Oh-Christmas-Tree!!

So maybe I'm a little behind but it is only because I have been mourning the end of Christmas. It truly is my most favorite time of year. But I don't want my mourning to interrupt proper documentation of my most favorite time of year. :)

A few posts ago I told you about getting our tree and promised a few pictures of the finished product. This was our first Christmas as husband and wife and we started with 3 ornaments, all from my mom. HA By the end of the season we picked up a few sentimental ornaments for our "homie" tree!!

Justin and I at 6:00 am before leaving on a 10 day vacation. I had a panic moment....
"oh my gosh, we must rig a picture of ourselves with our 1st tree before it gets ugly!"
So here we are....with our HUGE Christmas tree.

This is one of my favorite Christmas items. My family gave this to us. I hope to get the wise men and camel next year.
I love it so much I almost want to leave it out year around. :)

We decided to have a meaningful tree rather than a beautiful tree...although I think our meaningful tree is beautiful. Our hope is that we can add to it each year with things we love or an ornament that sums up something in our year.
This year we knew we wanted a wedding ornament to symbolize our wedding year! This one is a bell shaped like a cake....on one side it says,
"First Christmas Together...." the other side says, " Mr. & Mrs. has such a nice ring to it..."
I thought that was too cute!

We decided to start our tree with lime green and red to jump start our collection and we found this "H" in our themed colors for $1.o0.....woorah!!!

And last but not least my tacky red bird. This is a tradition that was started well before my time but something my parents still do! Our bird started off like this beautiful bird....but is now featherless, beak-less, and is just a site to see. HA
But it holds lots of memories and it is always so fun to see where the tacky white bird is.

The story behind the bird, told my Father.....An old friend of my grandmothers named Ed was what we would call these days a "fashonista". He had a niche for decor and my dad and some buddies came across a tacky white bird and insisted that Ed have it. "He just couldn't, oh he just couldn't!" I assume it was too tacky for his taste, but that was part of the fun! Well the bird went back and forth from my parents to Ed as a joke! Well for Christmas one year the bird came back to my parents and never left and it has been on our family tree ever sense. Strange how traditions come about, but it is one I remember and I knew my family tree HAD TO HAVE A TACKY BIRD!!! I was so proud the day I found it, I text my parents pictures, I knew they would be so proud!

I hope we have many many more traditions to come, I am counting the days until we can decorate for Christmas this year.

Fairwell to Doggie Heaven

Those of you who read often know I am an animal lover. I have one puppy, Lucy that I talk of often. She lives in NC with me. But back home at my parents I have 4 dogs. Today my parents had to make the hard decision to say fair well to one of our dogs.

She was the oldest at 13 or 14, so old no one really remembers but she was given to me by my parents on Valentines Day when I was in 5th grade. I told them I wanted a little puppy that would stay a puppy forever. So they gave me a Yorkshire terrier and I named her Carmel.

After leaving for college and moving to North Carolina, Carmel was old and "settled in her ways" so she stayed in Arkansas with my parents and their pack of 4. She was the smallest in the pack weighing just 7 lbs and wasn't scared of putting our 165 lb. English mastiff in his place. She ruled the roost and let every guest know it as they came in our house she would greet them with a vicious bark and a little nibble at their ankle. ;)

She was a great dog, a fun dog, and a little pup that we will not be forgotten.

Those of you who are pet lovers, you know the heartache that comes along with putting an animal down.

Say a little prayer for my parents tonight as they have a little extra room on the couch and in the bed.

Also, squeeze that four legged pup at your own home and let them sit on your furniture and bend a few rules....one day they won't be around the break them.