100.

Whooooooty Who!! One hundred posts BAY-BEE.

So to celebrate, I am giving away one of these cutie-patoot "Santa Rocks" carafes you were all googly over:

I know, it's stinkin' cute. Do any of you have a Flower Factory? We used to have one nearby. When they offered free memberships my girlfriend and I nearly passed out from the magnificence of it. Then our location closed...and this week we made the trek about 30 minutes away to check out one on the other side of town. It was even MORE glorious than our old one.

Clean. Massive. Cheap.

TROUBLE.

Good thing is half an hour away. We're already dying to go back. Anyhoo, I found more of these, so that's the fun giveaway for the 100th post. Just leave a comment and you are entered. We'll give it a couple days...say Monday evening?

Check out the other finds from Flower Factory and other places (just a sampling):

Three bucks people:

Less than $5:


Can't beat the Dollar Store at half off, really:


And all kinds of goodies from Micheal's to candy cane up the kitchen next year:

STEAL OF THE CENTURY! I wanted a skinny little kitchen tree...walked into Micheal's, saw this, originally $70... on sale for $27 but it was the last one. Asked if I could buy it off the floor and he said yep, for TEN DOLLARS!!


The pic doesn't do her justice. She's perfect -- all glittery and fun. I very nearly skipped out of the store with it.

And I am always on the lookout for things I can use all year in the clearance stuff. I usually find some good deals and did again this year. One example are the gold chargers for the dining room:


The cheapest I've seen them is $1.87 each at Hob Lob...I kept holding off because I think even $2 each is a bit ridiculous for plastic. These were $7 for eight at Target. Whew-Who.

And finally, to prepare us for the GLORY that is decluttering and organizing on January 12, I thought I'd share my tips for packing up Christmas.

I pack up one room at a time, and have specific bins for each room. I always have baggies, shopping bags and a Sharpie with me.




I don't use any more than these bags to protect things. The bins don't have far to go, just down to the basement. (God Bless you who have to lug those things to an attic!!!) I try to only work with one bin at a time, so I don't get overwhelmed.

This year, I've been really particular about everything, I even vacuumed out the bins before packing them back up:

Told you.


Then I write on the top with Sharpie what room the bin is for, and then use my Dymo to label the sides so I don't have to unstack everything to get what I want:
Finally, I used to always take pictures of things I had done every year and would keep them in a file on the computer so I could see exactly how I had decorated. This year, I just have to look here, so I won't have to worry about that. ;)

I've got one more room to pack up and the tree tomorrow. Now that it's mostly packed up, I realize how much I will miss it all, and can already hardly wait for ten months from now!

I have SO many projects running through my head right now, and I can't wait to get started. Thanks for making my first 100 posts so fun! Hope you'll join me for 100 more!

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