O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree

I really love having a Christmas tree. One of the reasons that I love our tree this year is because we had a small Christmas Tree Miracle. We drove to get our tree together, having already had a discussion in which we established that due to the downturn in both the national and the Ray economies, it would be wise to buy the kind of tree Russ would buy (less expensive and scrawny) rather than the kind of tree I would buy. (More expensive and pretty.) When we arrived at the lot we were immediately greeted by a row of broken trees--trees that had accidentally had the tops broken off of them, and had been repaired using plastic cable ties.

Bingo. Pretty tree, scrawny price.
So this year I've loved our Christmas tree because The Price Was Right.

But I love our tree every year, pretty or scrawny, because of what it holds. Our tree is never going to win any kind of award for tree beauty. There is no color coordination and no theme. (Although I will confess that after the children decorate the tree, I spend an hour or so making sure that everything looks balanced.)

Our tree is a history of the last 15 years of our lives together. When Cindy Lynn was 5 and Jason was 1, we went to Colorado for the wedding of my best friend from high school. We visited a glass blowers shop in Estes Park and loved watching him make things. I wanted to buy a $70 pitcher, but that was (and still is!) out of our budget. So instead we bought an ornament. It seemed like an extravagant and slightly odd thing to do at the time. I think it cost $25, which was a small fortune to us then. And it just seemed like it would be strange to have one ornament from a vacation on our tree--at that point in time we weren't big vacation takers, and we couldn't see that that would ever change. But we bought it anyway. It was so beautiful that we hung it in our bright kitchen window to enjoy all of the time. In December we moved it onto our tree, and after the tree came down it went back into the window.

The next year (much to our surprise) we took another vacation. We traveled from Idaho to the east coast to spend time with my family and go to a family reunion at the beach. And we bought an ornament at the beach. We had no idea what kind of trend we were starting! That first beach ornament has fallen from the tree several times, but each time we have saved the sand and the small shells and put them in another glass ball. And a very cool cube the last time.

Our Christmas Tree contains the highlights of our life. It shows who we are.

It holds ornaments that remind us of the people we love,

places we've been,

and adventures we've had.

When we haven't been able to find the right ornament we have improvised.

We are, of course, a little heavy on the beach themed ornaments.

Each year we decorate the tree together. We take the ornaments out of the box, reminisce about where we got each one, and talk about the fun memories we have. Each year there is less and less room on the tree for what I would call "filler" ornaments.

Because our tree is filled with happiness.