Decorating for the Holidays is a great tradition that turns a house into a home. For Paige and Darren, this was critical to helping their kids feel somewhat normal after blending the families. Even though we love the way our home is decorated, Darren's aversion to a disaster of a garage and piles of boxes made this time a year a time of dread and anxiety. Find out how we made our way through this.

History of Decorating the House

• We decorate for most holidays
• Paige needs to get it all done in 24 hours
• Inside and outside.
• Paige's Mom and Darren's Mom both have big decorations.
• When we got married Paige saw the new big house as a blank canvas for Holiday decorations.
• Paige would come home with bags of new ideas and decorations. The money did not annoy Darren. It was where to put the stuff.
• The Garage has never had a car in it.
• The boxes were out of control for a couple years.

Darren's Attitude Adjustment

• Paige wanted to bring some happiness and joyfulness in the house. Decorating for the holidays was a part of it of bringing happiness to the family
• Supporting your spouse when it is important to them.
• What do you do when something is really important to one of you and not the other.
  • Ignore it
  • Brainstorm how we can both be ok with it
  • What do I need to do to get on board?
  • The person wanting the support needs to be patient
• Understanding each other's strengths and weaknesses
  • Paige cannot work from a blank canvas
  • Darren is not great with details
  • Paige can make something beautiful and finished.
  • Darren is great at starting from blank page. But not finishing.
• In the beginning, it was frustrating to get everything done. 
• But now that we understand each others strengths we enjoy working together to get things done.

Lemonade Moment of the Week

Darren gets food poisoning and knocked off his feet for 24 hours. Jumps starts his Diet. And maybe he won't eat anything in the fridge anymore.