Holidays, Memories, Plans, and Celebration of Gratitude

I know its October; but I'm thinking a bit of Christmas and our upcoming project. 

I'm also aware that across the  Salt Lake Valley there is a family celebrating Christmas Eve today. The local radio station will play Christmas music just for them. Their 4-year old son has ALL just like Emma, and the doctors are out of ideas for him, so his family is celebrating all their holidays this week while he still feels good. His entire neighborhood had Halloween already and is all bedecked in Christmas lights tonight.

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I remember visiting the Festival of Trees with my family when it was held in the Salt Palace. I was amazed at the variety of themes and colors that all celebrate Christmas so well. I loved the intricate gingerbread houses and couldn’t imagine how anybody could make such incredible things out of cookies and candy. Mostly I loved the story or dedication of each tree. Sometimes they clearly tied to the tree, and sometimes not; but there was always a compelling story – some sad, some inspiring, some hopeful.

Every tree, every wreath, gingerbread house, quilt, table setting, and toy is decorated and donated out of love. Many are in memory of a loved one, or in gratitude for a life preserved. The amount of passion and love and emotion expended on these trees proved that you can turn emotional energy to creativity and beauty.

Early in our marriage, I started thinking about decorating a tree for the Festival of Trees. I had some nieces and a nephew that had spent some time at Primary Children’s hospital for seizures when they were very tiny, and Clinton’s family had even more reason to be grateful for Primary Children’s. He has two nieces that were born premature and spent much time there.

One niece, Emily, was the youngest baby that Primary Children’s saved to that point, though I understand they have since saved some that were born even earlier. She was about 26 weeks along when she was born, and was the size of a soda can.

I thought that we had much to be grateful for, and that it would be appropriate to do a tree benefitting the hospital and the children whose lives depend on it. We occasionally discussed and dreamed about it among my family and Clinton’s.

Clinton’s education and career goals took us to the East Coast. We had four healthy children. The first year we moved back to Utah, we took our kids to see the Festival of Trees and we certainly enjoyed it.

When Emma was diagnosed with cancer, I determined that this year, we would finally put action to the talk. Primary Children’s saved my baby and we would be there frequently for more than two years for her cancer treatments. I simply had to do a tree. I knew I couldn’t do it alone, and my sisters and mother immediately agreed to join in the planning, designing, purchasing, and decorating. I am so glad they took the lead, since I was barely coping with the newness of Emma’s diagnosis.

Our family went to the 2013 Festival of Trees with Grammy and Auntie Sarah; and Auntie Jen also went. We all took notes on how the decorating was done, what elements and themes looked best, what elements and themes sold well, how they were lit, dressed, and presented. 

Emma chose Minnie Mouse from the themes we considered.

On December 26^th, my sisters and mother and I went shopping at the after-Christmas half-price sales. We carefully scrutinized every pre-lit tree left at Home Depot, and from there we moved on to ShopKo, Target, Wal-Mart, Hobby Lobby, and Tai Pan Trading. There may have been a few other stops as well. It was certainly more shopping and comparing and considering and deciding and couponing than I could have done on my own. Grammy bought it all at half-price or just under.

When we finally finished, we had a tree, lights, shiny balls in red and silver in different sizes, accenting ornaments, wrapping paper, tulle, ribbon, raffia, and more. We had a critical mass of the necessary materials, and we had a pretty good vision of what we like and what we wanted to create. And we had it all stacked neatly in Grammy’s basement.

In September, we registered for our spot and started to internalize all the rules. We moved everything except the tree to Sarah’s house. We spent one very late night drilling and gluing so that all the ornaments are ready to attach.

I am beginning to get excited, and a little nervous. I hope this goes well.

Festival of Trees has a motto, a gift of love. Every item donated is truly a gift of love. For me, this is a way to channel some of my gratitude.

I can’t say thank you to all the people that have anonymously helped us. I can’t say thank you to all the people that support the organizations that have openly helped us. I have probably missed several people that I could have and should have thanked along this journey.  I can’t begin to say thank you to the researchers, the doctors, and the families that have been through cancer before us and paved the way for the treatments that Emma gets now. I can’t begin to say thank you to those who have made their careers all about healing my little girl.

So I will put it into this tree.