Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree

Chad's parents decorate and decorate well.  Christmas is, of course, the big one, but they also decorate for Easter, Halloween and Thanksgiving.  As soon as the ghosts appeared hanging from their eaves, Joseph started with the questions.

"Do we have Halloween decorations?"

"Ummm...not really. We've got some pumpkins." And some adorable hand crafted items that will not be going out until after Elizabeth stops eating everything I put on the table.

"We need to get some!  Boppa and Gee have lots and lots of decorations. Their house is beautiful."

So we made a ghostly garland, which appeased him until Thanksgiving.

"Do we have Thanksgiving season decorations?"

"Yeah...those pumpkins."

Joseph shot me a dirty look.  "Those are Halloween decorations."

"Huh.  Well, they're kind of autumn decorations."  He shook his head. I could tell he wasn't buying it, but he held his tongue.

So it wasn't a surprise when, the day after Thanksgiving, he asked me, "Is Thanksgiving season over?"

"Yes."

"Good! We can decorate for Christmas!"

I didn't have the heart to put him off, so out came the boxes.  Chad climbed up on the roof and put up the lights.  Joseph and I put away the pumpkins and put out the stockings, the Santa hats, the little trees, the Snoopy sledding thingees and his snow globes.

Yes, my four-year-old collects snow globes. The more ornate, the better. He started two years ago and, even though some have broken, he adds to his collection every year.

I blame an inside joke that had Danielle and I exchanging random snow globes each Christmas for years.

And then, on Saturday, we began the time honored Mandyland tradition of pulling down the Christmas tree from it's box in the garage.

Yes, we have a fake tree.  Did you forget about my little allergy magnet?

Saturday afternoon, while Christmas songs played in the background, we pulled out each ornament.  We showed Joseph his little hand prints and the ornaments that Gran gives him each year.  We rang silver bells and told him how we bought them for our wedding and each time the guests rang the bell, Mommy and Daddy had to kiss.  Which of course resulted in a lot of bell ringing and a lot of kissing.

We showed him all of the Maggie Dog ornaments and the ornaments from when Daddy was a little boy.  He marveled at the homemade ornaments that I put together when I was pregnant with him.

Maybe "marvel" is a strong word, but he did say, "How did you make this?!" Which I'll take as "marveling".

And while we decorated the tree, Elizabeth did her best to get a trip to the hospital.

Every ornament went in her mouth.  She tried to wrap the bead garland around her neck.  Then she started wrapping ribbon around her neck.

Chad said that she was just trying to wear something pretty.

We finished the tree and, while it didn't have the coordinated look of Christmas trees in years past and there were clusters of ornaments on the same branches approximately four feet above the ground, it was beautiful -  a work of art, love and family.