What fun the kiddos had at church today decorating the tree! Bud and Sis must have put up 50 ornaments each--all on the lowest branches of the tree! At least there were adults who could then decorate the upper branches. Even when all the ornaments were gone, Bud kept looking for things to hang on the tree. Poor boy. He just ran out of decorations. Sis really enjoyed handing ornaments to the adults on chairs, as well as hanging them up herself.
We were hoping that by decorating the church tree, we could avoid makng a big deal out of our tree. See, the cats, while 1 1/2 years old, are still quite kittenish and will eat the tree, the lighting wires, and any ornaments. We'd talked about covering the tree with sheets or moving it to the porch at night when we can't watch the cats. But none of it was satisfactory. We finally decided, after talking to the kids, that we would put up the tree close to Christmas Eve and let Santa decorate it that night, at least for this year. The kids were excited about this idea so that was our plan. So, we were excited to give them the chance to decorate the church tree at least. The kids loved decorating so much, however, that now we are revisiting the best way to have a tree.
My mom always installed? set up? the tree while we were at school, getting it in its place (it was always a plastic tree when I was a little girl, then mostly a real tree once we moved when I was in high school), getting all the boxes of decorations out of the attic, and stringing the (always colored) lights. Sometimes we would help with the ornaments; during the college years, I think she did them. There were always some . . . disagreements . . . between my sister and me over the felt-and-sequins ornmanents my great-grandma M had made, mainly whose were whose. Sometimes that made group decorating a little stressful. I'm not sure it's ever been resolved; it seems to matter less now. But then, we haven't shared a Christmas tree since, what, 1999? I don't remember when my last holiday in Houston was (it was after Mama and I got together by at least a few years).
There were always ornaments that I thought of as special (read "mine"): the glass nativity my "aunt" D gave me years ago; the painted wooden angel that Mom made me when I was little, as well as the painted wooden heart with my name on it; those great-grandma ornaments (I will not detail which sets here so as not to reopen that). I'm sure there are others I'm forgetting. And then there was always the porcelain angel from Bammie (Gommie's mother) that sat on the mantle that she had given me before she died (when I was 4). It's beautiful and plays lovely music.
I also had my own little tree, usually kept in my bedroom, from my great-grandma M, complete with little tree skirt and homemade puffy fabric hearts ornaments. I love those puffy hearts. Except I haven't seen them in awhile and don't know if they are in Houston or are here. We need to find those. We got the kids their own little Hallmark trees made of fabric with big buttons that have sets of puffy animal ornaments. They've discontinued selling the trees and ornaments, but you can use almost any fabric ornament with a bit loop.
Maybe I need to look for those puffy hearts again . . . Not that we're going to hang them up--the cats would love all the lace!
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