some decorating

With our bday party last weekend, there was no time for decorating the house. So, this past week I used all those free minutes between carpools and postponed grocery shopping in order to get the Chirstmas decorations up. Emma said to me one afternoon, "What's up? You've put up a lot more decorations this year." My reply, "I feel I'm coming out of a fog." Two Chirstmases with moves in January just zapped me of any feel-good-spirit. And it also helps that I've purchased some items - I felt my decorating lacked a fullness, so extra things like pine garland (not my most favorite) mixed well with my beautiful, yet scrawny, bayleaf with crystals garland to make the decorations look better, hence a stronger desire for me to take the time to put them up. Next year there will need to be some tweaking, but I've got the stuff. And also I'm a bit more schizophrenic and use (most) my decorations in different areas each year - keeps it fresh to me. After school the kids helped decorate the tree.

I've had a few conversations with my sister about decorating for Christmas. One was about "themed trees." She said she's not necessarily a fan and then I told her that I have a themed tree - "kids' crafts and non-breakables." We got a good laugh out of that. It's true though, each year some of my most beautiful and/or favorite ornaments stay in the box because there's just not enough room with all those giant construction paper wreaths, hand&foot reindeer, and foam picture frames. With a tree of non-breakable ornaments, the shock collar she mentioned for her toddler isn't necessary. LOL