Oh Tannenbaum!

Today is Christmas Tree Decorating Day!  Back in Colorado, we eventually had three Christmas Trees. Started out with the normal one tree and I'm not certain anymore how it morphed into multiples. It's not like we are crazy tree people, after all. But however it happened, it did. And ultimately I had a different theme for each tree, which means, different ornaments. Completely different.   One tree, usually the one in the living room, had an old fashioned traditional feel. The red, green and gold balls, some shiny and some more of a satin finish, a few of them with glittered designs.  There were miniature stockings and little wooden ships and houses and sleds.  And happy, jolly, chubby Santas ho ho ho'd from every angle.  Candy canes of course were present too. You have to have candy canes on a traditional tree.  The lights were multicoloured and binked in a  random pattern. And then it was all wrapped up with yards and yards of gold ribbon spun around the tree so that the tree itself appeared to be a gift.

The second tree, often in the dining room was the one I called the Elegant Tree.  It had a more slim, lean silhouette.  Very breakable glass ornaments sparkled from it's branches in clear, white, gold and silver. It wasn't the shape of the ornament that mattered to me so much on that tree but the colours. There were spheres and ovals and icicles twinkling. A few glass birds and elaborate shapes that I cannot even accurately describe as well as teardrops and prisms.  The lights were bright white and didn't twinkle at all.  If that tree had a pinky finger it would have been  lifted when it drank tea. The ribbon wrapped around that one was silver and white.

In the loft was the changeable tree.   It was huge and lush and filled with possibility. Once it was soft white twinkle light and stuffed animals.  Not hung from the branches of course, that would be cruel. But rather stuffed into every nook and cranny.  Over the years, despite my advanced years, I have accumulated quite the stuffed animal collection.  All gifts, by the way. Primarily bears but other animals as well. A veritable zoo of critters.  Small, large and in between, zebras, bears, owls, kittens and bunnies perched on branches, looking out at the world.  That tree had a small train set chugging away underneath.

The same tree, other years, was  declared the anti-traditional tree. Not one single traditional colour was allowed. (other than the twinkle lights) but rather pink and purple and turqoise ornaments. Chartruse mushrooms with pink polka dots and big purple egg shapes with gold glittered designs.  There are lime green and powder blue glass balls and a giant peony pink butterfly. It was a glorious Seussian tribute to a Christmas where I obviously wasn't feeling very christmassy. But, I loved it.

So that was Christmasses past. All those trees are gone. Donated to Goodwill before we left. Last weekend, we bought one (note that - one) new tree.  The old ornaments we kept and should be here....somewhere. I have found one bin of ornaments. That's all I can find. One bin.  And for no reason that I can even begin to imagine, it's a mishmosh of things from each tree. Crazy!  I am the tidy queen. I always put things away properly.  Each ornament carefully wrapped in it's proper box with tissue paper and then each tree's worth decorations put in a separate bin. I'm not sure who undecorated last year. My alter-ego? The Bizzaro-World Sam? The cat? Tim?  Because I opened that bin filled with the excitement of wonder which tree's ornaments I would behold in my head and looked with dismay at this kookoo mashup of stuff that does not remotely go together.

I just starred at it for awhile, hoping that I was wrong. I sorted through the stuff. There were red, gold and green balls, , but over here were pink, lavender and navy blue balls. Giant fuchsia and purple globes nestled beside a gaggle of jolly santas. A sled, some stockings, and a bright pink tree with purple  squiggles sat side by side. Then I saw it, the giant bright pink butterfly. These are our ornaments. They didn't get mixed up with someone's else's stuff in the move.  Can you imagine my dismay? I almost cried.  Where are my perfect decorations?

I walked in and out of the room many times.  I would look at everything, look at the tree and walk back out.  Finally, I decided. Ok I'll make this work.  So today, I'm putting it all on the tree. Yes that's right all of it.  Not sure how, but I'm going to make this work. Santas will sit right next to giant turquoise balls and the  wooden nutcrackers will dangle beside purple egg-shapes that are practically aflame with glitter. And I'll put that doggone pink sparkly butterfly right in front, up near the top.

And it will be perfect because that is part of the magic of Christmas.

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