In addition to baking a ridiculous amount of cookies, decorating for Christmas has always been my favorite part of the holidays. When we lived on land we checked off all the boxes: we strung up lights all along the apartment, hung mistletoe in the doorways, put a wreath on the front door, stockings hung with care above our fireplace and of course had a real tree in the corner decorated with the upmost amount of cheer. To say the least we went all out for the holidays, so I was a bit concerned this year when I realized this is the first Christmas we will be spending on our boat- how on earth would we keep with our traditions?

Chris and I put our thinking caps on (and by that I mean our Santa Hats) and thought of ways we could still decorate and make Avocet feel like Christmas. Getting a real tree was out of the question since 1. where the H-E-double-hockey-sticks would we put it and 2. pine needles in the bilge… Forget about it. Instead of a tree we opted for wrapping garland around our compression post, then hanging ornaments from it. Just like that, we had a “tree”.

Moving on to the lights. Now, we see a lot of sailors string Christmas lights up the mast and down the forestay as well as backstay but Chris and I agreed that if we did that we would have to be dedicated to staying in the slip for a while which neither of us wanted. So instead, we got some twinkly lights to trace our dodger and lined the inside hand trim of our boat. Lights: check!

While Christmas shopping we also found some little decorations that were small enough to hang up and put on the shelves and we even got a small wreath to hang above the V Berth! Lastly, since we don’t have a fireplace onboard we decided to hang stockings up anyways, and decided to play a recording of a crackling fire from our iPad just to help set the mood. With the addition of some holiday candles, Frank Sinatra Christmas music and cookies fresh out of the oven, we were ready for Christmas. To celebrate our cheery success, we snuggled up and watched a Christmas movie to make it official. Did you know Captain Ron- er, I mean Kurt Russel – plays Santa in a new movie called The Christmas Chronicles? Super funny!

Check  out the full video on youtube. What are your Holiday traditions on land or at sea? We want to hear your favorites! Feel free to share in the comments below or post in the comments on our Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/svavocet/?hl=en