Memory Tree

Hello friends~ Just thought I'd jump on here for a few minutes and share some pictures of our Christmas Memory Tree this year. I created our first Memory Tree last year as I was trying to come up with something new and different for our little tree. Since last year I was decorating very vintage-y, I printed off some black and white photo's of family members who are no longer with us as well as old photo's of my mom & dad when they were young. Everyone in my family loved looking at the old photo's and many of the photo's sparked memories and stories shared by my parents and uncle. Now, I'm thinking this is going to be tradition as I enjoy having the old pictures out to enjoy all the time. They make me smile as I think of warm memories of my grandparents, my Oma from Germany and other family members that I'd never even met but wished I could have like my Opa, who was killed in the war when my mom was a child. This year, I'll be adding Hunter to our Memory Tree as he was just as much a part of our family.

This is Oma, my grandmother from Germany. I remember her always smiling and laughing. She was the most jolly person I think I've ever known. She was just a tiny thing, not even five feet tall. She couldn't speak any English at all but we communicated just fine. When she lauged, her whole body shook and tears always came out her eyes. She could make me laugh just by listening to her giggle. Oma came to visit us from her home in Germany only a few times, but when she came she stayed for what seemed like months at a time. The time always went by too quickly.

When I was a little girl, I remember Oma watching Sesame Street with me and even though she couldn't understand what was being said, she'd giggle and laugh through the entire show. Her favorite character was Oscar the Grouch and that year for Christmas my mom gave her an Oscar the Grouch puppet, complete with trash can. Oh how she laughed and laughed when she opened that gift. We all enjoyed so much laughter when she was with us. She would say funny things trying to say them in English and make silly rhymes with made up words. She enjoyed playing cards with us and she would put down a heart and say, "heartz, shmeartz doo-deartz". Crazy, but so memorable. That's my Oma!
This is my Oma and my mother when she was a little girl.

The picture on the left is of me hugging my grandpa when I was a teenager. This was taken on Christmas eve. Little did we all know that this would be our last Christmas with our Grandpa. The pretty young girl on the right is my mom when she was a girl. That was taken at her confirmation.

In the picture to the left, is my aunt, uncle and my dad when they were all young. My dad is the one of the right. In the picture on the bottom left is my great grandmother (my grandpa's mother). My grandmother is in the bottom picture on the right.
Daryl's grandmother is in the picture on the left and another picture of my mom as a young woman. Here's our Memory Tree. Filled with love, laughter, smiles and many, many memories.

I just wanted to add that I would love for anyone to use this idea and make a Memory Tree of their own. It's a wonderful way to share our heritage and memories with family and friends. I'd love to see your Memory Tree, so leave me a post if you make one too.

Here's a couple pictures of our front porch. Just thought I'd include them on this post too.




I also wanted to let you all know how much I enjoy and appreciate reading your comments. They bring sunshine into my days and always make me smile when I think about the kindness of people whom I've never even met before. You make my day brighter by your thoughtfulness and I just wanted to say thanks and send you a big Christmas cyber (((HUG)))! Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope your Christmas is filled with many blessings and many happy new memories made. Hugs~ Birgit

Simple Christmas Touches

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.... everywhere you go.

Well, here in our little home it's beginning to look like Christmas as well. What a wonderful weekend we've had too!
Amanda and I went to two Christmas shows this weekend. Saturday evening we went to our churches Christmas Spectacular show and it truly was SPECTACULAR! Singing songs that bring praise to our God and the birth of our Savior. Lest we should ever forget that (without sounding cleche), Jesus is the reason for the season. Then, this afternoon after church we went to see the play of "A Christmas Carol" put on by our local Community Little Theater. Oh boy, another spectacular event. Back to work I go tomorrow. I have another busy week ahead of me with work, Bible study, Christmas shopping and another show on Friday with my mom and dad.

Since it's going to be a busy week, I thought I'd post pictures this evening of some of our Christmas decorating. My decorating is never the same twice so I have to think outside of my norm every year to come up with something different. I've always decorated with lots of snowmen and Santa's and vintage toys but this year I simplified, using mostly greens and lights and little touches here and there. Also because I've been putting in so many hours at work, it's hard for me to find the time when I'm home because I've always got laundry, vacuuming and house cleaning to do.

Sit back with a little cup o' somethin' warm and enjoy your visit. I'm glad you're here!

We'll start in the living room with our mantel.

It's my biggest challenge every year. I don't know why I have such a hard time, but I do. I'm in awe of the gift that so many bloggers have for decorating. I just don't have that gift, nor do I have the wonderful collections of prims to decorate with so I do my best with what I have.
Simple... very simple, almost too much so. I feel like it's missing something, but I don't know what. I'm still searching my boxes to see what I can add to it to make it better.

This is a little pouting chair that my sweetie made. The iron candle holder is one that I got at an auction several years ago.

The old trunk was one that we rescued from the side of the road on trash pick up day. Can you believe someone was just throwing this little beauty out? OOPS! I see I forgot to clean off the little side table. Oh well, our house is lived in. That's what it normally looks like. :)
Notice the little bowl of fixins around the candle? Colleen, from Baby Makes Five gave me two bags of them when she came to our open house.
As most of you probably already know, Colleen makes the BEST salt dough ornies I've ever seen. She has perfected her painting technique and everything about them is just stunning! So stunning that you have seen her wonderful tutorials in the new A Primitive Place magazine.
Aren't they wonderful? Thank you again Colleen! I think of you with a smile and warm heart everytime I look at them.
I'm needing to get me some more Christmas greens and berries to add to this stoneware pitcher. You get the idea though....
See the little rocking chair off to the right? That was mine when I was a little girl.

The photo is of Daryl's grandparents in their younger years. I love it because it was taken in front of an old Walgreens shop. Grampa was wearing his military uniform and grammy was dressed in her sunday best. The candle is one that I grunged up and I made the bark covered vase with greens and berries a few weeks ago with some of my crafting friends.
In this picture you see my grandmothers college photo and some of her old letters in their original envelopes with postage laying on the table in front of it. I found the two pictures above the table at different times but they both compliment each other with their sepia toned coloring. I also like that they are both of shepherds. Jesus, the shepherd boy and a shepherd leading his flock of sheep. If any of you know the names of these or any iformation, I would love to hear about them.
The picnic basket on the bottom of the stack belonged to my grandparents as well. It has their names written inside the cover.


The old mission rocking chair belonged to my great grandfather. It's one of my most cherished pieces.
Now we'll go into our entry way. It's such a hard room to photograph because it's so narrow, but I'll do my best.

See the old wooden skis in the corner? My hubby found those in the basement of a building they were gutting out. They were going to the dumpster!



The two stitched pillows were made by my dear, sweet friend Heather, in Utah. She's a wonderful stitcher!
Here's a little bit of our dining room. I'm still in the process of decorating in here, but I'll show you what I've gotten done so far.
My hubby made the wall box, fashioned after some we'd seen at a cash and carry show. The wool mitten has a little crow tucked inside.
I've got some greens to add to the top of the big red stepback cupboard. I made the NOEL banner a few years ago.

I'm still trying to find the right Christmas centerpiece for the table.

The settle my sweetie made got a little homespun stocking and snowlady.
Now let's go into the kitchen.Some vintage linen towels I picked up at a garage sale. The gingerbread men are some that I made a few years ago.
More ginger's in an old salt box with old blue paint.



I'm also on the lookout for some greens to add to the cupboard above our stove.The little gingerbread man here was made by my mom quite some time ago. She's always surprised to see all the things I've kept over the years.
Guess that's all I have for now. Next time I'll post some outdoor pictures of our porch. I finally got all the pumpkins and corn stalks taken down and put up some Chrismas greens and such.

Before I go, I wanted to say thank you to all of you who left such sweet and comforting thoughts on the loss of our furbaby, Hunter. Reading your words of kindness is always a comfort and joy to me. Blogging friends are wonderful! Thanks for visiting and hugs and blessings to you~ Birgit

Happy December!!

Happy December 1st friends! I'm amazed at how quickly November passed by and I'm sure December will follow suit and whiz by just as fast. I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Ours was filled with blessings and tears. Christopher came home from college a little earlier than expected so that was a special treat. He was able to change to an earlier flight since they had an extra seat so instead of picking him up at 1:30 in the morning on Thanksgiving day we were able to pick him up at 11:00 a.m. on Wednesday, giving us another day to have him home with us. We stopped in and surprised my mom and dad and what a wonderful surprise it was for them. My mom started crying, she was so happy to see him. :)

We had everyone over for Thanksgiving dinner, there were 18 of us in all. Since our dining room doesn't allow us room to fit that many people, we moved our two tables into the livingroom. We had plenty of room for everyone and the guys were happy because they could watch the football game during our feast!

We didn't have enough chairs so we had to borrow enough for everyone. Doesn't make for a pretty setting, but no one cared about the mismatched chairs. We all enjoyed being together and seeing Christopher.
These are the favors I made for everyone.



I filled them with miniature chocolates. Everyone seemed to like them.
Thanksgiving day was just a wonderful day filled with family and friends and lots of good food! The tears came the day after Thanksgiving. Black Friday has taken on a new meaning for me and my family.

While millions of people were out shopping and having fun early in the morning on black Friday, we were having to say goodbye to our old companion of 11 years. Our dog Hunter was diagnosed with cancer in his throat back in February and because of his age, we decided not to remove the tumor that was growing in his throat. In September, the vet told us that it had grown very large and was currently taking up about 80% of the air space in his throat and suggested that we consider putting him down in the next couple of weeks. I was in complete denial and he seemed to be doing fine and wasn't in any pain that I could see so I put it off and put it off.

Finally we got to the point when Christopher would be home for Thanksgiving in two weeks. I had brought Hunter to the vet again because I had been noticing that his breathing was changing and he seemed to be grimacing, while trying to breath. I told the vet that we'd just like to have him for two more weeks if possible. Christopher and Hunter have always been best buds, playing on the floor, playing ball in the yard, I just couldn't do it without Christopher having a chance to say goodbye to him. The vet put him on three different medications. One for swelling, one was an antibiotic because he was filled with infection in his throat and mouth and one for pain. It was like miracle medicine!! He started chasing squirrels again and running around in the yard. He could barely eat his ground food before the medicine, but after he started taking it, he was eating two cans of dog food a day! In a way it made it harder to make that final decision.

Sadly, the day after Thanksgiving we had to take him in to the vets again and this time would be his last. It was such a heart wrenching time for all of us. We cried and petted him and held him and said goodbye for the last time. It was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. I'm so thankful that Christopher was able to see Hunter and be with us as we said goodbye to our dear old friend, Hunter.
He's now buried in the back yard and in the spring we'll plant a bush, as we've done for our kitty, Shnoodles and bunny, Storm.

We tried to make the rest of the day as normal as possible. Christopher went to be with his friends and Amanda and I went out to lunch and did a little Christmas shopping while Daryl kept busy cutting wood.
It's funny the things you miss when they're gone. The sound the dog tags on his collar made when he was coming up the cellar stairs to be with us. Petting him on the head each time before I left and saying, "mumma will be home soon". Coming home and seeing him looking down the cellar stairs with a cock-eyed look and his ears flopping down waiting for me to come up the stairs to greet him. So many memories, so many smiles and so much joy he gave us. I think it will be a long time before I'm used to Hunter being gone from our lives, but he'll never be forgotten.

Today was my day off from work so I spent the day cleaning, doing laundry and DECORATING for CHRISTMAS!! I listend to Christmas music all day while the fire in the woodstove snapped and crackled. I'll share some pictures of our Christmas decorating in my next post. Until then, thanks for visiting and I hope your week is filled with love and laughter. Hugs~ Birgit