A Tale of Two Trees

On our way to EuroDisney we had some time in Glasgow and we helped Son No 2 put up the tree we bought for the flat the first year we had it.

That's the OH and son no 2 busy putting stuff on it ...

... and this is the finished article. 

And yesterday now that we were well and truly back in Orkney , and the cards you may remember were all done, we put up our own tree. 

 Son no 2 giving a helping hand again. 

 And here's the finished tree

There's such a difference between them. I had longed for a tree decorated in one colour only for  many years ( probably through having seen them in shops and glossy magazines) so when we bought the flat tree we bought one box full of baubles to go on it; in black and gold only, with garlands of golden beads.It's not quite monochrome but  it's as near as makes no difference, and  I love it. 

The family tree is a whole other story. Every decoration on there has a story attached to it. We have one or two that the boys made at school; battered and bowed, but still usable. There are some I cross stitched many years ago; I did two for everyone with their names on and some generic un-named ones as well. Son No 1 has taken the ones with his name on to Canada of course, to become part of his own family's traditions, but that is how it should be. There are a few that we have bought on holidays or trips away, which is why somewhere on there, there are wooden ornaments sporting kangaroos and koalas. And a pohutakawa fairy rom New Zealand, and a string angel from Amish Country and all sorts. There are beautiful blown glass ornaments from eastern Europe which we bought here in the Christmas shop in Stromness, and artisan made ones from sea glass by local craft people,  and others from abroad, bought or hand made by friends made through pen palling or Ravelry. In one way it's an unco-ordinated mess, but in another way it's the story of our marriage and our family and all our Christmases and that makes it less aesthetic than the one in the flat but much more meaningful. Every year we say, we have too many tree decorations, we mustn't buy any more, we have no space,  and by and large we don't. But we did get a new one this year, a random  gift from my sister. Meet Maisie Mouse:

And if you look quite hard at the picture of the finished tree, you'll see she found a place on it!