Our Story
The story behind The Ornament Book
The Beginning
The tradition that eventually became The Ornament Book started when my husband and I were dating.
At the time, I was obsessed with Diet Coke, and knowing how much I also loved ornaments, he found me a Diet Coke ornament for Christmas. I loved that he had taken two things I loved and put them together in one little gift.
I don't even like Diet Coke anymore, but every Christmas when I pull out that ornament, I remember so much more than Diet Coke. I remember how thoughtful he was. I remember the chocolate advent calendar he gave me that I ate entirely before Christmas. I remember us dating and who we were then.
That's what I've come to love most about ornaments. One little object can bring back an entire season of life.
Our Years Together
When we got married, we kept choosing ornaments that represented our years together.
Some marked the big things. A friend's mom curled up a copy of our wedding invitation inside a glass ornament. We collected ornaments from trips and places we loved. Others represented the smaller things that came to define a year.
I wanted to remember all of it, so for a while I tried writing our memories directly onto ornaments. I squeezed in dates, trips and little notes anywhere I could find room. They're not exactly the prettiest ornaments on our tree now, and some have so much crammed onto them that I can barely tell what I wrote.
But I love what I was trying to do.
For years, I wished I had a beautiful place to record the meaning behind each ornament and the stories that went with it.
Then the tradition grew with our family
Before my first son was born, I found a little Christmas tree at Target for 90% off. I brought it home because I knew I wanted him to have ornaments of his own.
I started choosing one each year that represented something about who he was at that age. One year it was a hand-blown glass avocado because it was his favorite food. Another year it was a bus because, at that moment in his little life, buses were everything.
As our family grew, the tradition grew too.
I loved the thought that someday my boys could take these ornaments with them. When they have homes and Christmas trees of their own, they'll already have a collection that tells the story of their childhood, one year at a time.
From Our Family to Yours
After years of wishing I had a beautiful place for these stories, I decided to make one myself. One book for each of my boys and one for our family.
At first, that was all I intended it to be. Something for us.
Then, the Christmas my oldest was six, he asked to help decorate our family tree. As we unpacked the ornaments, the questions started.
Where did this one come from? Why did we get this one? What does this one mean?
And we started telling him the stories.
Some he remembered. Some were from when he was too little to remember. And some were from a life we had together before he was even born.
That Christmas, I realized I wanted other families to have a place for those stories, too.
What I had set out to make for my own family became something I wanted to share with yours, The Ornament Book.