For the love of Christmas

Today my love for Christmas was rekindled. In the past I would pack up the whole house so I could put out all my Christmas decorations. Thinking about it now,  it was like having a life size doll house to change over. I know my daughter and son both feel scared by how cluttered the house would look  at Christmas with Santa staring at you from every corner. My ex got more Grinch like every year until he was down right nasty. So for the past few years with everyone yelling at me not to decorate, I stopped. Always made me sad because when you unpack the ornaments or Santa, the memories of when and why you got it come back. During the purge of my house a few months ago, the Christmas boxes got over looked so where not sold off.
With the holidays now here and the staff party is at my building, I finally get to decorate again! It's wonderful to see the smiles on people's faces when they walk in. The best part was, I asked a friend if he would pick up a tree for me since I was running out of time (tree had to be up by Thursday for the tree trimming party) and trust me, this is not a favorite activity for him. It was fun to joke and debate the pros and cons of real and fake trees.  For the first time in many years it was nice to feel the happiness and warmth of being with people who enjoyed the process (maybe not as much as me) of getting ready for the holidays.  Yes, I'm a real tree kind of person and I did learn it's best if only one person goes out and gets the tree. :)