decorations | Suzie Speaks

2014 has certainly been the year of the beard and photographer Stephanie Jarstad has taken this hairy celebration to a whole new level. While supporting Movember she created a project that would continue to highlight men’s health and prostate cancer awareness in the form of DecemBEARD, photographing festively adorned men in all their fuzzy glory. The results are superb.

Like what you see? You can purchase pictures of these bearded lovelies and more from Stephanie’s Etsy store in the form of Christmas cards and poster prints.

What about you guys? Do you decorate your loved ones during the holiday season?

You can also find me on Twitter and Tumblr @suzie81blog, and don’t forget to check out my Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/suzie81speaks.

Photo Credits: Stephanie Jarstad

I think I enjoy the build up to the festive season more than the actual day itself. The German Market arrives in the city centre, encouraging us to consume enormous sausages (!!), hot gluhwein, crepes and pofferjies covered in Nutella, and endless craft based crap that we didn’t realise that we wanted until we saw it. Carols and festive songs appear in all the stores and on every television advert. I get to buy presents for everyone and celebrate with my favourite people. Work finishes for a few weeks. I love it. I love the excitement, the decorations that appear, the atmosphere. Aside from the occasional hot, sunny days that the UK receives every summer, this is absolutely my favourite time of year.

I decided to join in the festive spirit and decorate our tree. The Bloke and I bought a fake one (due to the fact that the cats would attempt to eat a real one) about five years ago from Argos, and each year we diligently take it out of it’s box and joke about the fact that it looks drunk. He set it up and put the lights on it while I was away at my mother’s house ready for my return on Sunday, but as I was feeling rough I didn’t tackle it until yesterday evening. Amidst the box of random decorations that we have collected over the years I discovered something that would provide me with hours of entertainment…

I found the Santa hats.

Two years ago I purchased three small Santa hats for the cats, and I consider the fact that I was able to get a photograph of all three of them sitting together and wearing them to be one of my greatest achievements of that year. Sadly, I lost one of the cats earlier in the year at the age of nineteen, so I decided that The Bloke needed to take her place instead (with an adult sized one, of course – we wouldn’t want him looking stupid, would we?). On went the hats, and out came the camera.

All of them were less than impressed, particularly Daisy when I decided to double my fun.

I eventually stopped laughing, The Bloke stopped rolling his eyes and I got my decorating on. I tried to spend a little more time on it than in previous years, attempting to space them all equally, colour coordinating etc, and after a few catastrophes with bits of tinsel and standing on a few stray decorations that had fallen on the floor, I stepped back to admire my masterpiece.