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Dec. 24, 2006

OH CHRISTMAS TREE

Every year, our family tries to eat lunch or dinner under the Great Tree in the Walnut Room. We ooh and aah over the tall, stately tree and the exquisite decorations—with a new theme each year.

I’ve seen beautiful themed Christmas trees in homes, too, decorated all with red bows, white doves or something else. They usually are perfectly shaped and coordinate with the décor of the rooms in which they are located.

Our Christmas tree bears them no resemblance.

We always put it in a corner of our living room where the ceiling slopes down, making any tree more than 5 feet tall out of the question. Having it in the corner means that it doesn’t need to be perfectly even all the way around; there are two walls to hide bare spots. One year we went to cut down a tree at a farm, just to say we did; most years, a quick trip to the local home and garden superstore is sufficient for our needs.

But there never really are any bare spots, because our ornament collection numbers at least in the hundreds, maybe over a thousand. To anyone who wants to find a theme—all the best.

The ornament collection grows every year, as we take and keep every ornament that is given to us, whether it’s expensive, hand-blown glass or a construction paper wreath.

The tree sports ornaments made out of Popsicle sticks and cinnamon sticks; miniature crèches in plastic, fabric and wood; the ceramic bride and groom my aunt gave us at our wedding shower (the bride broken and glued back together); Santa Claus in cross-stitch; Santa Claus carrying a staff (more in the person of St. Nicholas), carrying a sack (many times over) and preparing to throw a gold plastic bowling ball (a gift from my kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Harwood, in 1975).

There are others from the same time frame—some even earlier, such as the wooden circus acrobats that once hung on my older brother’s crib mobile. There are alumninum foil wreaths and candles (with yellow paper frames), and homemade play-dough candy canes.

There are ice skates, black, white and red, and a “Christmas pickle.” (It is allegedly a German tradition that the first child to find the pickle gets an extra gift. I think it might be “tradition” cooked up by my kids.)

The tree has ornaments paying tribute to music groups and sports teams, and photographs of the kids, and the first dog my husband and I owned together. There are birdhouses— an item my mother collects—and miniature garden tools, a memento of my grandfather, an Iowa farm boy who grew up to work in an office and tend a large plot in our backyard.

There is the ceramic kissing pigs ornament, a gift from a cousin to celebrate “Our First Christmas,” and a silver baby shoe engraved with Frank’s name and birthdate, from a friend who knows how few items second children have with their names on them.

Sophisticated is something our tree will never be. Every year, it is still small, a little lopsided and just a little more crowded.

But I wouldn’t trade it for a more conventionally beautiful tree. It takes all comers, ornament wise, and it keeps its own chronicle of our family’s history, each year much the same, but each year just a little different.

Martin is a Catholic New World staff writer. Contact her at [email protected]