I am a HUGE tradition girl. I love anything and everything tradition. It makes me really sad when traditions get spoiled or don’t happen for one reason or the other. We had a wonderful time this year trimming our Christmas tree – a wonderful tradition. Baby Pip was recovering from a day of stomach flu so I stayed home with her while Papa and the two older girls went to Grandma and Grandpa’s back yard (they have a 100+ acres of land…) We have a cottage style house so we always get a great big Charlie Brown tree. This years was no exception. It’s 16.5’ tall and it touches the ceiling. We prune the bottom branches pretty high up so the girls can walk under it fairly easy. 
The trees we get are so scraggly that we have to literally tie them to the walls so they don’t fall over. But we love them! This years is actually pretty decent looking for a tree of ours… My favorite part is putting the ornaments on the tree. I get to tell my girls the stories behind most of the ornaments.
This past May, my Grandma passed away. This will be the first Christmas season without her around. It’s going to be really weird, sad. My Grandma had 13 kids, 34 grandchildren and 37 great grandchildren. She was truly an amazing woman. When her kids were cleaning out her house my mom brought me the one thing I had asked for – one of her small juice glasses that we always had TANG in for breakfast. She also brought me the bells that my Grandma hung on her tree. I was hanging them on the tree, thinking of Grandma, and I noticed that there were 13 bells – so appropriate. I am so grateful to have these bells – I will cherish them each year.
Here’s another one of my favorites. This is a picture of me in an ornament that I made this in Kindergarten (or maybe pre-school). I love how chubby my cheeks are!
This lovely ceramic ornament was added to my tree last year. A friend of mine from etsy surprised me with it in the mail last year. I love it! 
This ornament is 30 years old. My godparents gave it to me for my very first Christmas! 
At the Landwehr Christmas Party – the one with over 100 people, instead of exchanging gifts we all bring an ornament that we made. Since we rent a hall for the event we have to trim the tree so when we arrive we all put our ornaments on the tree. At the end of the party you pick a name and whomever’s name you pick – they get your ornament. The family always hopes my Aunt Ellen Landwehr picks their name since she is such an incredible Rose maul painter. This is one of the two ornaments I am lucky to have! 
What’s the story behind some of your favorite ornaments? Do you have any ornament exchanges or traditions you’d like to share?
I have a big ornament collection too. For years my aunts would make handmade ornaments to exchange every year and I loved being included. 3 are gone now and the tradition has kind of dwindled but hopefully we can get it going again. I also give my kids an ornament each year and I collect them when I travel too. So many precious memories on our trees!