TIMBER!!

Our beloved tree has fallen.

We got a lot of comments about our ornaments. Some of them consisted of the amount we had, the type, others picked out their favorite. I loved the conversations our tree started.

The center ornament was bought on Olvera Street, April 25, 2009. 

We were engaged a few hours later.

To the left is one of our new national park ornaments. The antlers, they're from Walmart. The one with the shamrocks, Grandma bought me when we were in Ireland together.

Our initials were a Christmas gift from Peter's brother Nathan. It was one of my favorite gifts. Do you see our first house key, oh how we loved Victoria! When it came time to return our keys to the manager, I couldn't do it. I wanted to keep my warn out, original key. So I made a copy and gave him the new one. The Sea is from our last Alden family vacation and man was it a good one! We never had a bad one but there was something extra sweet about the last one- especially since we didn't know it was our last. The next summer we added Jared to the family and Peter followed the year after.

We have a few snowmen too. The one reading the newspaper was won in the traditional Terry ornament exchange a few years back.

Our animal farm. Peter bought the first one in the Grand Canyon and brought it home for me.

It's the squirrel.

We are both the eldest child. That means we had way more ornaments than our siblings. Yes, I rubbed this in Tiff's face just a teenzy bit each year.

Us, in all our glory. 

These ornaments represent our travels. Ireland. Montana. Big Bear. Boston. Grand Canyon. Hawaii. Wyoming. Tahoe. Maine. Carmel. Oak Glenn.

These are the ornaments I/we acquired in the past 12 months. You see why I had so many ornaments for my first Christmas? I'll say it again, I'm a planner!

In the buff.

I think we gained a 100 square feet.

It was a wonderful first Christmas. Our neighbor across the street told Peter she would miss seeing our tree in the window. What a compliment. 

Now I have to figure out how to decorate for spring...or just regular life. We went straight from signing papers to hanging fall garland to stringing up garland filled with twinkle lights. My mantle looks so bare now.

xo, p&l