for the white tree.
I bought the white tree last year at Treetopia on sale after Christmas. The copper/blue tree is from Target this year, and by far my favorite one. The red/green decorated tree is from Frontgate and will hopefully last us a million years.
My mom made our house incredibly magical when I was growing up. In fact, she still does and I’m hoping that I can get a video of hers before these 12 days are up! She’d stay up all night for days to turn the house into a Christmas wonderland for my brothers and me. It was the most magical time EVER.
Needless to say, I’ve been a complete Christmas freak since I was a kid. When school started up again, I’d wake up early and go downstairs just so I could sit by the Christmas tree in January before we got on the bus. It was my absolute favorite!
Eddie and I were determined to make our house as Christmasy as we could for Max this year. Eddie decorated gingerbread houses for eight hours because he is a perfectionist, and even set up his own tree downstairs in the basement that I didn’t get to capture. It has been so much fun and I love sitting under the lights every night.
Enjoy! And scroll down for giveaway #1!
GIVEAWAY!Â
Every day for the next 12 days until Christmas I’ll be giving away some of my favorite things. I want to show every bit of my appreciation for you guys sticking here with me for over seven years, reading the rambles that I write and making my recipes and leaving comments and supporting me 100%. Even when I write horrific run-on sentences and use 34 exclamation points in one post. And say “literally.” Ugh.
THANK YOU so much for being here. You changed my life and I am forever grateful for you.
Today I’m giving away a mirrorless camera! If you read my favorites post, you know I use one all the time and I even shot a few pieces of the video here with mine. I was super excited to giveaway the Samsung nx300 that I always talk about, but unfortunately it’s no longer available. Instead, I’m giving away the comparable Sony alpha a6000, which I’ve even considered switching to. This giveaway is not sponsored or affiliated with anyone and is given by me. It is open to EVERYONE EVERYWHERE! Wahoo.
To enter: leave a comment on this post sharing your favorite holiday memory!
For a second entry: SUBSCRIBE to the howsweeteats youtube channel. There is a red button on the right side and you will only be notified when I upload a new video. This is the best way to be notified of a new video/giveaway in these 12 days too! Leave a comment telling me you did so.
For a third entry: follow howsweeteats on instagram. Leave a comment telling me you did so.
The giveaway will only be open for 24 hours (!!) so be sure to enter and share! A winner will be picked at random. Come back for a new video and giveaway tomorrow. xoxo
1,439 Comments on “12 Days of Christmas! I Christmas House Tour Video & Giveaway. {CLOSED}”
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My favorite Christmas memories center around FOOD! Christmas tree sugar cookies with lots of sprinkles and Christmas morning breakfast casserole!
Hopefully I’m not too late! I love my mom’s real garland that she puts up around the doors INSDIE the house and the way she does the stairs with lights and garland. Plus nutcrackers. It sounds like we have similar Christmas decor explosions since growing up :)
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Subscribed to youtube too!
My favorite holiday memory is coming home to a ultra festive home that my Mom decorated <3
I love opening one gift on Christmas Eve!
My favorite memory is baking cookies (for Santa) with my brother and all my cousins! I also follow you on Instagram :) Merry Christmas!!
Oh, that cupcake ornament!  The winter wonderland! That table runner!  Tiny toes touching the tree!  The wonder in Max’s eyes as he watched the train!  SO very sweet!
I didn’t realize my computer sound was off, so when I saw Max talking, I checked and turned it on…how lovely to have the music in the background!
My favorite childhood memories at Christmas radiate from our Italian Christmas Eve dinner where my favorite meal ever was always served: spaghetti with crab sauce!  And my favorite memories with my children were making and decorating graham cracker houses!  Love Eddie’s too!  Merry Christmas!
Oh, And I subscribed to your YouTube Channel too! Â
P.S. Don’t count my exclamation marks:-)
In college I used to LOVE coming home after finals to a decked out house. Even though I was kind of an adult it always felt so magical to return home, relieved of all the stress of college, and spend time eating cookies, watching movies with my family, and driving around to look at the lights with my friends from high school. Now that I’m a college teacher I’m always telling my students to enjoy finals because at the end you get to go home and its Christmas!!!
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My Grandma and Grandpa lived 6 hours away so we didn’t see them a lot at Christmas time but every year, without fail, we’d get a box in the mail. In it were brown paper bags full of shell on nuts and marshmallow Santas. As odd as it sounds, we loved those bags! When Grandma passed last year just before Christmas we were sure to leave her some shell on nuts and marshmallow Santas.
We always read Madeleine L’Engle’s “The Twenty-four Days Before Christmas” Christmas Eve, a story about a family with three children and one on the way. My dad would read it aloud for us, and without fail every year he gets choked up on the last few lines, after the baby is born, because he thinks of my youngest brother, who was born right around Christmas time. We would gather together and drink Mom’s homemade hot chocolate. Now, we have to Skype to hear the reading, but it’s still just as special.
Your decor is amazing! My favorite Christmas memory is waking up sooooo early before anyone else and sneaking through the presents :)
My favorite holiday memory is decorating cookies with my grandma & grandpa! Grandma would always holler at grandpa for putting too much frosting on the cookies (is there such a thing?!?)
One year my mom and I decided to take the “easy” way out of gingerbread house making and made a graham cracker gingerbread house using plans from an old book. The only problem was the plans weren’t scaled correctly. Took us 2 days to make it. We called it the church because it was so huge. We even gave it a little bell tower.
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My favorite holiday memory is spending Christmas Eve at my grandmother’s house for our Feast of the Seven Fishes!
Been subscribed to your instagram for two years!
About eight years ago, my family was going through some difficult financial times. We had not been able to afford a Christmas tree — real or artificial. The artificial one we had was beyond repair so I had decorated the house with the other decorations we had and hoped we could find an affordable tree before Christmas Day. Four days before Christmas, we found a fresh Christmas tree at a home supply store on sale for $5. It was a huge tree! We were so excited. The kids and I decorated the tree and thought it was the most beautiful tree ever. We were so lucky that year — family and friends made sure our children had gifts from Santa. It was truly the love of Christ shown through the actions of so many people.
I am basically Buddy the Elf so EVERYTHING CHRISTMAS and ALLLLL THE MEMORIES! A few that come to mind are the Santa presents in special never before seen wrapping paper that would appear under the tree on Christmas morning with From Santa on them that continued even after I got married because my mom was a big believer in keeping the magic alive. :) Another would be a tradition my husband and I started our first married Christmas which is opening coordinating Christmas PJ’s on Christmas Eve and then reading “Night Before Christmas” and the Christmas story from the Bible, we still do this 19 years later with our three now teenage kids. Those quiet Christmas Eves with our ridiculously coordinated Christmas PJ’s make for some of the best memories. Gah, I just love Christmas so much. Your house looks beautiful!
My brother and I would always assemble the (fake) Christmas tree together. It was one of those that had the color-coded section branches. And then we would hang our Green Bay Packer stockings on the window knobs (we had a mantle but this was where they went!) and my mom and I would ALWAYS bake Christmas cookies. Christmas morning my brother and I would go grab the stockings and either open them in my parents bed or together as a family.
My favorite Christmas memories are laying in bed at night with 2 of my 5 sisters and making step by step plans on what we would do Christmas morning. From the 2am get out of bed step to the 6am turn on coffee step. We did this almost every night from Dec. 1 on. Rewriting the same plans over and over!
Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!
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My favorite holiday memory is just really being family every year. Its so special!
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yay camera!!!
one of my fav christmas memories was waking up on xmas morning when I was a child and the hallway and been “wrapped” with wrapping paper so I had to tear it down to get to the tree! It was so exciting!
My favorite holiday memory is actually bittersweet. My (now) husband and I met in January of 2010 and after nearly a year of dating, we hadn’t yet figured out how to “share” holidays between our families that lived in different states. So, we spent that Christmas of our first year together apart. I hated it. I loved being with my family, but I just felt like a part of me wasn’t there, and it was that Christmas that I realized I never wanted to spend another one without him.
My fondest Christmas memory is attending candle light church service on Christmas Eve with my family and coming home to hot chocolate while opening our stockings. I hope to continue this tradition with my own family someday!
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My favorite memory is waking up super early on Christmas morning and sneaking downstairs with my sister to see what Santa brought.
My favorite Christmas memory is going Christmas Caroling with my church. We would always go to the homes of the senior adult sunday school class. one lady always had homemade hot cocoa waiting for us.
Some of my favorite holiday memories are playing so many games (cards, monopoly, etc) with my fam, and cooking SO MUCH tasty food. Kitchen togetherness at its best.
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I enjoy your blogs/posts so very much! I receive your emails via my work email. Even when I am crazy busy, I take time to look at yours. Whether it be the headline or the gorgeous photography, it captures me and I find time to read it!
Your holiday décor is stunning, by the way! I love, love your recipes! Super delish! Merry Christmas!! :)
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My favorite holiday memory is my first with my husband. His family celebrates Christmas on Christmas Eve so on Christmas we set up a fort in the living room and watch Netflix all day while eating Chinese food in our pjs. It’s become a tradition that I hope we’ll continue for the rest of our lives.Â
Your house is holiday goals!
My favourite memory is travelling to my grandparents house for the holiday. One year it snowed about 3 ft in a day or two – we normally get no snow at all – and we had a white Christmas for the first time ever. On Christmas morning we went for a walk and saw sleigh tracks and what looked like reindeer hoove marks. No idea how they did it but it was so magical!Â
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I subscribed to your YouTube channel.
Hi! My favorite Christmas memory is sitting at the base of the stairs in the living room with all the lights off except for the Christmas tree lights. I would gaze at that tree forever, it made my heart swell with the Christmas spirit!
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I follow you on instagram……
We always did a big Christmas Eve party at my grandparents house. Santa made an appearance every year and once when I was like 6 i was POSTITIVE that I heard the reindeer on the roof!Â
My mom had these christmas houses that I set up every year. I would come home from college and the first thing I did was set up the houses. She has since moved and doesn’t have the space to do them every year, but man do I miss it! Love the idea of making a Christmas wonderland for your kids!
My favorite Christmas memory was the year that we accidentally left my son’s ice cream birthday cake under the Christmas tree after returning home from a December 24th celebration at my in-laws. We looked for that cake for an hour the next morning, in the freezer, refrigerator, the car….everywhere. Then it dawned on me that it came in the house with the rest of the gifts we had been given the day before. There it was in all its melted glory….under the tree!
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Me and my family are complete Christmas freaks also! If I’d let my husband, we’d have our house’s Halloween costume be Christmas decorated. My fondest Christmas memory is receiving cassette tapes of Madonna and Run DMC also, my sunshine Care Bear.
Your house is gorgeous, Jessica!! I’ve been looking at flocked Christmas trees the past few weeks and want one badly but I’m trying to wait until after Christmas when they’re hopefully on sale (a girl can wish). Yours is not helping my obsession! :)
One of my favorite Christmas memories is from last Christmas. I had just had a baby at end of November, so my parents knew that I probably wasn’t going to get all my Christmas decor out and decorate a tree. They wanted me and my baby girl (and my husband) to have a tree, so they went out and bought me a little tree which they then came over and decorated for me. My baby was only about 4 weeks at the time, but when she saw the lights on the tree she stared it so contentedly. It was the first time she had really focused in on something other than my face. I have a picture of it that I snapped with my phone, and still to this day it makes me teary eyed.
My favorite Christmas memory is when my dad would prepare us hot chocolate in holiday travel mugs and then drive us around to look at Christmas lights.