Over-Achiever

My happy, Christmas Kitchen table.

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My friend the laundry queen told me I was an over-achiever when I happened to mention on facebook that I had just finished putting up my seventh Christmas tree. Now, I do not usually consider myself to be ambitious, but somehow this year is the year of the Christmas decorating bonanza and I have been going crazy! I think it's because of the vision I have in my head of my mom and dad's beautiful home at Christmas time growing up. We always had a nice, big kid-friendly tree with bright colored lights, icicles, and garlands which was covered in all the quirky ornaments we kids had collected or made over the years. Then, in the living room was a gorgeous flocked tree bedecked with white twinkly lights and covered in red velvet ornaments, roses and ribbon.  I loved to sit and gaze at that tree or see it shining magically through the living room window from outside. As fate would have it, this is the first house we've ever lived in that had a front living room window, so I've never been able to complete my vision. There's also been the little matter of lacking money, time or energy for a second tree -- so we always had one tree that combined a mish-mash of crazy kid ornaments and with a sprinkling of artistically inclined "Jen" collectibles. We had colored lights on it until they died a few years ago and I bought white lights to replace them -- much to the chagrin of my children! I've felt bad about it ever since. (I guess not bad enough to buy more colored lights.)

Fast forward to this year -- I didn't have the money for a new tree still, but I did find one while shopping on Black Friday at Wal-mart that was on sale for $25; a six-and-a-half foot tree with colored lights that would be a little small, but might fit the bill for the kid tree. I proposed we put it in the basement family room and have that be the tree with the presents on Christmas morning, freeing me to have my tree in the living room, decorated elegantly by me and only me.

The plan was accepted, but as my hubby Ren and daughter Hannah pulled the tree out of the box, I heard groans and exclamations of "Oh no! It's a Charlie Brown Christmas tree!" Apparently 6 1/2 feet meant 5 feet of scrawny tree and a foot-and-a-half of ugly trunk. (Though some children thought that meant room for more presents and was a bonus!) I put the best face I could on it, reminding them of the lesson from Charlie Brown -- that it would look great once we decorated it. It did turn out pretty cute, but as the symbol of hope and excitement for Christmas morning, it fell far short. I lamented the fact as I chatted with my parents that afternoon on the phone and later in the week, they called to tell me they wanted to buy us a big tree with colored lights for the kids as their Christmas present to the family. I love it when they swoop in and save me, I don't think I'll ever get too old for it! They were at Costco in Oregon and wanted to know if we had the same tree they had just found. We did and I went and bagged it within the hour. We put it up that weekend and laughed to see how puny the other tree looked next to it. And we Christmased happily ever after.

But still, how does one arrive at seven trees in this little tale? Well, here's the list: 1) The ill-conceived Wal-mart tree; 2) My tree in the living room (Curty wanted to know if my presents needed to go under my tree); 3, 4, 5) Three lodge pole pine trees that I decorated and put on the sofa table in the upstairs famly room; 6) Our original Christmas tree from our first year of marriage -- a 2 foot high midget tree I put on a table on the stair landing; and 7) the new gargantuan Costco tree with the super-cool lights and foot pedal for turning them on and off (Eli loves this feature and turns the lights on and off a million times a day!) I have spent lots of time decorating and it has turned out nice, so I had to take some pictures. These were mostly for my parents benefit, so suffer through my happy pride in displaying the fruits of my labors or move on to the next blog if you must.

Here's my tree:

(Mom, notice my new, velvet Christmas tree skirt)

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and my favorite Willow Tree nativity set (my parents gave it to me for Christmas, Thanks Mom and Dad.)

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Here's the upstairs family room and the three little trees.

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All the stockings, hand made by me, except for the last two for children who were born too close together. They might get their stockings made this year, who knows?

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Here's our fireplace (which we do actually use for 3 months in the morning when it hits a frigid 50 degrees! See my new Santa on the mantel, I love him!

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I love this comical shot of all my children trying to lay underneath the sad, little Christmas tree and gaze at the lights.

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Ah, that's much better. We love the lush, bright tree that actually reaches the ceiling and is strong enough to hold the kid-star. (I banished that star from the tree a few years ago and replaced it with a crafty wooden one, that is now happily on top of my tree.

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There's me on the momentous occasion of assembling my seventh tree!

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And Curty enjoying the BIG box from the BIG tree!

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And now for random decorating the tree shots. I think I'm too lazy to label these with names, but the grandparents will know who they are and the rest of you probably don't care overly much.

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