Decorating Day!

I personally think there is no other time in a relationship when you realize how different your view during the first little bit of marriage can be from your spouse's than when you go to "celebrate." Birthday, holidays... they're just stark reminders that you come from different families who value different things. I don't remember what the difference between dating and marriage was, but there was a distinct difference. Most of the differences are comical (your family does what?!) but others are just down-right heart-rending for some. I'm a big traditional-kind-of-girl. We always had more ornaments than the tree could hold, and in truth, that's how you know the decorating is done: when the ornament you just hung falls off, time and again, you're done. My mom has decorations dating back over a century, which include the veritable army of nutcrackers my Nana collected for years and years. They still freak out the dog, but I'm sure one day she'll get used to it.

Needless to say, the house I grew up in was steeped in traditions and Christmas time was always a great time for pulling out ornaments and decorations, remembering when you got it and why. Todd and I have tried to make many of our traditions, and I really enjoy them. I'll share more on those later, but today, as we were trimming the tree and setting up the nativity, it was a really blessed time. We were setting up a number of nativity sets, one of which is massive and Todd reminded me that we got it as a first anniversary gift... in July... and when we finally opened it in December, Todd had to phone his dad and ask "if he had Jesus" (Mary and Jesus were in a separate box that we didn't have, which still gets a good laugh from all of us). It was neat to pull out ornaments from 1991 from my Grams and realize, as Em is hanging all of "her" ornaments, that some day, she'll be hanging her own memories on her own tree somewhere out in the big, wide world. It made my heart sing to be able to share the stories with her about where a decoration came from and the story behind it. She didn't believe me that I was a teacher... but what kid thinks their mom is anything but plain ol' Mom?

Cooper dove right in and tried to create as much destruction as possible in as little amount of time as possible. I must admit, he's pretty proficient!

Em, on the other hand, gently pulled out her's and Cooper's stockings and promptly put them on. Did I mention her new obsession with putting on socks???

Em's ornament from last year... how big she's gotten since I traced and sewed that.

Cooper, being just barely 14 months-old, was relegated to soft things and unbreakables. Which meant lots of playing in the big felt 'Santa' sack and much admonition from Todd and I to stop whatever he was doing. However, he does have one ornament that is unbreakable (I think) and that was his felt handprint from last year. It took him a bit to get Daddy to let him do it by himself, but he managed and was so stinkin' proud of himself!