December 1

Let me first say, with a little bit of a sidebar for today's post, how much I enjoy writing this every day.  I love seeing how many people are following along on our journey and I hope you are enjoying reading everything we are up to Upstate.  I also love that Ben can read the blog so even though we are talking to him for about 15-20 minutes every 3-4 days right now he is still able to check in and see what we are up to on a daily basis as well as see all the pictures I add.  Finally, I find this to be cathartic for me.  I am finding a release in taking half an hour every day or so and writing a bit about our life, our joys, our struggles, the funny moments and tough days, our new experiences and excitement.  Like I said, I hope you are enjoying reading as much as I am enjoying writing.

With that said, today is December 1.  For me, this is officially the start of the Christmas season.  For the past three years we have done the Advent calendar with the kids.  Sometimes the days are elaborate, like last year when we took the kids to Saratoga to ride on the Polar Express.  (Holy moly!!  What a treasure-trove of memories and fun!)  Sometimes the days are really low-key.  Either way, the purpose of the Advent calendar is to give my children Christmas memories and the love of family tradition that will last their lifetime and beyond.

December 1 for our family is always "decorate the tree" day.  The first thing Connor did when he woke up this morning was to rush downstairs and pull the Day 1 tag out of its holder.  I don't know that I have ever seen a child more excited to decorate a tree, but honestly, Christmas trees are his thing.  He has had a fixation with them since his first Christmas.  He loves to have the lights on and enjoy the beauty of its glow.  I think, for him, the Christmas tree has a magical quality to it.  He gets it honestly.  My parents will tell you I used to lay under the tree at night and fall asleep staring up through the branches aglow with lights and beautiful ornaments.  Since he was so excited this year and I knew our tree was small enough to only need one box of ornaments, I took out the box of "kid friendly" ornaments and let the kids do their own thing.  I only unwrapped and handed ornaments out....they did the rest.

Honestly, I let go of what I wanted the tree to look like, let the kids make it exactly how they wanted it to look and it may be the beautiful tree I have ever seen.