Perfecting the Tree

The thing about being a perfectionist is that nothing is ever finished...(insert heavy sigh here)

Last night we put up our LIVE Christmas tree...which smells AMAZING!  It even looked beautiful with just the little white lights all over it, but no one else was satisfied with that.  Typically we let the kids put the ornaments on since they all have their favorites; so I opened the box, carefully unwrapped each one and handed them off to the kids to hang where they wanted them.   And in less than 30 minutes, everyone stood there marveling at their awesomeness that they had an almost finished, beautifully decorated tree before December had even started!  My job is to put the garland on the tree after the kids are finished decorating, but I almost always do that after they've gone to sleep or while they're at school so they don't notice the part where I move their ornaments around.  It's never my INTENTION to re-do the entire tree, but I'm a perfectionist, so inevitably that's what happens.  Somehow one of my favorite ornaments always ends up on some obscure branch in the back and I'm compelled to move it, which means that I have to move another one to accommodate it.  And before I know it, I've relocated nearly every ornament on the tree.  Fortunately the kids don't really notice (or if they do, they don't care), because once they've put the ornaments on, the only thing they're really interested in is what's UNDERNEATH the tree.  

So, I spent the morning today doing TWO of my very favorite things...listening to Christmas music and PERFECTING the Christmas tree.   

And now we can ALL stand back and marvel at the awesomeness and beauty of the season.