Ornament Traditions

Welcome back to Taylor Talks!

Last week, I wrote about the tradition that my family has with getting new ornaments for the Christmas tree each year. After receiving a comment about what a wonderful tradition it is, I wanted to discuss it more and talk about how this tradition has evolved over the years.

When we were little, my parents would take us to the store each year to pick out a new ornament for ourselves. Normally, this coincided with our visit to see Santa at the mall, but not always. I, of course, picked out Disney ornaments for many of my younger years. We would sometimes get ornaments based on something special we did that year, or maybe we really liked a movie that had come out so we chose that character.

No matter how many children were in our family each December, we were each always allowed to choose a special ornament for ourselves. I still love the "White Christmas" ornament that I picked out one year when I realized what a wonderful movie it was... when you press a button on it, the ornament plays the title song from the movie, and my brother has now become obsessed with it. I also have a "Lady and the Tramp" ornament from the classic spaghetti-eating scene. When you pull a string under the ornament, Lady and Tramp come closer together and kiss.

I remember going to Macy's in Manhattan in December 2001, just a few months after the 9/11 attacks. As kids, you eventually figure out that the mall Santas are just Santa's helpers, but that year we were going to see the real Santa at Macy's. Well we got this "I love New York" ornament that year, and my mom wrote "In memory of the Twin Towers" on the back of it.

We have ornaments on the tree from a bunch of my siblings who no longer live with us, but it's great to look back and see who was with us each year. As I mentioned in that other post, we also have family ornaments that reflect the changes in our family overall.

I don't remember when exactly, but at some point our tradition changed into us getting personalized ornaments. These would celebrate something special that we had accomplished that year. I have graduation ornaments, college ornaments, one that celebrated me getting my driver's license... there are so many.

I absolutely love this tradition, and I'm so thankful that my parents started it so long ago. I think it's a beautiful way to relive memories as you decorate the tree each year, and I look forward to continuing on with this tradition for years to come!

Thank you so much for your continued support! I look forward to sharing more stories about my experience with foster care, and hopefully hearing from readers who have questions or similar stories to share. I'm always willing to answer questions and hear about other experiences! Please don't forget to like and share my Facebook author page as well!

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Thanks!
Taylor

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