Trying Ohhh Sooo Hard!

That's me... tryin' so hard to gain some spirit! It's already the 10th of December, and I'm just not feelin' it. Where's my Christmas spirit? I do wish I could find it, but it's just too hard this year. I'm just kind of going through the motions right now and trying to make it to a new year. I just can hardly fathom that we will be having Christmas without Dad... he absolutely loved Christmas with his whole heart. As he stated in his family Christmas newsletter last year, "I am positively and absolutely, unapologetically a Christmas groupie -- not quite a junkie, but surely a groupie." And so he was!

I've put up some decorations, but that's about the extent of it. I am so happy that we now have our own home this year and I do enjoy decorating for the holidays, but I just can't seem to get the full-blown enjoyment out of it right now. At this time last year, we were spending time in my parent's home... we were away at friend's for the weekend and we had stopped into Altoona to see how my dad decked out their house for Christmas. I am just so sad and hurt that the "magic" that my dad seemed to put into our Christmas celebrations will never be embraced again. All we have now are memories.

Aside from the decorations part, Christmas Eve will forever be changed without my dad's messages. I looked forward to going home to church every Christmas Eve to hear my dad preach... and luckily we took the video camera with us to the service last year and did record some of my dad's very last Christmas Eve service. Now I can barely even make it into a church. I know it shouldn't be that way, but I believe it's just temporary as I continue to grieve and let out my frustrations. Afterall, I don't go to church to worship my dad... I go to worhip God.

And, then there is Amelia. This was to be our first Christmas with our new baby Amelia. Again, this just doesn't seem fair. But, we will make it. We might not have everything that we had hoped we'd have, but there is still so much that we DO have, and I know that we are blessed in many ways. So with that thought, I will just say that God is good and merciful!

So like I said, I have put up some decorations and I'd like to share them of course! I didn't get around to any of my usual cookie baking or card-making for this year, but I always decorate.

I love that we now have a fireplace mantel to embellish...

The carved angel with the nativity scene is a Jim Shore collectible piece that we actually gave as a present to my dad last Christmas. He had just started collecting some of the Jim shore pieces about a year before. I think it's beautiful on our mantel, and I can't help but to think of him every time I look at it!

The metal silver tree is also from my parents collection. I've decorated it with all old glass ornaments from when my mom and dad were kids. The Mary and Joseph with baby Jesus wall hanging is actually a pastel drawing/painting that I did one year for them as a gift.

I decided that this year, the only tree that I wanted us to put up was the babies' tree. Last year I had been wanting to get a small white tree to hold all the ornaments that I was collecting in memory of our first baby and of Ava. I found a cute pre-lit white tree the day after Christmas. Since we now lost Amelia too, I thought that we could honor their remembrance this year by putting up their baby tree only, and I think that is what we'll do now every year until and "if" we welcome home another baby. Here's the tree and a few close-ups of some of the new ornaments for this year...

And last for the time being, my wonderful hubby brought me home a beautiful surprise the other night. He got these three sweet bear stockings embroidered with each of the baby's names! I was speechless...

He said he wants us to start our own new Christmas tradition of writing notes to our angels every Christmas Eve and putting them into their stockings! Isn't that a beautiful tradition?! I think so!