Santa Full of Cookies - Day 3

Happy Tuesday everyone!

As I mentioned the other day, there are many reasons why I have originally gravitated to an ornament, and in this case, I can say I picked it out because it was just so cute. It involves two of my favorite things: Santa and cookies! The ornament is dated 1992 and apparently at the age of 11 I had impeccable taste in decor. What can I say?

This ornament, however, has had a very interesting struggle. When I got the ornament in 1992, I did not know at that tender age that it would set off a firestorm of conflict in my house. In the days before we got our own storage boxes at my parent's for our ornaments (yes we all had individual boxes marked so that we knew which ornaments belonged to whom) my mom would simply write our names inside the box whenever we received an ornament. Upon receiving this ornament, my mom wrote my name on the inside of the box and placed it in the pile to pack up for the next year. In the ensuing months between the dismantling of the tree and the reassembling of the tree that most of you refer to as January-November, my mom must have conveniently forgotten who the ornament belonged to, and had fabricated a lengthy story about her ownership of the ornament. I however, could not be swayed and stood by my conviction, and her handwriting which plainly displayed my name.

As the years went by it became a playful back and forth in relation to the ornament as to who it belonged to and how I could possibly feel okay with taking an ornament from my mother. I never backed away from my convictions and pressed forward knowing the truth. As we were preparing the tree in 2001, many things were flying through my head. I had just proposed to Molly 1 month before and we were preparing for our wedding in December of 2002. (Monday the 14th will be 7 years!) I knew it would be my last time setting up a tree with my parents, and it was a bittersweet moment. As I put that ornament on the tree, I remember my mom making some comment about how this would be the last year that I would place the ornament on their tree and I, as I often do in these cases, got really emotional. It was at that moment that I set a plan into motion for Mom's Christmas present.

My plan was to find this ornament and buy it for my mom that year. I turned to the only place I knew to find random gifts at the time: EBay. It didn't take long to find one of them, but I knew I was going to be paying a premium price for the ornament and the shipping. However, I knew the present would mean a lot and I bought the first one I could find. On Christmas morning, I left a note on the present saying that now my mom could always have that ornament on her tree, and she opened her own Santa Full of Cookies. It was one of those moments that I think I completely shocked my mom and I know that she was touched by the gift. Now every year, when I put up this ornament I can think back to years of loving banter between my mom and myself and the memories of putting our Christmas year up as a family. Here's hoping that Ainsley, Molly and I will have those same types of experiences in the future.

Merry Christmas!