October and the bulk of November seem like they were forever ago. Let's see there was Halloween, Open Studio, and Thanksgiving just happened. Whoa! I am planning on digging my heels in on December despite eight Nutcracker performances and the ordinary hustle of the holidays. Recently Heather mentioned how much she wanted December to be a slow month. I am right with her on that one.
At the tree farm . . . Elijah and I are equally picky about trees. I find this to be pretty funny.
So as always, I am planning to slow down the Advent and holiday season as much as I possibly can. We started by putting up our tree. It is our tradition to pick one from the tree farm a day or two after Thanksgiving. Our tree is still getting decorated here and there (it's really never done especially when you can make cinnamon ornaments and the like), and I have yet to start on the house. Unfortunately, it seems like we all have to work, or go to school and rehearsal, as well as eat and sleep. I have almost made peace with the necessity of incremental decorating that goes on around here-almost. The good news is that I found my bottle brush trees and my Nativity from Mexico so I am dancing a jig over those rediscoveries.
A "gingerbread" ormanent my mom bought in Germany for the kids. I depend on her to keep my ornament stash somewhat "classy".
My Thai fish that I bought from the U.N. gift shop when I was sixteen . . . .
"The Sock Monkey" made by Julie . . . .
But what I have made complete peace with is the end result of a child-decorated Christmas tree. I was once on my way to becoming turbo Martha Stewart-like. I have been rather Martha-y since childhood. I arranged the birds, roses and bows just so on the tree. I mean I was six. Man, how I enjoyed a themed and neat tree trimmed with white lights. Well the white lights bit the dust a while ago and our trees always sport white and muticolored lights that twinkle. All is still well. For a while though I had an interesting time dealing with the huddled decorating style of my children-ten ornaments on two branches while a big "bald" patch surrounded the crowd of Santas, bells and other ornaments. Oh well. I don't know if it is age or a desire to put my energy elsewhere or seeing how much they enjoy decorating (perhaps it's all three), but now I am cool with the huddled masses. I used to crave order on the tree. Now my eye doesn't even twitch when I see the tree and I am actually enjoying it. Elijah, however, is another matter. I believe he is a bit into the themes and order too. He proclaimed our tree to be "messy". I think I will leave it to him to negotiate ornament placement with his siblings; I will be hanging out on the couch enjoying my tea and knitting.
My girl loves her Christmas tree almost as much as she loves "candy canns".
How about you? If you celebrate Christmas, is your tree already up? Does yours sport huddled masses of ornaments too? ;-)
