It’s that time of year again. I’ve written about my holiday ornament tradition several times (here, here, here, and here) but for those who don’t feel like reading blog posts from 2007–dear God, the pictures–the tradition goes like this. I love glass ornaments, so that’s what I use to decorate our tree. Every year I buy a few ornaments to represent the year for us as a family. Here are the ornaments I bought this year, all from Target.
I bought an apple siting on a stack of books to represent my return to the working world as a teacher’s aide.
This ornament representing our Buttercup isn’t glass, so it’s a bit of a cheat. Glass ornaments are hard enough to come by, so in my mind the glitter acts like glass and is, therefore, glass. It’s all about sales, even when you are your customer.
This one was hard for me to buy, and even harder for me to photograph. How can it be 8 months since we lost Buster? (That’s one of the posts I’m most proud of writing.) I think about him every day. I’m debating going back to the store to buy another one for Buddy because he is 14.5 years old. Soon he will need his own ornament, I imagine, and I would love for them to match because they were our peas in a pod.
I write little messages on the back or bottom of each ornament to keep track of the memories. So far I know what each ornament represents, but one day I may forget why I have mushroom ornaments. Or maybe one day my great grandchildren will find my boxes of ornaments and wonder about the batty old woman who had a tree full of frogs, cakes, bones, elephants, golf balls, dogs, birds, mice, books, Star Wars, Mickey Mouse, and so on.
I would be curious to know how you store all your ornaments! Do you wrap them in paper like in the photos?
Yes, I do! I have enough ornaments now that I should probably reconsider how I store them. I've always used a big bin, but I need something more shallow.
I love your tradition.
Thank you, Barbara. :)
We choose ornaments each year, as well. I'm a fan of glass and glitter myself.. shocking that we wOuld have that in common..not. the kid though? She just likes all kinds of random things so nothing matches. I'm okay with that. Do you store your ornaments with their story? Great idea!
I don't store them with the story, but enough people have asked me that I'm going to from now on. Normally I just write it out on the back, but the story within the story idea is great.
This is such a sweet tradition!
Thank you, Rachel!
And, as I've commented before, this is why I could never have a perfect tree. There's nothing like gazing upon a colorful tree of love and memories . . .