My mom went through a phase that began in the early ‘90s of elaborately decorating our house for Christmas every year. It started with my dad deciding to have a big holiday party for people from work, which also coincided with my youngest brother entering kindergarten. She finally had the time and a reason to go all out, so she did.
I was a teenager by then, and I probably grumbled about helping, but it was fun having such a festive house during December. My mom had (and has) great taste and made a lot of the decorations herself. The final products were unique as well as beautiful. Still, the highlight of the Christmas season, for me anyway, was decorating the actual Christmas tree.
The decorations for the tree, unlike the decorations for the rest of the house, were more eclectic than elegant, and every kid had their favorites — the ones they wanted to hang first. Unfortunately, sometimes they were the same favorites. The result: Tree trimming wasn’t always a peaceful affair. And, while I remember everyone being relatively careful, there were always casualties — ornaments that had gotten broken in the box during the move into or out of storage or simply weren’t up for the joyful enthusiasm of us youngsters.
So, yes, there was usually some shouting and an equal amount of tears, but that’s probably part of what made it memorable — tree trimming captured the whole gamut of human emotions in one epic, early winter afternoon.
I had every intention of recreating this in my adulthood, and when my son was just an infant, I started gathering ornaments for our family tree. I still had a few from my own childhood, and my husband had a few from his as well. There was also the gifted “First Christmas” ornament from our wedding, one from our belated honeymoon to Hot Springs, South Dakota and another from a trip to Boston to visit my college roommate so she could meet my brand-new baby — all in all, a good start.
We’ve continued the tradition of ornament collecting over the intervening decade. The kids have made ornaments in school and received some as gifts. Like her grandmother, my daughter loves to decorate for holidays, so she’s crafted her own ornaments for the tree, as well as for her bunny’s hutch, and for her favorite stuffie, Hedgie’s, tiny Christmas tree. Much to my delight, I once again live in a winter wonderland of decorations during December.
Yesterday, we finally decorated this year’s tree. As is often the case when kids aren’t tiny anymore, we now have sports practice and homework and hanging out with friends to contend with, so finding a time to unpack all those ornaments was a little harder. But, when we did, it was every decorating dream I ever had come true.
“Oh look, it’s Dad’s cowboy ornament!”
“My dinosaur!”
“This one is from when we went to the aquarium at the Mall of America. Remember that?”
“The icicles! The icicles! These are my favorites…Wait…No, these are my favorites!” And on and on as the box slowly emptied, each treasure carefully unwrapped and placed gently on its own bough.
There were definitely some arguments. And a few ornaments came out of the box looking worse for wear. But, mostly, the afternoon was peppered with joyful exclamations and rambling remembrances.
Outside, the day was gray, and the wind was bitter, but we didn’t mind. The twinkle lights, once hung around the tree, reflected merrily on the sliding glass door, red, gold, green and blue, magnifying the cheer.
When every ornament was hung, every branch laden with a sweet story of a happy time, we stood back to admire our work. We keep joking that last year’s tree was a ‘once-in-a-lifetime tree’ — it was full and lush, perfectly symmetrical with no flat spots or crooked branches — almost too perfect to be real.
However, admiring this year’s tree, I couldn’t help but sigh: “Wow, I think this is our best tree yet,” and I meant it.
I suspect I will say the same thing next year, too.
