Christmas Decorating

Yesterday, Doug pulled all of the Christmas out of the storage room.  When I first saw the eleven tubs, the entire set of North Pole Villages, the three boxes of light up Christmas animals and the Christmas tree, I almost cried.  I love our Christmas decorations and traditions, but the reality definitely became apparent to me this year that we have too much.  Doug was already on that page, but now that we have talked more of moving and downsizing, we have to start the process now.

I felt a lot better about the Christmas after today.  Doug was able to hang up all of the outside decorations, put up the Christmas tree, fix the non-working strings of lights and set out the North Pole Village by this afternoon.  With all that he got done, I was able to focus on the tubs and decorate the tree.  Once I finished going through all of the ornaments and unpacking everything in the tubs, Meg was able to look through it all and decide what she wanted to take to Bloomington with her.  She ended up with two tubs to add to her collection. Next, I FaceTimed Brett so that he could also look through all that I was ready to part with this Christmas.  He ended up with a tub full as well.  

Cal left for Chicago at noon today.   He let me know before he headed out that he really didn't need any Christmas decorations.  I wasn't too shocked by that.  The last person to go through the "goodbye" pile was Cameron.  I wasn't sure how much he would want to keep as he usually holds on to more than the other three.  I was actually surprised by how much he parted with this time.  Meg and Brett were both relieved, however, that he said he wanted to keep the "Saxophone Playing Santa."  We had had it for years and they didn't want to insist that I keep it, but were glad that he did.  Doug did not share their sentiment, but overall was thrilled to find out that in the end we had downsized at least five tubs of Christmas decorations.  I was happy about that and was also pleased that I found the missing piece to Grandma Guard's vintage toy stove top.  I had lost it several years ago and found it tonight in the bottom of the last Christmas tub that I cleaned out.  Overall, it was a great day.  We got a lot accomplished, decorated the house, downsized quite a bit and even had some decorations for Grandma Jane to use at the cemetery.