O Christmas tree

Next to listening to Christmas music all month long, putting up the tree is my favourite part of the holiday traditions.

I love Christmas trees. I prefer real ones, despite the fact that I'm sweeping up pine needles until Easter; although fake ones are just as nice. Because it's the Christmas ornaments that I really love.

I don't do the Martha Stewart tree. Instead, I have a very ecclectic collection of ornaments -- making for a very ecclectic looking tree.

My ornaments hold special memories, remind me of certain times or tell a story.

The story ornaments are the ones I bought (or we bought) while on vacation somewhere. I have a ball from the Rockafeller Centre in New York, a lighthouse from Nova Scotia a scottie dog from Scotland and a skiing moose from Tremblant. Each one reminds me of that trip. But, my all-time favourite Christmas ornament, is my santa dressed as a turtle from the Cayman Islands.

The ones that remind me of certain times are, for the most part, the ones with dates on them. There's the one Ryan bought me for our first Christmas after we got married, there's one for our first year in the house and one for each of the kids' first Christmases. There's also a snowflake with my name on it dated 1979. It had been a gift to me that year, and I took it from my parents tree when I moved out.

That leads me to the ornaments that hold special memories. Every year, for as long as I can remember, my grandmother put up a white Christmas tree covered in only tartan ornaments. About five years ago, she decided the tree was looking a little tired and old and that it was too much work for her to put it up on her own. So, that year, she brought out her box of ornaments and my sisters, my cousins and I were all told to take whichever ones we wanted.

So on my tree, are a handful of tartan ornaments. Some of them look like they came from a dollar store, but that's not the point. The point is they came from my grandmother's tree.

Put the tartan ornaments with the Hallmark-type ornaments, the turtle Santa-type ornaments and the Ikea balls and other dollar store ornaments I've bought to fill it out and you have one ecclectic looking tree.

Especially since this year, Austin helped with the decorating. Being only three feet tall, there's now a patch of tree in front that is, um, very well decorated.

And I wouldn't have it any other way.