Tree and ornaments, crying and laughing

Thanksgiving Day, just before decorating

One of the best days of the year is when we decorate our Christmas tree.

Unpacking the ornaments is unpacking our lives. Each ornament has a story:

• Handmade Santa band from Grandma Irene
• Pasta angel handmade from my mom
• Clay Santa that Steve made
• Wooden school bus from Grandma and Papa's trip to Germany
• Bavarian egg from our friend Sarah
• Silver angel from our friend Sharon
• Tiny gingerbread house from the year we moved to Frisco in 2002
• Wooden frog from Aunt Karen to remember my mom 

For Cooper's first Christmas, Steve and I started a tradition that I've continued -- an ornament that represents something special about each child for that year. When we pack away the tree in early January, I write a note about the new ornaments. Then in November, when we put up the tree again, we unpack the special ornaments and read the notes -- Buzz Lightyear for the year that Cooper was obsessed, Elmo for that Katie was obsessed, a bicycle for the year that Cooper competed in triathlons, a violin for the first year Katie took lessons.

The idea is that when each child leaves the house for their own home, they'll be able to take a ready-made collection of personal ornaments for their own tree. 

Yesterday, after the tree was assembled and we'd fluffed all the branches, we started hanging ornaments. Cooper gets to place his ornaments and Katie hers. I handed Cooper his cowboy (from summer 2010, when we spent a week at a Colorado dude ranch) and asked, "Cooper, will you take all of your ornaments next year to college?" 

At about the word "take" I started to tear up. 

About that time, Katie walked into the entry with hot chocolate for Cooper. She saw him holding the lone cowboy, and without even looking in my direction, started to cry.

Poor Cooper. Stuck between two trying-to-hold-it-together Damm women who are excited about his future but have trouble imagining the house without him.

He hung the ornament on the tree, hugged us both and said he would probably leave the ornaments at home while he's in college.

No one stays sad for long while decorating a tree. We continued, unpacking ornaments, singing to Christmas music (and skipping the songs no one likes, such as "Baby It's Cold Outside"), drinking cocoa.

Katie complimented Cooper for helping with something (his height is a great advantage for decorating), when he told us, "I'll make a great husband one day. I mean, my future wife has no idea."

We laughed for a while. His random immodest claims always make us giggle. There's no specific ornament for all the laughter (or the tears), but we've got all kinds of memories.

Our finished tree