Remember the blog from a few of days ago, Christmas fun – December 8? I wrote about Elyse searching on-line for the perfect Christmas tree. Well, I found it! It was just like she saw it on Walmart.com. There is was at Wal-Mart dot Preston Highway. I spied it in the Christmas section, soon-to-be garden center when New Year’s Day comes and goes.

It was sitting on the corner display with a price tag in my range. It was a bit narrow and small enough to fit in and later be stored in our house. I bagged it in my bas-kart and called Elyse. “Guess what?” I said. We giggled together as I told her about the tree and anticipated how we would soon decorate it.

When I arrived home and unloaded the car of all the things I’d bought (why can I not get out of Wal-Mart without spending $100 plus?), my sweet William started unpacking the tree from its box. I saw its colored lights and was disappointed. I was expecting clear white lights, and I began wondering if this was the tree I wanted at all. 

But Bill was excited, as excited as I can remember him being about a Christmas tree. He was like a little boy again, transported by memories to his boyhood days when the family tree was filled with large colored light bulbs. Perhaps you can remember them, too. The bulbs were huge in comparison to the tiny lights we use today.

Bill reminisced and talked about happy Christmases past as we unfolded and fluffed the tree. I was no longer disappointed in the colored lights. It was well worth not getting my first choice just to see Bill’s delight.

The next day, the grandchildren came to the house. I carried down boxes of ornaments. There are the vintage ones, saved from my childhood, fragile and losing some of their color. Then there’s the collection of plastic bells my dad bought the year after his little girl (me!) broke too many of the glass ornaments. There are ornaments from Bill’s and my first Christmas together, and the yearly ornaments bought as our son, Travis, grew up. Some ornaments were gifts from other people and provoked a sweet memory. The grandchildren had fun hanging them as I told stories of each one.

Better late than never, our tree is finally decorated.  I remember Linus in A Charlie Brown Christmas when he said, “I never thought it was such a bad little tree.  It’s not bad at all, really.  Maybe it just needs a little love.” 

Love makes everything better, doesn’t it?