..oh, christmas tree..

..i love this time of year..

i love the decorations, the treats, giving presents, shopping, crafts, and the snow. i especially love that special Christmas Spirit that seems to be in the air. everyone's hearts seem softer and more open to love of our Savior. what a special time of year.

i'm also a HUGE fan of decorating the christma

s tree. growing up we would have a family meeting about what our christmas tree was going to be like every year. we'd pick a theme and go to the store to get the things we needed. we'd do snow

men, silver and gold, cinnamon sticks, gingerbread men, candy canes, you name it we did it. i loved spending that time with my family. it was always fun to make the ornaments, watch my brothers hang them on the tree and then watch shannon go through and fix them.

..obviously this year was a little different because matt and i have our own tree! matt humored my excitement and before thanksgiving was even here we went and bought our tree. we picked out 6 ft. skinny alpine. i love it! we went with a traditional green and red theme. i th

ink it came out pretty cute. it was fun to spend time with matt and decorate OUR home for the holidays. we even decided that as a family tradition we would get a new ornament every year symbolizing something significant that happened in our family that year. this year we got married so it was only fitting to get an ornament at disneyland while we were on our honeymoon..

..last year matt bought me the first piece to a nativity scene that i really really wanted. each year he plans to get me the next piece until i have the set completed. we also had the traditional pine cones and santa claus figure. i love having the words like "joy" and "believe" around our home and i'm thinking about keeping up all year. i like what they signify and mean. i think we could all use a little joy in our lives year round and believe a little more in the things we love and know to be true..

..needless to say i'm pretty excited for what the holidays will bring and spending our first official christmas together (even though it's really our third..)..