Christmas Home Tour 2024

 

Welcome to my home all dressed up for Christmas!

One of my favorite things about large family gatherings is the reminiscing. I especially love to hear the oldest generation present at these occasions sharing memories of their childhood and I even love to hear stories we’ve heard many times before.

 

We spent Thanksgiving with my side of the family in Georgia this year and so much of our time together consisted of regaling each other with tales of holidays past.

My husband and I couldn’t resist telling (retelling?) the story of our very first Christmas tree as a married couple. Our wedding had taken place only two months prior and we were so excited to pick the perfect tree.

Having only ever picked out trees with our parents who owned actual homes, we didn’t stop to consider the postcard stamp size of our apartment.

We lived in Southern California at the time so we went to a local tree lot and found the most beautiful tree. It may have cost way more than we were planning to spend but this was our first Christmas and we considered it a gift we were giving each other to celebrate the milestone.

After dragging it up the stairs to our second floor apartment and squeezing it through the door, we quickly realized we had a problem…a HUGE problem.

The tree which seemed to be just the right size at the lot was massive once we stood it up in our teeny tiny living space.

It was so big that when we sat down on our couch, the tips of the branches brushed against our knees. And then there was the issue of ornaments of which we had very few. I ended up adding a lot of ribbon to that tree because it was the cheapest decoration I could find.

We have laughed so much over the years as we’ve recounted the story of our first Christmas tree as newlyweds.

And as we recall the very beginning of our lives together, we marvel at just how far we’ve come.

Twenty-six years later, we look back and think of the ways in which we’ve been intentional in our home. Not only is it a place where we’ve spent time and resources making it as beautiful as it can be to us, we’ve also dedicated our lives to raising two children who are on the precipice of being launched into the world.

Ours has not been a perfect life or a perfect home by any means.

But it’s one that has been filled with so much joy and the kind of peace that can only come from the Lord.

That peace is what we’ve wanted everyone to experience when they’ve walked through our door.

In the same way that we tell and retell stories from our past, when we get out the Christmas decorations each year, cut down the tree, say hello to ornaments like they are old friends, it’s all part of what we do to remember and honor the past even as time continues to march on.

I keep my grandmother alive in my heart by making her famous molasses cookies and telling my kids about the box she would send us every year with those cookies and so many more goodies inside. They know the story since they’ve heard it a million times but maybe, just maybe, they will tell that story to their own children and even use her recipe in their own Christmas baking.

Or, maybe when they get married someday, they’ll be picking out their first Christmas tree and remember our mistake and learn from it….hopefully!

In our soundbite culture where I can no longer find something on my Instagram feed that I saw just two seconds before, our history provides us with something foundational. It’s grounding in this ever shifting world.

But no story is more important to tell than HIS story.

His story is THE story upon which everything else rests. As Greg Koukl from Stand to Reason likes to say, it’s the “story of reality”.

And, at Christmas, we take extra care to tell that story. We pause and reflect on the incredible gift of the incarnation. Jesus, the son of God, entering humanity and coming to be our Savior.

He is the ultimate gift, one we do not deserve and yet has been offered to us with unmerited grace. My prayer is that if you have yet to acknowledge the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, this might be the year where the truth is made clear to you and you experience the fullness of His love.

And for those of you who already know, may this season of Advent be one in which you experience the story afresh and determine to live your life as a testament to His goodness and mercy.

Merry Christmas to you dear ones, from my home to yours!