I love decorating for the Christmas season, but I like to stick to a budget when making purchases that add holiday cheer to my home and I have my staple stores that I hit every year. I know from experience that they are going to provide me with a large selection of stylish and quality items at affordable prices.  This year I am adding The Home Depot to my list or preferred places to shop for Christmas decorations.  Did you know that The Home Depot carries a wide selection of decorating items for inside and outside the home?

My daughter and I planned our whole afternoon around our Home Depot trip last Sunday.  First, we stopped for hot cocoa, of course!  We hadn’t even gone into the store when I spotted two things that I love – Christmas trees and poinsettas. The live Christmas tree area was set up in the parking lot and it was busy! Since we already had our tree, I opted for two miniature trees instead. These trees are perfect for adding that holiday charm to other rooms in your home or for greeting your holiday guests at your front door. By the way, I was trying to carry the two mini trees, which were a bit heavy considering they were small, to a cart.  I must have looked like I needed help - a very helpful employee brought me a cart, nice!

Right next to the minature Christmas trees I found my next “must have” item – a potted poinsettia plant. I LOVE the poinsettia, or flor de nochebuena, because they remind me of many Christmas celebrations spent in Mexico.  The flower is everywhere this time of year in Mexico, including my abuelita's courtyard!  Did you know that this popular holiday flower was discovered in Mexico and that the Aztecs prized them for their curative properties and red pigment? Joel Roberto Poinsett (1770-1851),U.S.’s ambassador to Mexico following Mexico´s Independence from Spain, is responsible for introducing this beautiful flower to the US and for making it a symbol of Christmastime! Ok, but I digress with the history lesson…..Seeing the poinsettias in such abundance at the store brought back a wonderful sense of nostalgia from my childhood, so my daughter and I picked this one to decorate our home.

Next, we finally made it inside the store and immediatley we were greeted with the tunes of the season over the speakers - gotta love that Christmas music!  And more poinsettias and my other favorite flower - the amaryllis, so pretty!

We made our way past the large assortment of artificial trees in pretty much any size, shape and style you could want.  Then we headed to the lights, but stopped and checked out the ornaments first! Wow, what a selection! The Martha Stewart brand caught my attention right away - you can pull together a very lovely and coordinated look with ornaments from the Woodland, Celebrate and North Pole collections, all very nice but different to suite any taste.

Ok, on to the lights.  The store had a HUGE selection! My daughter and I browsed for about 15 minutes before settling on some super stylish Martha Stewart lighted garland and mini LED lights for my tree. In my quest to keep things "green" around our home,  I made sure that the lights we pruchased this year were LED.  Did you know that LED lights help save on energy costs, last longer than incandescent bulbs, and are cool to the touch when lit (super important for me because I have young kids)?   The Home Depot had a very large sign above the light section outlining the different types of lights they sold, clearly comparing the various kinds, which was very helpful in guiding my purchase.

We found our lights, now on to fill a missing element in our home - holiday scent! That's right, I LOVE the rich aroma of cinnamon, nutmeg, peppermint and vanilla that fill the air, so I was very excited to find a large selection of holiday scented candles and air fresheners.  My daughter loved the vanilla Glade scents, so we stocked up for season!

Now that we had all that we needed we browsed the store for quite some time.  I didn't know that I could buy stockings, doormats and tree skirts too!   I made a mental note that next year I need to start my decorating shopping at The Home Depot.  Then I spotted the perfect gift for my husband - yay!  He reads my blog, so I won't say what I bought!

I thought my daughter and I would be in and out of the store in about 30 minutes, but the trip took us 1.5 hours -  there was just that much to check out!  I was very impressed with their selection of decorating items, and the prices were definitely budget friendly.

So, would you like to check out The Home Depot too this holiday season too?   Enter our contest below to win a (1) $50 gift card!

GIVEAWAY: (1) $50 Home Depot Gift Card 

• visit www.homedepot.com/holiday and comment on this post below with something you learned by visiting the site.
• Follow The Home Depot on Twitter: @HomeDepot
• Like The Home Depot on Facebook
• Giveaway is open to US entries only for residents 18 and up.
• Giveaway ends on Sunday, December 11 at 11:59 p.m. EST.
• Winner will be emailed within 6 hours and have 48 hours to respond or another winner will be chosen.
• Prize is provided by The Home Depot.

This is part of a compensated campaign with Latina Mom Bloggers and The Home Depot. The Home Depot works with bloggers such as myself to conduct product reviews. They do not tell bloggers what to say about their products or how to say it. The Home Depot fundamentally believes that people should be free to form their own opinions and share them in their own words. The Home Depot often provides product - free of charge - to bloggers for review as they did for this post. The Home Depot's policies align with WOMMA Ethics Code, FTC guidelines and social media engagement recommendations. The Home Depot provided me with a gift card to shop for the holidays and post my experience. All opinions expressed in this article are my own and not influenced in any way by anyone.