Posted in Special Days

Today was the day I have been looking forward to---the day my brother's and sister's families and my own got together at my dad's to help him decorate the tree! We do this every year, but this year was special. Dad was diagnosed with lung cancer back in March, and has had a series of pretty serious health problems crop up on top of that ever since. In the back of our minds, I know all of us wondered if we would be able to enjoy this day once again this year.

But there we all were, with Dad looking great and feeling pretty good considering all he has been through recently. He and I sat and just watched as my brother and brother-in-law did their yearly "get the tree together just right" routine. None of the rest of us, in their opinion, have any business messing with the assembly because they are the experts. It is so funny to watch them go through this yearly ritual of finding just the right codes on the branches, and fluff the branches "just right," and then even funnier to watch them add the lights. It is truly a "you have to be there" experience. You would die laughing at them, but they take it so seriously that we don't dare to chuckle at them.

After this, all the rest of us help to decorate. The old, fragile ornaments that I remember so well from my Grandma Dee-Dee's and Grandpa Bop's tree are added with loving hands and with hearts full of memories of Christmas's long ago. The huge glass ball ornament that hung on their tree was at least the size of a basketball in my childhood memory, but somehow since then has shrunk considerably, to the size of a huge apple. I wonder as I look at my niece and nephew, if they will remember it being as huge as I used to think it was. Next we hang the "cry baby" that my great-grandmother made from cutouts, foil, and garland. The bugle, the lovebird, the pipe--all those memories were hung one by one.

And, of course, "my" angel went on the very top. Dad told the little ones how he and my mom bought that for my very first Christmas, and how he held me up on his shoulders each year to place it on the tip of the huge live trees we used to have back then. My little niece, who is 4, found it hard to believe that Aunt Kathy was once young and small enough for Grandpa to life up to the tree top. She just looked at me and giggled.

After decorating, we ordered pizza, and sat and told more stories and laughed. It was good to have such an incredibly beautiful normal day after the roller coaster ride we have been on this past year. It was good to just sit and talk and laugh while eating our pizza, and having Dad yell at everyone to drink all their pop so none went to waste. I think life is a blissful normal again for awhile, and I thank God for that.

Just a couple years back, we were telling this same story, and my dad, on a whim, grabbed me and picked me up, and lifted me to put my angel on top of the tree, just as he had when I was little. I think we scared my brother and brother-in-law to death that we would destroy the tree they had taken forever to assemble. And my sister was watching with anxious eyes, worried that if the whole thing toppled, all the antique ornaments would be crushed beneath Dad and me.

It was funny, yes, but it was also a *fun* moment for me that year. For a second I could go back to my childhood, and Dad could go back to his days as a young daddy. For just a moment we could both be young again, and it was fun! I'll never forget that day, ever.

I am so thankful that the Lord has given us another year together as a family this Christmas. It was so wonderful to see everything unfolding just as it does every other year. I hope and pray that we have many more days just like this one in Christmases yet to come.

Just in case you are reading this---I LOVE YOU, DADDY!!!