13 Years of Memories

It was Christmas 1995. I was feeling pretty down. I was 21 years old and feeling alone in the world. I was not speaking to my family, I had lost my apartment, and I was living in the basement bedroom of a friend/co-worker. One day the Mountain Man candy lady came into my workplace like she did periodically and saw this cute Frosy ornament. I bought it, deciding right then and there to start my own Christmas tradition of buying myself a special ornament every year. And I have... This was my first ornament. Frosty. Because he is cute and I like snowmen. 1995.

The year 1996 was the year I met my husband. We broke up for a few weeks right before Christmas (we got back together on Christmas day) so I wasn't in the mood to buy an ornament. Luckily, a friend gave me this cute little doll. She's now missing a black button foot.

My husband bought me this cute Precious Moments ornament for our first Christmas together in 1997. We had a Precious Moments cake topper on our wedding cake too.

We spent Christmas 1998 surrounded by boxes as we waited for our first house to close. It finally closed two weeks late in 1999 but we thought that this house ornament was still appropriate for 1998 since we were up to our ears in closing stress and boxes.

I was pregnant with our first child in 1999. That summer we went to a big, outdoor boating event in a nearby city. Not only could you look at tons of cool, wooden boats but they had tons of vendors and food. I saw this salt dough pregnant woman and had to have her for Christmas that year. She lost her foot a few years ago. Last year, she lost her head...it falls off so she can't hang on the tree. I want to either find the lady who made her and get a new one or try to remake her myself.

Our first child celebrated her first Christmas in 2000. I just love these teeny Precious Moments shoes. They have her name and birthday written on the bottoms.

In 2001 we chose to commentorate September 11, 2001 with this ornament. I was going to say something about praying the families affected have peace this year but there are just no words...

The year 2002 was our second child's first christmas. We chose this cute ornament for his first Christmas.

In 2003, the wife of a former coworker of my dad sent us this hand made ornament. This spider is so pretty and came with a story about how the spider covered a tree with its webbing and how Santa turned her web into tinsel. Cute story. We have no tinsel on our tree though.

A family friend gave each person in our family an ornament for 2004. Here's mine: a cute fabric bag with a snowman. Its begging to be filled but I don't know what to put in it.

This little puppy ornament reminds us of the year my husband's boxer suddenly became ill and had to be put down because she had advanced cancer in her liver and gall bladder. She never showed any signs until it was too late.

In 2006, my husband's boss took everyone to Disneyland. The kids loved it, I found this ornament in a shop on Main Street because I knew a Disney ornmaent would be perfect for our tree.
One month after Disneyland, I became pregnant. The kids had been wanting another sibling so everyone was very excited making a second ornament for 2006 necesssary.

Our third child is celebrating his first Christmas this year so my daughter picked out this ornament for him.

One year I realized that I wasn't going to give up my yearly ornaments as long as I live. My kids would have to come home for Christmas if they ever wanted to see them again after they move out. This led me to decide to start them a collection as well. I start each child's collection when they are about 4 or 5 so we can tailor them to their activities or likes. This year my daugher has a gymnastics bear and my son has a black Spiderman.

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