We went to a Christmas tree farm to cut down our own tree. This seemed important to me. As a kid, I always had an artificial tree. I knew I didn't want to do that. So we drove an hour from the city to a tree farm. We took a hayride out to the field and walked around in the cold, hunting for the perfect tree. Or the perfect tree for us. We knew that we didn't want anything too tall or too beautiful -- we wanted something a little odd, a little Charlie Brown-ish.
Back home, we made some popcorn and hot chocolate and got busy with the business of trimming our tree.
We don't have a lot of ornaments and it doesn't seem authentic to go out and buy a ton so we made do with what we had and we'll add one or two each year. This year, we bought two ornaments made in Kenya, from locally sourced materials. We stumbled upon them at Meijer on Thursday and knew we had to get them.
We don't have a star for the top of our tree. It looked a little odd without something on top so we decided to put a giraffe made out of rope that we brought home from Ethiopia. We think it looks just perfect: a giraffe on top of our fat little Christmas tree. Perhaps a new Christmas tradition has begun?
How does your family trim the Christmas tree? I've enjoyed reading all your comments on the last post. I'd love to hear about your tree traditions. Do you buy an ornament each year? Do you string popcorn? Do your kids make ornaments? Please share!
Posts
Your tree looks beautiful! I bet that Dagim loved the outdoor adventure.
ReplyDeleteHans and I have started a tradition of buying ornaments when we travel. We borrowed this from his parents - we loved the idea! We also each have some childhood ornaments.
I grew up with real trees (often ones we cut down), but we have had a fake tree for the past few years. We travel to see family over the holiday, so this seems to work well. The lovely scent is missing, though. This year I bought a tiny rosemary tree from Trader Joe's - it looks like a tree, is real, smells good, and best of all, we can eat it later. :-)
Happy holidays!
Your little tree is beautiful, and I think it's giraffe "topping" is just perfect!
ReplyDeleteThe one tradition that endures in my family is spending Christmas Eve at my grandparents. The table is filled with plates of finger foods....the punchbowl is filled with champagne and peaches and fruit juice....and we just enjoy each other's company and tell stories, share memories. Often, we look at pictures. We stopped doing gifts a few years ago since most of us just go out and get whatever it is we want anyway. It has made all the difference, and it is the one night every year that I truly look forward to.
We had real trees until 4 years ago when we bought a prelite tree and it has stayed around ever since. Our last real tree fell over several times a day thanks to a faulty tree stand and that darn cat!! We decorate with homemade ornaments and ornamnets given to us from our parents; like everything in our house it's mostly hand-me-downs.
ReplyDeletePaper chains, popcorn and cranberries.
When the boys were little they'd have fun decorating a section of the tree and it often looked funny to outsiders to see clumps of ornaments, but to me it was the most precious thing ever. Last year only Justin wanted to decorate so the two of us worked our magic.
We top with a Martha Stewart star, but have used a gold bow in the past. I really like your giraffe, I wonder if a giraffe was in the stable with Jesus all those years ago- could have been?? Now I need to get decorating...
Every year Santa brings each girl an ornament. I hope that by the time they leave and have their own trees they will have a collection of ornaments to start decorating with.
ReplyDelete