1/365 Traditions

I know Christmas has come and gone, but I walked into my parents kitchen today and had to take these.

Growing up, my brother and I always got a new ornament every year. Sometimes the ornament would be from a family vacation or maybe it represented something we were interested in. One year, my mom found a beautiful ballerina for me because I took dance for several years. Another year, it was an elf talking on a cell phone... No explanation needed there! Every once in awhile, we were able to pick out our own ornaments and always searched and searched for the perfect one.

I could not wait for December 13th to come around so we could go cut down a Christmas tree at the tree farm. (I had to wait until the 13th because my brother's birthday is on the 12th and we always waited until after his birthday to start putting up our decorations and the tree.) We would bring the tree home and spend hours decorating it and wrapping white lights around it. The best part was getting the ornaments out of the box and unwrapping them, not sure which one we would find next. Each one unwrapped was another special memory with friends and family.

My brother and I would scout out the best branches on the tree for hanging our favorite ornaments and our mom would add clusters of ball ornaments strung together with ribbon, red heart ornaments, teddy bear ornaments, and sometimes a strand of red beads. Pretty soon we had so many ornaments, we had to get anoter tree!

The second tree was decorated with colorful lights and handmade ornaments from my grandmother. Most of the ornaments were made from felt and the cats would always find a way to remove them from the lower branches so they could play with them. We always found them scattered around the house.

It wasn't until recently that I realized how much time and love my grandmother put into these ornaments. My grandfather told me that she made thousands of these ornaments and gave them to friends and family... Each person getting about 25 each year! She passed away a few years ago, and we miss her so much, especially during the holidays. Every time I walk by the colorful felt ornaments, I am reminded of my grandmother and how much she loved the holidays.