It's Beginning to Look a lot Like Christmas!

The Christmas tree is on the front porch. It's basically covering half the front door, still wrapped in the tree lot mesh. I am mostly just happy we have one. Carter left for school begging that no one decorates the tree without him. Of course no one is going to decorate the tree without him. Last year he unpacked all the ornaments, hung them on the tree, and I loved it. Sure, all the ornaments were below the equator and on one side of the tree, and largely hanging from about 5 branches. That's fine with me!

I admit that I have long grown out of the "just out of college/got it from the curb" variety of decorating. But when it comes to Christmas trees, I am more sentimental. I like colored lights because of the beautiful warm glow it creates. And because all white lights are used year-round now on every restaurant patio in the country. So, they don't seem so special. I don't want a tree that is just beautiful to look at, but full of ornaments that my kids have made, friends have given me, and others that have been passed down from my mom. While visiting a friend one Christmas, her mother explained that she had ditched all of her old, cheap ornaments and decorations and bought all new ones in the same color scheme. It was a lovely tree - for a hotel lobby. I suppose what I'm struggling to say is: I find the beauty of the Christmas tree to come from everything it represents.

A King. " A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse, ..."(Isa. 11:1)
A Savior. "And purchased my pardon on Calvary's tree." (My Jesus, I love thee)
A Light. "A light shines in the darkness" (John 1:5). History records that Martin Luther decorated a small tree with candles to illustrate how light shines through darkness (though it sounds like a serious safety risk). I love taking the kids driving around to look at all the lights; I love that we string lights all through our houses and yards in the darkest part of the year.
Tradition. Christmas trees have been traced all the way back to 7th century and all over the world.
Family. They can be a real family tree. Ornaments that are passed down, ones with children's baby hand prints, exotic ones from places you visited, tell the story of your family.
I can't label this last reason. Suffice it to say, I love the warm, fuzzy feelings having a colorfully lit tree gives a home. I can still remember sitting in the dark living room as a child and gazing at the tree and knowing it would only be there for a few weeks.

There are all kinds of Christmas trees and as I wrote last year, Nathan has been very creative in achieving the perfect form. My favorite is a real, Douglas Fir. One year, Nathan got a Scotch pine. I think it's because he liked the smell and is a Presbyterian Scotch-Irish himself. I was not a big fan of the Scotch pine. The aroma was over-powering and the needles pricked my hands when ever I tried to put ornaments on it. I finally gave up and Nathan decorated it with gloves on. And then all the needles shed to the floor on a daily basis I have seen plenty of fake trees that are nice, but assembling them is really more than I'm up to any more. Real trees require no directions, no fluffing of the branches, no disassembling. When Christmas is over, the Douglas fir is pulled back out the front door and left for the City's yard waste truck to collect it and make it into lovely free mulch. No storage space needed either. Real trees are just too convenient for me to consider a fake one.

By tonight, I hope our tree will be up, inside the house, and Carter can begin decorating.

Growing up, my mother hated putting up the Christmas tree and grew so tired of it being up, that it never lingered after December 25th. My dad loves to tell the story that he went to bed early on Christmas eve, woke up late on Christmas day, and MISSED the Christmas tree. It makes me laugh every time.