We love to decorate for Christmas. Love, love, love it! We love getting all of our boxes of memories out and finding fun places to showcase them all around our house. On Saturday, we decorated the ol' casa for Christmas. For those of you who don't know, our new house is my parents' old house, the one that I grew up in. You know how you have super strong memories of your parents' house at Christmas...this decoration is supposed to be here...we ALWAYS put the tree over there. Well, I was surprised to find that it was a bit of a struggle to decorate this year. There was always a certain feel about the house when it was decorated for Christmas, a warmth that I'm struggling to replicate.
The tree is up, the lights are all twinkly and colorful and the ornaments are a hit with the kiddos who hang out there asking me questions about whose is whose and what year they were from. The little Goebel angels that my Grammy collected for me when I was a kid were placed on the mantel by Grace who loved doing it almost as much as I did when I was little. The stockings are hanging above the fireplace from their P.E.A.C.E. letters. Gifts from former students are all around reminding me of some of my favorite people. Our many nativity scenes from around the world have not made the scene yet (we're waiting until balls don't suddenly fly toward breakable objects from out of nowhere...does that ever happen?) but we have a few of our favorites out. Christmas music was pumping throughout the house and Grace was dancing her little heart out with her silver leggings, pink sweater and Santa hat on. The boys were helping hang up ornaments and fluff the tree and making all of the noise-making stuffed animals dance and sing in one cacophanous, joyful chorus.
And yet, it just didn't feel quite...right. Maybe I need a little Linus telling me again the story of Jesus' birth to revive my Charlie Brown spirits. (That always gies me goosebumps...any child voice reading Scripture gives me goosebumps.) Or maybe I need to remember that, for our kids, these are the warm memories of their home at Christmas and, for them, it doesn't need to look just like the house I grew up in but rather to look just like the house they're growing up in.
Happy memory making to you and your family!
1 comment:
I know what you need - plastic! I know where you might be able to get a cute snowman, santa, and iceman. We'll talk. The kids don't seem to be missing out on any Christmas memories. You're right, for them this is their Christmas. It's all they know. For you, it's a little different, but just like the new carpet, you will grow into making it your own. Let's go look at Christmas lights. That always puts me in the holiday spirit! PS I did not get an email letting me know you updated. Guess I'll have to check daily!
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