A Christmas Past


Lizzy at Christmas time
Christmas has always been one of my favorite time of years. I just love the spirit that it brings and the memories that we create. Since being married, our Christmases have looked different pretty much every year. But I love looking back on our Christmas past and seeing the beautiful memories that we made. One Christmas in particular is special to me and I wanted to share it with you….

December 2012

As you may know, I love to make things. I love coming up with an idea and see it come together. Wither it is a hutch that I am redoing, a sign for Emma’s room, or making presents, I love it all. I always seem to have the desire to make something especially when I can’t just go and buy the object that inspired me in the first place. Jake usually just thinks I am cute as I try my hand in a little bit of everything. So now that you have a little insight into my craziness, I have a story for you… Now that Thanksgiving  was over I could finish decorating for Christmas! I was so excited to finally go out and look for a Christmas tree. We had been waiting until after Thanksgiving to get that last finishing touch. Jake and I had not decided if we were going to get a real or fake Christmas tree. We LOVE real Christmas trees, but living in an apartment and leaving town for a couple of weeks can make a real tree hard to manage. So off we went looking for our dream tree. We looked at fake ones at several different stores but we were not sold on any of them. I just kept on wondering where we would store it. Then the day after thanksgiving the Christmas tree stands finally open. Jake and I took a walk with Emma to go and look at them. Emma loved touching the different trees and exploring the tree lot. I can I say it smelt soooo good. I think the best part about Christmas trees is the smell.

Emma looking at Christmas trees

Emily collecting sticks for the Christmas tree Walking home with stick tree

As we were looking around we found the perfect Christmas tree for us. It was a little shorter then me and the perfect shape. It smelt good and would definitely do a great job holding all our ornaments. We started to walk back home (where the car was. Jake for some reason didn’t feel like carrying the tree 6 blocks lol). As we were walking we started to talk about getting the tree. As we talked it quickly went to “lets get the tree” to “I don’t know if we should…” Have you ever added up the cost of something and then wish you had just bought the sucker without thinking about it? Well it was one of those moments. We were both kinda bummed. Jake mostly cause he was studying for a test for hours on end and just wanted to be done and decorate a tree. When we got back to our little home, we had not settled on getting the tree or not. Jake went back to studying and I started playing with Emma. Now here is when my creative bug started to kick in. I am super impatient and I wanted a Christmas tree. I knew that our budget was tight and a Christmas tree would be a splurge. So I decided something. I decided how cool of a situation we are in now. Since we are poor college students we can do whatever we want to make a tree and no one would care. It was our time just to have fun with the holiday and with life. Why not experiment and make a tree. Now you might be tilting your head right now saying “make a tree?” But thats right we made our Christmas tree. Without telling Jake what I was doing, Emma and I went for a walk. We found fallen tree branches and twigs that would create the perfect tree. I think we got some really strange looks in the process. 

When we got back Jake just smiled, laughed, and thought it was the best idea ever. I think I scored brownie point in the wife department with him that day. We took the big branches and bound them together. I put in a few extra branches and Wa la the perfect Christmas tree.

It looked even cooler after we put lights and ornaments on it. I know that it is not the usual Christmas Christmas Stick Treetree, but I think this is my favorite tree that we have had so far. I just love starring at it. It really turned out great. I am kinda tempted to keep our “tree” around for more then just Christmas. We will see though. All I know that this is going to be the best Christmas ever. It has already been amazing. The great thing about our Christmas tree is that it reminds me that Christmas is more then just pine trees and presents. It is about the birth of our Savior and love and blessing that abounded from that special night. We don’t need anything fancy to celebrate. Jake and I just need our little family… and a little imagination  I just love the Christmas season!"

Emily and her family

 

 

 

Our Christmas tree has grown a little since our little Charlie Brown Christmas Tree. But every year we tell this story to our girls to remind us all that Christmas isn’t about things. Its about our Savior and our family. And every year we set out a little stick tree to remind us of our Christmas past, of  our poor college days where budget was tight but life was sweet and we had what was most important. Each other.


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