Barbara's Blog: December 16th - Christmas Tree Reveal

Well, I almost finished this in time to post it on December 16th!! But, here is my post - it's actually 12:07 a.m. EST - can't seem to get the time away from Pacific Standard Time!

It's unclear to me exactly what we did as far as decorating our tree, or any special reveals when my brothers and I were growing up. What I do remember is when we would be at my grandparents' house for the holidays, we went to bed on Christmas Eve -

and the tree was completely BARE.

This picture is just an example of how bare the tree was!

I found it in clip art on the computer...

Christmas morning, when we woke up - usually quite early in the morning! - the tree would be completely decorated and lit up for us! My parents and grandparents would stay up late to make sure everything was "just so" - and they must have actually stayed up all night long to be able to turn the lights on before we made our early appearance!

Once I had my own children, our trees were usually the "fake" ones. It just wasn't in our budget to purchase a "live" tree; so we focused on decorating the one we had. I remember how much I hated our "fake" tree - until all the decorations were placed around the branches; the garland and lights and all of the special ornaments...then, we would stand back and admire our beautiful tree!

Our decorated "fake" tree

a few years ago

One year was an especially hard one for us, and I had not planned to put a tree up at all. The only people at home were my husband and I, and one of my daughter's friends who was living with us - and she wasn't around much. But, she decided we needed a tree and bought this fiber-optic one!

The fiber-optic tree

a few years ago

One year we were trading trees with my parents; they had a 6 foot tree and we had a 4 foot. After church that Sunday, we went to my parents' home for dinner and to spend the afternoon with them. I put the 6 foot tree in my car and left for choir rehearsal at the church. Later, when I walked out of the church...

My CAR was not in the parking space where I had left it.
There were pieces of glass on the ground where the car had been parked.

I went back inside the church and called the police - and had to wait for them to get there and then be taken home.

The next day, I received a call that my car had been found, just a few blockes from the church. I knew I didn't have much gas, but enough to get me home and to work the next day when I'd be able to fill up the gas tank. The back seat of the car was full of glass where the thief had busted out the back window. The steering column was busted from trying to get the car started...and the tree was gone! a bag of candy cane shaped pens and some paper for making cards were also missing.

Word travels fast within the community of a church! When I came home from work that Monday (yes, just the next day after the car was stolen!) - propped against our second floor apartment...

was a beautiful 6- or 7-foot tall LIVE Christmas tree with a big red bow!! Members of our church had pitched in and bought us the tree!

How blessed we felt!

For years after the "stolen car incident", we managed to put aside enough money to purchase a real tree, and put that big red bow on top of it!

And, a look at the trees from my daughters' homes, and one from our first Christmas in our down-sized apartmemt.