Holiday Traditions #7 – Ornaments

Our tree tells the story of us. One of our favorite things about the holidays is opening up our ornament boxes and looking at our ornaments! We don’t buy just pretty ornaments, we buy ornaments that are meaningful to us. Our ornaments:

• Special Moments / Milestones – 1st Christmas in new house, Bear expecting our first child, Goofy holding Minnie (they were so smitten with each other!), Elephant (1st time at a circus) Bear on Moon (Tinkerbell’s 1st Christmas), Our “deer” kiddos (an ornament I made to show we are now a family of 5), and so many more than I have time to picture.

• Baby’s Handprint Keepsake Ornament – I made these with each of our 3 kiddos out of salt dough. It is a treasured keepsake to me & I made one for the kids that I tucked away for when they are older too. Goofy’s hand is red, Minnie’s hand is purple, and Tinkerbell’s foot is yellow. If you want to see how to make your own, go here.

 

• Interests – I like to remember who my kids where & what they liked with an ornament. Here are some of our favorites: Girl dressing up (reminds me of Minnie – she LOVES to dress up), Curious George (my kid’s favorite TV show), Donald with coffee (reminds me of my hubby in the morning!), Pirate ship (for my pirate loving Goofy!), and Pooh & Eeyore (one of our most beloved childhood characters PLUS Tinkerbell learned how to stand up on her own watching this movie in the theatre!).

• Danbury Mint Ornaments – My grandparents started the tradition of giving my parents the annual Danbury Mint Ornament when I was very young. I remember marveling at the beauty and intricate details of these beautiful gold ornaments. When I got married my grandparents started giving us an ornament too! It was so much fun to open up the box and see what cool new ornament we got each year. My grandparents are in heaven now , but my folks have continued this tradition. If you’re interested, the ornaments cost $19.99. You can always find a great selection of previous year favorites on eBay! Here are some of my favorites:

     

• Vacation – Each year on vacation we get an ornament from wherever we visited. For us it is such a great souvenir!  Instead of picking up some knick-knack that will just get dusty or sit in a box  we take time to pick out the perfect ornament to remind us of our vacation. Then, once a year, when we set up the tree we take time to look at it & remember all the fun we had. It is a great reminder of all the fun times and places we’ve been. Here are some of my favorites: Moose snowflake from camping in Yellowstone, whale in Alaska stocking from Alaskan Cruise ($400 total for 2 of us 7 days!), Spanish fan from backpacking through Europe (before kids!), shell from our honeymoon cruise (the first of many cruises to come!), ship from family cruise to Puerto Rico, and Tinkerbell (from our families 1st trip to Disneyworld -it reminded us of the evening fireworks show where an actual Tinkerbell zipped up the castle and of Minnie dressed up as Tinkerbell).

 

• Sentimental Ornaments – candy cane hearts was the first ornament we bought together (back more than 10 years ago when we were engaged), handmade snowman made by my mother-in-law, Pooh on rocking chair (was on my family tree growing up -I use to take him off the tree & put him in the manger scene to see baby Jesus too), Grinch (just like my family did growing up, we always watch The Grinch together after setting up the Christmas tree), and so many more!

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