Next weekend, we’ll make the long drive to Mike’s Tree Farm — $10 any noble tree, u-cut.
We’ll sip foamy hot cocoa from our travel mugs, sing to Nat King Cole first and then The Muppets. After we’ve walked laps around our last favorites, we’ll pick a tree for our living room and a small one for the girls to decorate in the basement.
We’ll leave a $20 in the coffee can on Mike’s peeling wood porch.
When we return home, my Mike will prep the tree on the front porch, shaking it, trimming it, screwing the trunk into the stand. Then he’ll bring the outstretched arms of the too-big into the front room, and the girls and I will smell outside coming in and see how gloriously green it is, and we might jump up and down or squeal, and we will know it’s Christmas.
Then the unwrapping will begin.
I will unwrap the wooden skiers with pipe cleaner skis and toothpick poles and the trees with button ornaments, made by our dear friend as a wedding gift fourteen years ago.
I will unwrap the snowwoman decked out in cranberry and navy plaid, brought back from North Carolina by Nana. Her arms knotted sticks. And the terra-cotta cross from the Southwest, a glazed red heart at its middle.
I will unwrap the treasures picked for me by my Sis through our yearly ornament exchange. The girls and I will marvel again at how the artist painted Mr. and Mrs. Claus’ cheek-to-cheek dance from the inside of the glass heart.
I will unwrap the snowman from Gaga — the one with wings — who carries a package in tiny hands. One I always hang near the top with birds and angels and other winged things.
One after another, we’ll unfold the treasures.
Yesterday, the first Sunday of December, after an especially full few days and Michael out of town, the girls and I unwrapped the very beginnings of the season. The ones tucked inside lots of layers, the ones that take a while to find.
Before the grand tree joins us, with turkey hands still dancing through our house, we eat hot soup and grilled cheese, then sit on the couch together. Christmas carols played on piano pipe through speakers while we look at Sici’s photos of the Festival of Trees. We zoom in on the colors of the tree outfitted with African animals and the carved gourds — shades of the harvest painted across winter green.
We pull out some of our favorite Christmas books, read about Mortimer the Mouse making room for Baby Jesus in the manger.
We lay out our own nativity scene, pulling one plastic piece after another from the box. There’s the wise man with the feather in his elegant turban, plucked from one of our pillows to replace the one that fell out that first year. There’s the baby Jesus wrapped in toilet paper because it didn’t seem right to leave him cold. There’s Mary and Joseph, the shepherd, the camel. The mama sheep that J makes sure we place right beside her lamb.
And there’s the angel placed at the top of the scene, watching the miracle that’s unfolding below.
I head to the kitchen to clean a few dishes while the girls read the Christmas stories they’ve written. They are a murmur of voices, and then I hear Sici’s alone, and she is reading aloud to J and Lala. The three girls are squeezed together on the couch, unexpected sunshine streaming through the windows.
Our house looks far from Christmas perfection, but we’ve begun to unfold the gifts.
Of slow. Of time. Of together. Of simple.
One small layer after another.
Every Monday, Amber Haines of The Runamuck, leads an exploration of voice in writing, in which we use concrete words to express the abstract. Please visit Amber’s to read her glorious writing and that of other writers and friends who link up there. This week’s piece began with the prompt “THE ORNAMENT.”
Connecting through the power of stories written, spoken and lived
I want to come!
Girlfriend, the way you show the tangible really shows me your grasp of the intangible. Love this!
Amber, so humbled. Thank you, friend. You’re welcome to join us for cocoa, $10 trees and some boisterous singing anytime.
Ashley, as a mother of adult daughters I’d be willing to bet someday Sici will be reading that book to her children. It’s a tradition bonded to her soul. It won’t be Christmas without it! I’m amazed at the simple traditions that I started with my daughters when they were young that they insist we absolutely must continue every year. They are 32 and 35!
There is such comfort in those simple traditions, isn’t there, Barb? Though times change and circumstances shift, to know some things remain constant seems to touch a place deep inside that longs for safety, consistency…joy re-lived and repeated over and over and over again.
Ashley…I love the whole of this post…but one of the last lines -“…. we’ve begun to unfold the gifts.” I LOVE that! The true gifts aren’t the things under the tree, they’re the living loving things everywhere else. And such a beautiful reminder that the time leading up to the day is a process of unfolding the gifts of Christmas. xx
Thanks, Mama. It has brought me new joy this year to see the seasons as a process of becoming as opposed to a stressed-out “arrival.” And yes, these gifts everywhere!
You and your household are the best definition of what advent truly is – thank you for the inspiration :)
It’s certainly an imperfect process, Deb, but we are trying to receive more of the daily joy of this season and not just the event itself. I’m finding when the “gifts” are being opened more gradually, we are able to more fully take in the Gift….know what I mean?
Yes, and you are seeing so many more things as “gifts”. It reminds me of 1000 gifts – opportunities to see ALL our blessings, in this case the value of each special ornament :-)
I love the way you describe the preciousness of celebrating Christmas together.
I don’t yet know if I will be playing along – maybe I’ll write a five-minute post now…
I see now that you have, Tanya! Yay — I’ll be visiting soon. Thanks for the encouragement here. :-)
You inspired me! I love the ending especially – it just captures so much of the preciousness of Christmastime and family together.
Hi dear Ashley
What I find so special is the memories you unwrap with each decoration, fond memories from long ago. It seems as if each one has a special meaning to you and that is what makes Xmas special. The reminder of God’s love for us and making it possible for us to love one another.
Thank you, sweet Friend.
Mia
You are so right, Mia. Unwrapping God’s love one piece at a time makes loving others and ourselves from a genuine and rooted place possible!
Ashley, wow girl. It’s like a whole lifetime within a lifetime wrapped in a box in a box. You truly capture how each small piece is like a capsule into which fragile memories have been placed. Isn’t it remarkable how large and significant the tiniest moments are. How stored up in a sacred place they rest and wait safely, as on the tippy top shelf of our remembering. Safe and ready to be poured over in long remembering every year.
Yes, it is remarkable, Elizabeth — how large and significant the tiniest of treasures. Wow, that’s good about memories — “they rest and wait safely, as on the tippy top shelf of our remembering. Safe and ready to be poured over in long remembering every year.” Have you written that somewhere besides here? I love that idea.
There is a gentle ordering to all you choose to do in preparation and celebration…Yes, how well you have demonstrated the Advent season and its gifts.Your home sounds like a great place to be this season.
I wish our preparations were more calm and structures. My teenagers are everywhere don’t sit down and read together much. They did do some cooking and have started to bring down the boxes from the attic.
I have never been a big ornament person…But, we have always decorated the house in fresh green garlands, wreathes, sprays and arrangements cut from our yard and neighbor’s yards and the woods about us…Nana and I used to do it for her house and my parents. Over the years, the girls have taken on more and more of the work. That is our slow and steady time of discovery and quiet anticipation and celebration with all creation.
Kim, I love your thoughts and the ways of preparation you’ve shared. How beautiful…bringing the gifts of the woods inside…let heaven and nature sing for sure. And this: “That is our slow and steady time of discovery and quiet anticipation and celebration with all creation.” Beautiful. I want to read more about this kind of advent.
Thank you for sharing your unwrapping. Remembering. Noticing.
And I love the picture of your girls, so priceless.
Looking at our tree as i type, and thinking of yours on the other side of the country, also full of memories and life lived.
I love that picture of connection across the miles. Thanks, dear Melanie.
I love that each ornament has a memory, and that there’s gifts “Of slow. Of time.” And Jesus wrapped in toilet paper. Nice. Your girls sound lovely and to eavesdrop on them reading together is precious.
Thanks.
Thanks for your comment, Kath. They are lovely indeed. :-) I learn so much from their toilet paper wrapping, present living selves.
You have managed to put me in the mood! You have instilled in your girls the meaning and essence of Christmas. The treasures really are in what you are unwrapping.
Yay, that place for quiet and just being present with them helped me get in the mood like nothing else had. So happy it did for you too, Pops.
I love the picture this post is of the true meaning of advent unfolding in your home…it is an indpiration to me to remember to slow down & take time for those special, meaningful moments with the kids like reading Christmas stories together or playing with the nativity scene!
I so need to be reminded myself…it does not always come naturally, does it? In fact, sometimes it seems so very unnatural. But I think these are usually the moments I remember best and cherish most — these slowly unwrapped ones.
i see the ski elf ornament!!! love you!
Love you, pal! And love those cute little guys.
This was beautiful my friend. You’ve certainly begun to unfold the gifts. The most important part is in the stopping to notice that they are gifts. :) Much love to you.
You’ve said it perfectly, Danelle. Thank you.
I have to thank you for the efforts you have put in penning this blog.
I’m hoping to check out the same high-grade content from
you later on as well. In truth, your creative writing abilities has inspired me to
get my very own website now ;)