Now that we are on the west coast we are blessed to be able to share Christmas and New Years with both of our families.  With this privilege comes a challenge: if all days off work are spent with our families what about Christmas time for us?

L and I talked about this and came to a decision: our core family time will be earlier in the month, cutting down and decorating a Christmas tree.

I grew up where picking out the Christmas tree was something we did as a nuclear family. We would come straight home, put Christmas music on, and decorate the tree. Luke has similar experiences, although different tree retrieving adventures. For more on this see:Oh Christmas Tree . . .

Our tree indicates our history: a mixture of how his tree growing up looked and how mine did. It includes ornaments from our childhood, ones that family bought for us in the past few years; in this way decorating our Christmas tree is a great way for us to reflect on the past. But there are many new ornaments as well; some we have picked up on our adventures and vacations together .

What traditions have you reserved for your core family over the years?