SPT - it's ornamental

Anyone in my family who has just opened my blog to see this picture is probably sighing with worry.

I love ornaments. I take after my mother a lot, she often buys new ornaments throughout the year as she sees them, and they are always the cutest things ever.

Well the ice skaters were bought during my teenage years. My joy during the holiday season was to arrange the ice skaters each day into a new daring position. And then to stand back and watch the reaction of fellow family members (mainly my mother) as they would discover the compromising positions of the ornaments. So amusing. I was naughty, but very creative.

So when my mother's tree became overwhelmed with too many ornaments she handed them out to us, as she saw fit, or as we demanded. And I was thrilled to be given the ice skaters (I mean who else could they go to??). They no longer enjoy their compromising positions, and my lady skater has lost a leg over the years, but I always have a little smile on my lips when I take them out of their Christmas box and remember the good times with them.

On a different note, this is my all-time favorite ornament on my tree. From my earliest memories of our Christmas tree I remember this Santa Claus as being mine. I wasn't allowed to hold him or take him off the tree, but he was so special because he belonged to me. And now he hangs at the top of my tree every year, far from grabby little hands, and reminds me of my childhood Christmas.

In our little family we've started a tradition each year of the boys getting their own ornaments. We write their name and the year on each one. Here is Talin's for this year. A soccer ball. I do let them pick them out, but not without heavy influence on my part as to what it should be. One year Talin ended up with a crouching Batman ornament, and I've vowed to never let a similar ornament grace my tree. This year the challenge was distracting him from the many gaudy, silver and gold crosses. He was insistent on one. But in the end Tom was successful in encouraging the soccer ball.

And surprisingly enough, my most stubborn, always right little boy is easily influenced by me. I don't know for how many more years I might hold this power over Collin, but I plan to use it while I can. So he decided on the cute little snowman, with my smiling approval of course.

And on a completely different note, we've had a nasty winter storm come through Des Moines. Ice that coats everything, pulling down power lines and causing major driving issues, and now it's starting to snow and we're expecting 2-5 inches of snow on top of the ice, which makes for a lethal combination.

So the boys are home from school today, and we are taking it easy, hot cocoa and movies kind of a day. And even though I was strictly prohibited by Tom not to attempt to go outside or walk on our porch, because of the ice and my delicate condition (ha!), I still had to get this picture. I managed to do it safely as well. Here is one of our trees on the front porch area, so weighed down by ice that's it's fallen over onto the walk-way. Fun!