When Daddy & I celebrated our first holiday season living together, it was actually a little bit of a challenge. We both had different holiday traditions that we had grown up with & cherished. All of a sudden we were looking at having to decide what our holiday traditions would be.
One of the first things we talked about was our Christmas tree. I don't remember ever having a real tree growing up. It's kind of hard to get a real tree when you live in places like Hawaii. We had a beautiful (as life-like as you can get) fake tree that we would put up & cover with way too many decorations each year. Real trees just seemed messy & expensive to me. Daddy grew up with real Christmas trees, & he insisted on us keeping with the tradition he grew up with: cutting down our own Christmas tree.
I'm so glad he did. Going to pick out the perfect Christmas Tree as a family at Shartner Farms the day after Thanksgiving (we give Thanksgiving it's due, but I'm happy to rush into Christmas celebrations as soon as it's over) has become one of my very favorite holiday traditions.
You like the baby trees. I like big, fat trees (the bigger, the better). Daddy likes trees that will actually fit in our house.
Your job is to make sure the tree doesn't fall off of our car on the way home, & you take your job very seriously.
Once we get home, we let you take a nap while Daddy & I get the tree in the house & Daddy puts the light on it. Once you wake up, you put your reindeer antlers on & help us decorate the tree. While we may not have a fake tree, we keep my family traditions alive by filling our tree with way too many ornaments. I love every second of oohing & awing over each ornament with you, some of them more than 30 years old now. You're kinda the cutest & sweetest little tree decorator in the whole wide world.
After our tree is lit & decorated, the living room is my favorite room in the whole house. I could sit in the cozy light of the tree forever. It's just the kind of magic I need to start the Christmas season.
I love you so,
Mommy
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