For my wife and I, Christmas is a particularly special time of year. We both feel that it transcends anything of religious nature and is more about a celebration of the people and things you have that are special to you throughout the previous year and on into the next one.
Below, I will be documenting how we decorated our little Ranch House this year. But first, I wanted to share our collection of Special Ornaments. As of this post, we have been together over 12 years and have bought a Special Ornament to commemorate each one. They all have their own story. So for the sake of documentation as well as sharing, I’ll list them here. The collection has grown so big, that they now have their own dedicated Tree!
2013
Our first year together. We began dating in late July and consider August 1st to be our anniversary together. We moved in together later that fall and got our first ornament together. It was actually a gift from Liz’s mom from Hallmark!
2014
This was the first ornament we picked out and we got it from Hobby Lobby. We call it the “Lisa Frank Deer”. It set the precedent of making our selections totally and random. We also decided we would never get an ornament from the same place twice. The following year took this criteria to a whole new level!
2015
This little glass tree we got in Singapore during our 6 months backpacking around Asia trip after we got married. We got it as a tiny tree for our Airbnb but decided it would be the ornament of that year. We mailed it in a Pringles can for safe keeping. Now it sits on the tree skirt every year!
2016
My first job after coming back to the States was at a car wash. Someone left this ornament sitting on top of a trash can lid. As you see, there was nothing wrong with it except a tiny bit of wear on the Welcome. I figured it didn’t get much more random than this, so it became that year’s choice.
2017
I believe this little tree also came from Hallmark, but it was our selection rather than a gift, so it doesn’t fully break the rule about getting an ornament from a different place each year. There’s a little twisty knob underneath that makes the snowflakes inside move around like a blizzard. It’s also our 3rd tree-shaped ornament lol
Also 2017
Liz briefly worked at Meijer one year and bought an ornament making kit. She made about a dozen ornaments for other people and this one for us with our initials. D + L.
2018
We got this from the Home Store not long after the first opened up in Lafayette. As a kid, Nutcrackers were my favorite and I had more than 20 of them. This year, one of Liz’s presents to me was a set of them. They are on the big tree, away from this special one, but you’ll see them below.
2019
For our first Christmas in our first home, we kept it simple. We went to a Goodwill and bought the first thing that stood out. This Penguin matched and made a good friend for the Lisa Frank Deer!
2020
This year was crazy for everyone. But we made the most of it by taking a little trip over to Muncie around Thanksgiving. We found a little Mom N Pop secondhand store and there was a tree with ornaments for sale. We knew we just had to have this sparkly Pickle. It also matched the Penguin and the Lisa Frank Deer.
2021
After we moved into our second house, way out here in the countryside, we started exploring the nearby town of Frankfort. There was a little Antique + Craft store where we found this deer head in a bucket. We decided it was fitting getting another deer head ornament since we had three tree-shaped ones.
2022
The is was the year we first upgraded to having two Christmas trees. Liz’s work got a new one, so they gave her their old one, which was falling apart. But we salvaged a whole tree out of it by throwing out the lower sections. When we went to get lights and ornaments for it, we found this Chinese Takeout Box at Michael’s. If you’re not familiar, they’re kinda like Hobby lobby.
2023
Some time in November, I went into a Church’s Chicken in Indianapolis. When I was placing my order, the manager opened up a shipment of Chicken Leg shaped ornaments and said, “Here ya go, sir.” Normally, me and Liz choose an ornament together. But I texted her a picture of it and said, “It’s not going to get anymore random than this.”
2024
Last year we found this little light up ceramic deer while shopping at ALDI. We figured why not have a 3rd deer ornament if we had three tree-shaped ones!
2025
This year, I was tipped off, by the chick who cuts my hair, of a little specialty shop in Downtown Lafayette called SCOUT. Liz wasn’t with me, so I sent her pictures of the entire selection and let her pick. She chose the duck with the blue scarf. But unbeknownst to her, the pink scarf one was behind it. So I got both without telling her. That way, I could also help pick one out and for the first time, we did the dual ornament thing. These were actually really expensive. But when you consider more than half of the ones above were less than $5. Some were only $1. Two were gifts and one was literally on a trash can, then I figured we could splurge.
Here are a few more notable decorations but we’re quite our “Special” ornaments. Then I’ll show you how we decorated this year below.
My mom had an ornament made out of a picture of us from Japan. Liz’s mom gave us an ornament to commemorate each house we bought. And the Blue Robed Wizard/Merlin version of Santa/Father Christmas, whatever, is just a really cool one Liz had since before we met.
And now it is time for the Main Event!
Merry Christmas to all!
