Haul out the holly!

Each Christmas I try to do something different in my home when it comes to decorating.

This year, I hung some ornaments from the window.
And put my tiny tree in a corner of the living room.
Decorating for Christmas is one of my most favorite things to do all year. It's fun to unwrap little treasures that I only get to see for about 40 days of the year. Like my small snowman collection.
And my Christmas trees and all white nativity scene.
Not much is "new" this year. Though I did get a new Christmas tree as a gift. They are my most favorite of all things to collect for Christmas. Perhaps it's my most favorite symbol of the season. I could go look at decorated Christmas trees all day and never get bored.
I made a few things thanks to gadzooks of ideas on Pinterest. Some of them are hanging on my wall to have as a Christmasy wall art collage instead of the floral painting that usually hangs there.
It's the little things though that makes my house feel more homey at Christmas.
Berries and pine. Simple and festive.
And no house is complete without a place to stop under the mistletoe to steal a kiss or two.
This shelf is one of my favorite things to decorate. I won't even tell you how many times I changed it....
Tommy keeps asking why I have a shoe hanging on the wall. I suppose it's weird really. We decorate dead trees and hang socks. And mommy nails shoes to the kitchen wall and has grass and candy hanging out of it.
I wanted to keep things simple in the dining room. Reds and greens are my favorite colors to decorate with at Christmas and somehow my dining room has turned into the unofficial cardinal room. I had no idea I had a thing for cardinals until now. (Not pictured are the two small pictures of cardinals that hang in here year round). It makes cardinal count - 4.
I threw together a centerpiece for the table. Though I'm not really sure if I'll keep this arrangement as it is. Knowing me, it will probably change five more times before the season is over.
My dining room is ready for dinners and parties. Bring it on.
I found some new stockings I loved this year at Hobby Lobby.
And I got four of them. And even though the fourth doesn't belong to anyone, it's hanging there as a reminder of hope for me. That maybe someday, the fourth stocking will have an owner because we'll have another little one in the house. And that even if we don't, God has freed my heart to long and wait and rest in whatever His plan is for me.
Every year I have to get a few new ornaments. I love trinkets and cute things that tell a story. Like this one I found of an electric guitar. It says, "If it's too loud, you're too old!" It made me laugh. I bought one for my dad and gave it to him on Thanksgiving for his own tree. Music has and always will be a place that we can connect and I'm grateful for that place. I love when ornaments are reminders of special things.
It's become a tradition with Todd and I, that we buy at least one marshmallow person ornament every year. He bought me a few the Christmas we got engaged in 2005 and we've bought at least one every year since. This is a horrible picture, but it's a hunting marshmallow person, complete with a rifle and everything. Very us. Or very Todd - either way.
And the best for last.

The Christmas tree. Isn't it just glorious?
Maybe I love it so much because something about it relaxes me. I can turn off the lights and the TV and sit there with a cup of coffee or hot chocolate and just be. I am invited to remember or pray or just feel the things that take space in my heart during the holiday season.

I'm officially decorated and decked out for the holidays. My big 'girls night only' Christmas party is tomorrow night and I have quite a crowd coming. There will be lots of rocking around the Christmas tree and egg nog drinking and merry-making.

Oh, I just love this time of year. And I love that my home is a reflection of how I feel about the season.

Heirlooms

The last step to decorating the Christmas tree is putting the tree skirt at its base. After the garlands and the ornaments are hung and perfectly placed, it's the very last thing to do. And since the tree skirt I have belonged to my mother, it's something that evokes much emotion and feeling within me. Seeing it there makes me feel like I still have a piece of her around at Christmastime.

When I got married to Todd, my dad let me have it for myself. It feels like a treasure and I hold on to it tightly, because memories of my mother at Christmas are some of the most precious that I have.

Christmas was the time of year that she came to life in ways that she wasn't alive the other eleven months of the year. She made things extra special and extra fun and extra magical. As a grown woman, I find that I'm a lot like her in that regard. I purpose to make parties and gifts and decorations with that extra something. Not because I'm trying to be like my mom. But just because I am. It's part of what makes me me. And it's a place where I am proud to be like my her.

I still remember the year that she made that tree skirt. I was probably ten years old. I remember going to the fabric store when she selected which materials she would use to make it. She pieced together squares of Christmasy fabric and sewed a cute ruffle on the edge. I remember she stressed quite a bit about it - I'm pretty sure she got angry and cried some tears trying to figure it all out. I think it was a challenging project for her as sewing wasn't exactly her forte. She ended up mastering it though, and it was so lovely.

It is still lovely.
As a girl, I can remember putting it around my waist and spinning in it, pretending that it was some grand Christmas skirt and I was off to a fabulous party. I remember playing that game with my sister when she was a little girl too. In all honesty, I've actually done that as a grown adult. I've put the tree skirt around my waist and I have a spin and just for a moment, I am ten again.

But shhhh. Don't tell anyone that. It would be embarrassing if that secret ever got out.

This year as I've sat on my sofa gazing at my tree, it's felt like my tree skirt doesn't really fit. And it has traditional colors and it's cute, but it just doesn't feel like me It doesn't go with my pretty mesh garland or the fun sprigs I have at the top of the tree rather than a star or an angel. And it doesn't go with a lot of my decor either.

My style in my home has changed a lot in the last year or so. I've felt like I've been growing up and growing out of things. I grew out of my sunflower motif at home and changed everything a few months ago. I think it's felt true for me in several places this year - where I feel more grown up or just new and it has translated into a blog name change and home decorating and clothing choices and so on.

And the same feels true for the tree skirt. I feel like I've grown out of it. I think that maybe, I've even grown out of needing this piece of my mom in my home at Christmas.

For years now, I've needed that visible and tangible reminder of her around for the holidays. I wanted to honor and remember her in that way. Maybe even part of me felt like I had something to prove - that she still mattered to me. Or that I hadn't forgotten the woman she was before the divorce and the alcohol destroyed who she really was. And maybe now, almost twelve years after her death, I am starting to allow myself to let go of some of the things. Because I don't need the tangible things as much as I used to.

Because the woman she was - in all of her liveliness and beauty and creating is still very much alive in me.

This time next year I hope to have something new and something very me that I've made myself for our tree. I have a few ideas and I'm sure my mom would be thrilled that I'm putting her antique away and creating something that feels more like myself. I know that in creating something new, I am still honoring the memory of her.

This will be the last year that my mom's tree skirt graces our family Christmas tree. I will hold on to it and treasure it and lock it away with some of my other heirlooms. That's what it is now isn't it? An heirloom.

On my day off...

On my day off I play with buttons....
and string.
On my day off, I create.....
and make pretty things.
Lots of pretty things.
On my day off I get dirty and make a mess.It's my day off. And I'm thoroughly enjoying it.

Oh and thanks Pinterest for all the Christmasy ideas. I owe my new-found craftiness to you.

Lonely

Loneliness seems to have a way of creeping in unexpectedly. And I wonder why I'm even feeling that way when my calendar is booked and I have 380-something "friends" on Facebook.

How can I feel lonely when I feel closer with my family? Or when I have lunch with a friend today, plans to visit with another tomorrow on my day off and will be helping a friend with her cupcake business on Saturday? How is there even room to feel lonely? It begs the question, "What is wrong with me?!"

It seems like in all of the activity it feels weird to feel lonely, and yet loneliness comes. I have no control over it. It's that ache for something greater or something more that is beyond my control. It goes beyond making plans. It's just there - a void, a hole, begging to be filled with something.

These feelings are familiar though. They remind me of other seasons of life. Like being a young teenager who felt alone and betrayed, confused and silent. Or as a young adult woman who lived with her grandmother and spent every night watching television because she had nothing to do and no one to do it with. Or being a new mom and having to stay home to care for my baby when everyone else was at a party.

The loneliness is many things I suppose. It's the pangs of missing my mom. It's the wanting more in my marriage. It's the friends that have moved away that have left holes in my heart and my life. It's the longing to hold another baby in my arms and feeling like it won't ever happen. It's the knowing deep down that relationships here will not bring me the kind of fulfillment I'm looking for.

Perhaps loneliness comes with every season of life. Maybe it's supposed to.

It's December 1st. It's Christmas season. I'm finishing up Christmas cards and starting to shop for gifts and planning parties....and I'm a little lonely too.

The Toddler Age

Two and a half could possibly be the greatest age ever. Although I've felt that way about every age that Tommy has been so far. Right now, he is so full of excitement and wonder and discovery. Everything, and I mean everything, has the possibility of evoking huge emotion within him.

There are some things I don't want to ever forget.

- How excited he gets over seeing bubbles in his pee after he's gone to the bathroom. Maybe that's gross, but his elation and exclaiming, "Look at duh bubbles in the pee-pee! Look at dem all!" is just absolutely hilarious.

- How he wants to camp out under the Christmas tree to lay down or read his books. The most precious thing on earth perhaps.

- How my kisses still make everything feel better.

- How he LOVES the 'ball in the sky.' (A huge water tower near our house that we often drive by. He gets SO excited about it and it is a very disappointing drive if we don't get to see the ball in the sky).

- How he dances to music.

- How he still asks to go to Wyatt's house even though he moved away. I love that he remembers his little friend.

- How he's turned his pop-gun into a "guitar" and loves to have me pretend to play it.

- How he sings Amazing Grace how sweet duh sound.

- How he randomly says at anytime, "I dust love you mama."

- How excited he is when daddy gets home. He runs to the door and leaps into his arms - it makes my heart melt every single time.

- How he's learned to make sound effects. When he plays with his cars and trucks now, he's totally got some kind of grunting sound down when they're driving.

- How he absolutely loves to play in the car and sit in the driver's seat to pretend that he's driving. And how he has a meltdown every time that we're done driving too.

- How he explains things like Thanksgiving. "Dere's turkey and pie and daddy and pie." That about sums it up, don't you think?

- How he loves to give kisses and hugs.

- How he says please and thank you and you're welcome - and how he learned such polite manners, I don't really know.

- How he smells right after his bath.

- How his messy hair looks when he wakes up in the morning.

- How he asks for pancakes or "offles" any morning that I'm home with him.

- How he clomps around in our shoes. And when he wears mine, he calls them "tap shoes."

I'm sure there are more and I could be here all day listing them all I suppose.

Yesterday, I had an usually stressful day at work. I cried all the way home just to release everything I had been holding in all day long. He greeted me with a smile and a hug and asked for my keys so he could use them to drive his Mater truck. He wasn't worried or stressed about a thing in the world.

After Oma left, he started to sing some of the songs we often sing together. And it calmed my heart to hear it.

Funny how kids seems to always put life back into perspective. We were home. We were safe. We were healthy. We had everything we needed. His heart was content enough to sing. I love how in his toddler innocence, he continues to invite me to rest and to play and to remember that the simplest things in life are the things that really matter.

NO MORE: Turkey, pie and dishes

1) Did I mention that I made my first REAL apple pie for Thanksgiving this year? I've made apple things before, but not a traditional apple pie with the crust on top. I think I kind of rocked it. Though I kind of don't like apple pie and ate NONE so I don't really know how it turned out.
2) I am SO over turkey. Seriously, I don't want to go near another turkey until next November.
3) This about sums up how our family fun night of tree decorating went:
Tommy was sad that we had to hang the ornaments on the tree. He kept taking the ones he liked and stashing them in a corner. After two major meltdowns he got the hang of it and eventually decided it was fun to hang things off of a tree. He spent a good part of Friday night lying under it and informing me that's where he would be sleeping.

4) I don't do black Friday. It does not interest me AT ALL. Am I missing out? I stayed home and did laundry, decorated and relaxed.

5) We went to a lovely wedding on Saturday. Though a cold front blew in right when things got started and well, it was quite a chilly ceremony! I loved her decor - the bride made everything herself!
6) I made a grand discovery this weekend. The best invention EVER - PUMPKIN EGG-NOG. It's like two of my most favorite seasonal things rolled into one. And it doesn't disappoint - it's seriously delicious.

7) I have exactly 98 Christmas cards to address and get out. Is that a lot? People tend to look at me like I'm a little nuts when I tell them how many I'm mailing.

8) I'm done washing dishes. I never want to wash another dish for the rest of my life. I feel like I've done nothing but bake pies and wash dishes for the past five days! This week is paper plates and leftovers. I'm officially on a dish strike.

9) I am all decorated for Christmas! My favorite evening time ritual now is watching Hallmark movies with only the lights of the tree on. And perhaps a glass of egg-nog too.

10) I'm serious about the turkey thing. NO. MORE. TURKEY.
And maybe no more pie.

11) It's time to get my cyber Monday on. Are you shopping online today too?

The Best Thanksgiving Ever

Wednesday night, when I made three perfect homemade pie crusts, I just knew that this was going to be a good Thanksgiving.

The fried turkey turned out incredible, as always, thanks to my husband - the master fryer.

I think Poppy kind of loved it.

My son had a blast playing with his cousins on the gorgeous and mild November day we had here.

There was laughter and silliness and fun. And a sister moment I won't ever forget.

The Thanksgiving proclamation was read. Next to the fried turkey, it's my most favorite Thanksgiving tradition.

Some precious and glorious moments moved us to tears.

There was a time for singing and going around the room giving thanks and praise to God. That was perhaps, the best part of all.

There were just a few dishes that needed to be done!

Some faces were absent and Robin wasn't feeling like herself. We had tears and shared in our disappointments together. And even so, it was a beautiful, special, memorable, lovely, rich, sweet, redeeming, God-given day.

It was kind of the best Thanksgiving.....

Ever.