Christmas Tour of Historical Homes

For an early celebration of my birthday, Kevin took me out to lunch at my favorite restaurant in downtown McKinney! If you live in DFW and you have not been to downtown McKinney, then you definitely need to plan a day to visit! It is so charming and so much fun! Spoon's is by far the best restaurant on the square and my all time favorite place to go! We always request to be in Lisa's section because she is the best waitress EVER!!!

After lunch we headed to the 36th Annual Tour of Holiday Homes in Downtown McKinney! It was so much fun! I had no idea there was so much history in McKinney!

Our first stop was one of the homes in the beautiful Chestnut Square. They had women dressed up in 1800's style dresses telling the stories of what it was like for the people who originally lived in these homes back in the late 1800's!

This was what the kitchens were like back then! Can you imagine cooking dinner for your family in this kitchen? Look how small the ice box was! Only big enough for milk and eggs. Did you know that most kitchens were actually outdoor patios during this time? This is because there were frequent kitchen fires and they didn't want to burn their house down, so the stove was kept outside.

There was something special about being in this kitchen and thinking back to simpler times when families always gathered around the table to enjoy home cooked meals! I think I would have loved being a 1950's housewife! Baking, cooking, cleaning, taking care of kids and greeting my husband with a hot dinner and a BIG kiss when he gets home from work sounds like my kind of lifestyle!

This is the living room. No lights on the tree because there was no electricity back then. No TV, no video game systems...just a place for families to gather and talk and laugh and play games together...imagine that! I am so glad McKinney has kept these homes preserved so we can show today's kids what life used to be like!

After this home, we were actually able to visit PRIVATE residences that people have renovated and made absolutely gorgeous! I just fell in love with them. Because they were private residences, I was not able to take many photos of them. It was amazing to see how beautiful these homes were after they were restored! It was AMAZING!

These were a couple of the private residences we toured!

I did snap a couple pictures of this 3rd level train room! This person had several trains that spiraled all around the entire 3rd floor loft! It was soooo cool!

It even went through the bathroom!

There was a wall of antique train cars!

One of my favorite things about these historic homes is the beautiful wrap around porches. It made me want to cuddle up with a book, enjoy an afternoon of tea with a friend or maybe even do some outdoor blogging on the laptop!!

Each year different private residences open their homes for people to come and tour! It was so much fun and definitely something I would like to do again!