Every person has their own traditions that go along with each holiday that comes about through out the year. This time of year makes me think about what traditions I grew up with and which new ones I am creating with my own family.
Growing up some of the holiday traditions consisted of going to a holiday concert as a family, driving around looking at Christmas lights in different neighborhoods, going out to pick a real Christmas tree, and watching National Lamppon's Christmas Vacation. As a present, my mom would give my siblings and myself a new Christmas ornament each year to hang on the tree. I know looking back, that was always the highlight of the year to see which new ornament I would recieve and where I was going to hang it on the tree. Some of my friends from high school gave christmas ornaments as gifts as well. Now that I am an adult, I look forward to hanging the old ornaments on the tree every year. I need to get to my mom's house to get my childhood ornaments that are still packed away in a box.
Now that I am married and live 3000 miles away from my parents, I have had to start some new traditions. Rob and I have started to decorate the house for the winter and Christmas season about a week or so before Thanksgiving. We both love the Christmas season and tend to buy several items on clearance after the season has passed and the stores want the holiday items off their shelves. It is always fun pulling the items out every year and seeing the house be transformed. We have four Christmas trees this year. Yes, I did say four. Two on the main floor, one on the top floor, and one down in the basement where we spend most of our time. Our main Christmas tree on the main floor is themed with Purple, Green, and Silver ornaments. We have a miniature tree that sits on the vanity in our guest bedroom. I found mini musical instrument ornaments for that tree. The big tree upstairs on the top floor is the traditional decorated tree with all of the ornaments that I have been given over the past years. Finally the small three-foot tree in the basement is decorated with red and green bells.
As a birth-mother, I started the tradition of giving Kaylee a Christmas ornament every year as well. I started it back when she was just a newborn and celebrating her first Christmas at 11 months old. What I also do is buy an identical ornament for my own tree. That way I can look back over the years and feel that she was somehow in my house for the holiday season as well.
That's very cool that you have more than one tree. I remember one year I had a tree in my bedroom. That was fun. I was in a play and it was a prop that was going to be tossed if it didn't find a good home. I've been forging my own traditions myself. Each year seems different but I enjoy trying things, keeping what I like and tabling what I don't. I need to go through my ornaments at my parent's house too. I have lots of old ones and ones that were given to me as presents.
ReplyDeleteI never thought I would have more than one tree...but I love it. Each one has a different feel to it.
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