O Christmas Tree

Tonight my Farmer put the Christmas tree together (yes, we're one of those) and the excitement in the room was exhilarating (if you like that kind of thing).  I stayed out of the way, catching up on my blog-reading (in which I discovered that two good friends, in two very different parts of the world, just bought/moved into their dream homes.  More later, maybe, on my conflicted internal response.).

Here is how I shared about this precious family bonding time, on facebook:

"It's awful but I don't even like the way they decorate the tree - I know it makes me Terrible Mother of the Year, but I would really love to have a color-coordinated tree, without all the trinket-y ornaments ... true confession."

"So, after they all go to bed, I get to put up the rest of the decorations, where I want them, without excited children dogging my every step, offering helpful choruses of suggestions."

"It's trinkets all the way here (and multi-colored lights- ugh).  And of course the irony is that when they're all grown and gone, and I can do the tree how I want it, I won't want it anymore, and I'll miss their excited gibbering."

Here is what I didn't share on facebook, that happened just a bit later:

Lil' Snip came into the livingroom and, unfazed by my laptop shield, exhorted me to "come see the lights, Mommy!  Come in to this room!!"  (Lil' Snip almost never speaks without exclamation points).

So I came with him, into this room, to behold the ugly multi-colored lights with my son.

The room lights were off, the better to admire their awkward handiwork.  The bottom half of the tree was highly ornamented.  There were dark, unlighted regions where the string of lights had been a little too eager to get to wherever it was going.  And under the tree, as close to the glory as they could get, lay my children.

They invited me to join them.  On the floor.  Under the tree.

So, I did.  I looked up through the branches at the lights, listened to Lil' Snip's nonstop excited commentary about the "sparkly-feeling" tree needles, watched his twinkling eyes reflect red, blue & yellow, and when he drummed his feet on the floor in sheer exhilaration, I joined him and drummed mine.  He looked at me, surprised, and smiled.  "Slowly, Mommy," he told me, slowing his own rhythm down.  Spice yelled "Mommy's having fun!!"

And I was.

They sang Christmas carols - O Come, O Come Emmanuel and Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming and Go, Tell it On The Mountain  - around that ugly, beloved tree.  Lil' Snip gave everyone goodnight hugs and kisses and was trundled off to bed, pleading "can we leave it up?"

The tree is up.  And thanks to the innocent delight of my children, so are my spirits.

I might even let them help decorate the rest of the house, tomorrow.