O Tanninbed O Tanninbed
….ok I know that’s wrong. It’s Tannenbaum. I’m dreaming of a not so white Christmas…that is the dealio for realio. Mother is PALE, boys and girls. Really…the glow in the dark kind.
Anyway, here I am again with another listy thing for our BIG FIRventures! I see so many people posting pics of their trees on the Facebook. I love to see them. They make me happy. Not as happy as a dog in a Santa hat picture, but really close. I love that we share our Christmas trees with one another, just like we share pictures of our children and our dogs in hats. Our Christmas trees hold memories of our lives. They are like twinkling, shiny memorials of our happiest days. We have three trees this year. I know, excessive. I am not entirely sure that I am not filling some Christmas void. I’ve got to be compensating for something, right? BUT they are all fabulous. They are all happy making. They are all stressful. Well, all but the den tree. That is the one at the top of the blog. that tree is named Douglas. Douglas is my gay son Christmas tree. He is sparkly and fabulous and is hardly any trouble at all, once we got him raised and out of the closet. Even though he is sparkly to the max, he’s a little shallow and very thin. He is the least stressful of the bunch. We will talk about why in a minute.
The other two trees are precious. Here they are together.
The small tree is Cookie. She is a cheap ass little Walmart Christmas tree that I got for twenty bucks. She sits in my kitchen and is country to the core. She has burlap garland and cookie cutters all over her. Cheap and cute. i love her. I lit her with white Christmas lights in sections so I don’t have to unravel her next month.
The big tree in the back is the Momma tree. She holds the memories. My ornaments, Sondra’s ornaments, ornaments made by my daughter and the first footprint of our little man dog, Jasper. Momma needs to be a little full figured to hold all of the love that she will have draped on her. She has a ton of Christmas decorations that represent all of our years together and the ones apart, but they are all memories on the path to where we are today. When I put on those decorations, I often go back into the glow of the lights of Christmas trees past to and revisit those times with loving retrospect. I remember the love and the mistakes and it helps me to be more grateful for where I am this Christmas.
This big Christmas tree was my big stress this year. We usually get a real tree for the living room, but decided this year that we hated the mess of it and would get a fake one instead. Holy Crap are they expensive. I went from store to store in sheer panic that I would not find a tree in our budget that I would feel good about putting in our huge front window. Last week I finally gave up and was ready to slide Douglas into the big front window after one last shopping trip. Defeated, I began make my way home, passing a local thrift store. Someone in my head screamed “TURN IN TURN IN TURN IN!”
I didn’t want to, that thrift store smells like stale cigarettes and dirty laundry. The voice in my head wouldn’t stop. So, I back tracked through an alley and the parking lot of a closed up tire store and pulled in. To my surprise and excitement, they were unloading a truck full of Home Depot demo trees. I bought one and took it home. It is beautiful! I bought it for under half of what the store sold it for and I got a bonus. When I was pulling down the branches, out came a small glass angel with a gold halo. There is some validation for ya, folks! This new tree is beautiful and even though she is new, she is charged with holding the memories and the energy of Christmas past. When I decorated her, I revisited those times and the people who have moved on to the other side, and it felt warm and good. She has a big job and I am thankful that she handles in glittery gladness. That night when I said my prayers, I said a special gratitude for our new family member, Big Momma. My guides said quickly, ” It is unnecessary to become so distraught over such things, dear.” They are right. So….I’m gonna share my new list for trees. I hope it helps in some way.
1. Pre-lit is fab. If you don’t have a pre-lit, make one. Put your Christmas lights on your tree in sections so that when you take it down, the lights stay on. No more tangles. No more ouchy fingers. Of course if you have a real tree….sorry bout it.
2. Do only what you feel you can. If you can’t manage to put up all fifty five of your trees this year, so what? Commit to what you can commit to. But I will advise you to do a little something. Put a little shiny somewhere in your house. Make your own merry. Do what makes you smile. Glitter makes it all better, baby. 🙂
3. If you can’t do it yourself, ask for some help. My mother, who lives in the far away land of Ohio, wasn’t going to put up a tree, because she couldn’t. She mentioned it to a woman that she knows and the woman comes every year and helps her put her tree up and take it down. She doesn’t decorate like she used to, but she has some merry in the window. That makes her smile.
4. Make some Christmas decorations out of nothing. I try to do something each year. We have ornaments made out of gourds, thread spools, cookie cutters, felt….make a memory with someone you love. That is what big momma’s are made of. Don’t stress about it. Get on pinterest and find something easy. OR….ask a kid, they have great ideas.
5. The secret to Douglas is Shrink Wrap. Well, we say shrink wrap, but we mean heavy plastic wrap. Last year, he was so pretty that we decided to wrap him up tight in plastic wrap and duct tape it together. I put a trash bag over the top and the bottom and ducked taped them together. It wouldn’t have worked if he wasn’t so damned skinny, but he is. We carried him out to the barn and that is where he stood until we brought him out last week. A box cutter and a little fluffing was all he needed and he was ready to be plugged in! I will probably do it to Cookie too.
6. If you have wooden floors or tile floors; felt stickers on the bottom of the Christmas tree stand makes any tree easy to move. Comes in handy for real trees and watering.
7. Don’t get stressed out like me. It wasn’t fun, and it wasn’t really necessary. It damaged a potentially wonderful night with my little family. I was ridiculous. I hope when you read my story you will say to yourself that Susan Rushing is crazy …don’t be crazy. Christmas is about love, not crazy. I did wear my cookie pants. That helped.
So, that is my crazy list. I hope you find a small nugget in there. Happy tree making. Happy Memory making.
Deck your halls, y’all…and don’t forget that mistletoe
Smooch out!
Love Yourself Through It! 