Preparing our Home

'Tis the time of year for Allen to make his bi-annual trip to the attic to get out the Christmas decorations. We always wait until after Will's birthday celebration and, this year, we finished those by his birthday on the second. However, our plans to decorate we derailed a couple times. The other day, Allen and the kids built the tree while I addressed cards and worked on school stuff. Another evening, Allen hung the lights and helped me get the ribbon on the boughs. Tonight, we finally had it ready to ornament (though this mama really only want to go to bed.) Allen snapped a few pictures while I helped the kids carefully unwrap several years of sweet memories to hang on the tree. My eyes teared up, as always, when I saw the photos in the "Baby's First Christmas" ornaments. The one of Will doesn't make my cry, but I had to fight tears with each of the others as I remembered the NICU tubes and wires that are in the photos. I reminisced about our first home, our first Christmas, our travels -- including the new angel ornament I got in Uganda this year.

This year, I even did something that was REALLY hard (at first.) I left all the ornaments where the kids put them, even though that meant that the bottom third of the right side of the tree was left ornament-less. Usually I move some around because I like it "balanced", but this year I dared myself to leave it alone and to learn to be okay with the perceived imperfection. It was Maddie' year to put the angel on top, but she screamed with terror every time Allen lifted her, so she surrendered the crocheted cherub to Jon.

Just about the time I was thinking about taking the kids to find an ornament for this year, they got some in the mail. Great Grammie Vail cross stitched them each an adorable snowman! (Getting all four to cooperate for a picture was evidently too much for me to ask. This is as good as it gets.)