The first hard freeze!

that looks so cosy! thats why i like winter ~ beautiful striking shapes and colours outside and all warm and comfortable inside the curtains!
very cold for texas i guess??

Every one looks nice and comfy, I like your Christmas tree.

Super, N2O! And for us centigrade people 23 degrees F = -5 degrees C. And yes, that's cold enough for me! I'm glad you've got a lovely warm fire going.

It does look very cosy and christmassy, funny how you still do your temperatures " in old money " as we say here in the UK, N20.

Looks nice & cosy in your place N2, keep warm..:o)

I love the open fire place...a thing we don´t have here in our house, and also the christmas tree is already decorated, in Germany it is tradition to put the christmas tree up on the 24th...(christmas eve) in the morning, and we also have the tradition that we have the christmas presents on christmas eve in the evening after the christmas meal, and another tradition is the evening meal, for us it is potatoe salad and frankfurter sausages, that is so that there isn´t so much washing up to be done after the meal so that the family can go and open their presents, although I have been living in germany now for over 40 years I still can´t get used to it and christmas day is a bit of a anti-climax for me.

oh, sorry its an anti-climax ~ its really nice to hear about other traditions tho
we were in austria one christmas ~ that was all centred on christmas eve and christmas day was quiet ~ we were skiing tho so it was ok for us

Yes, the pets like to find a warm spot.Our Paddy(border terrier cross) has recently started sneaking up on our chairs when the sun is shining through the window onto them.We don't have the heart to shoo him off as we used to when he was younger!
Nice blog and lovely cosy looking pic's.

Love to see real fires, your home looks very cosy.

i agree, i love pictures of warm fires ~ very therapeutic even just to look at!!

Don't your cats climb the tree? Or are they too warm & comfy to care about trees? I gave up on having a Christmas tree years ago - they just don't survive cat attacks!

Yes, Lauram the cats have already destroyed the first tree that we put up! {chuckle} It was a Walmart artificial tree that was quite flimsy and cheap. We erected the industrial grade tree that was up in the attic and they have not been able to destroy that one, except for a few "ornament cat toys" that were carefully peeled from the branches. :-)
That's 'ma "critters"!
~N2O~