Ornaments

When Eric and I had our first Christmas together we realized that we had no decorations.  As starving college students, we didn’t have money to spend on much.  While shopping for presents for our families, we came upon an ornament that we both liked that was in a clearance bucket.  We looked at it for a long time wondering why it was clearanced several weeks before Christmas. I remember it taking us quite a while to figure it out… It was not missing a leg at the time.

We bought just that one ornament that year.  For a tree, we hung green ribbon on the wall crossing back and forth down the wall until it made a small triangular tree shape.  

Over the next few years, we bought one ornament each year to add to our collection.  At some point there was a year in which we couldn’t agree on one ornament, so we each chose one.  That became the tradition.

On Owen’s first Christmas, his Nana and Dock bought him this ornament.

Eric and I had already bought an ornaments for our tree that year, but not one for Owen.  N&D’s ornament made us decide that it would be fun for Owen to also have his own ornaments that he could take when he had his own tree.  When my brother and sister and I were children, my grandparents had bought each of us an ornament each year.  It was a great tradition, which I really love.  Eric and I added writing the date so that we could keep track, and when Jack was born, went back and wrote names on each ornament so we could remember which ornament belonged to who.

This was Jack’s first:

Apart from their very first year, both Owen and Jack have always picked their own ornament.  On their 2nd Christmas each of the monkeys picked up an ornament and screamed when I tried to put the ornament back.  I figured that was choosing for a 1 or 2 year old.  Owen’s is a glass snow globe – not sure how many years that will last… Jack’s was a clay snowman with a bell – much more appropriate.

2007  -  Owen (plane)                             Jack (snowman)

2008 Owen (red train)   - Jack (lion)

2009  Owen (red train – again)  -   Jack (red plane)

2010 – They monkeys chose the same ornament this year, and I wrote their name on it.  I actually had to purchase three  of these ornaments after Jack held one of them by the string and swirled it over his head pretending he was a helicopter and it was a blade.  Apparently the ornaments are not meant for that kind of abuse and the sleigh flew off the string and across the store and broke…

This year the monkeys were especially excited to hang up their very own ornaments.  They delighted in pulling them out of the box and remembering the circumstances that brought them to buy the ornament.  They loved hearing about how their first ornament was chosen.  They loved that they “forced” us to buy their second ornament.  They loved that they have chosen everything afterward.  I love having a little piece of my babies from all the stages of their lives. (I doubt that I will be able to part with the ornaments when they are older.)

Did you figure out what was wrong with the poor first Santa.  Yeah, he has no arms.  We love him anyway…