Small tradition, big joy: Your unique story ornaments

FPU Ornament- Image courtesy Alexis Helmrath

Christmas is coming and you’d like to add a little something else under the tree for your children.

Something to commemorate an important moment from this past year, a milestone, perhaps, or a humorous story.

An item that will surprise and delight for years to come, that can be created from scratch or purchased, and can be a frugal and fun tradition to add to your holiday.

I have just the idea for you, and it has been family-tested and received high marks for over two decades.

Story Ornaments

Every year we give our daughters a Story Ornament, which becomes a perennial reminder of an important event in their life from the past year. We might commemorate the can’t miss big ones: graduations, engagements and weddings, but we instead might choose to celebrate the smaller, but still memorable moments.

Over the years, we’ve honored our annual trips to the amusement parks with a roller coaster ornament, reminisced about our day trips to the seacoast with glass bulbs etched with the beach and celebrated moves made and skills gathered.

We bought a miniature Wheel of Fortune as a reminder of the game that helped our eldest get through a week of being stuck in the hospital following an emergency appendectomy.

We made a little toy truck into a hanging decoration (yup-just takes a drill and a small eye hook) to mark a cross country trip two of us took in a 16′ Ryder.  Oh, yeah, just in case you were wondering, we know how to travel in style and comfort.

We burned a small Hotwheels car—yes, set it on fire until it had a nice, blackened, crispy finish—and when it cooled, set it into a clear plastic case. We completed the diorama with a blazing skyline photo backdrop so we would always remember our daughter’s junior year in Paris, when the rioting “youths” were torching about 1,500 cars a night and helicopter spotlights lit up the surrounding area. Yes, thank you for asking, we were very, very nervous. We could have chosen an Eiffel Tower or any other easily recognizable Parisian landmark, but we wanted something, well, a little more dramatic.

Keeping the memories fresh

The finishing touch to these one of a kind creations is the short note that we pen so that the memory stays fresh. We write, by hand, on stationary or in a notecard, a simple paragraph or two about how we made our choice, and highlights of the central idea. When we gave Leslie the bright yellow Ryder, I included a note that stated my joy at being able to spend so much one-on-one time with her, my pride at her ability to handle the truck in New York City, and my gratitude at her hollering at me to stop as I was headed right for an overhang at a Sonic drive-through, not realizing I was in a vehicle too high to pass underneath. . .

Even though the girls are both in their twenties, we still carry on the tradition.

We love how it cements a high point in their life for a particular year—something important or memorable—by pairing the “rest of the story” with the ornament.

We adore how the gift continues to delight, year after year. At tree trimming time, we carefully open the boxes, re-read the notes and add a year’s worth of perspective, growth and sometimes laughter to that memory.

We are thankful at how it gives the girls familiar and beloved decorations for their own trees, as they will eventually take this richly anecdote-filled collection to start their own tradition, perhaps one day to share with children of their own.

So, what do you need to start this tradition in your family?

Very little, actually.

How to get this tradition started

Just think about what is meaningful to your child, and go from there. Do they love a particular television show? A certain character in a book? Did they take a special trip or achieve a milestone? Remember that you can turn almost anything into a decoration for your tree, so set your creativity loose.

If you would prefer to buy something readymade, remember to check with your best friend, eBay, to see what is available, because you can find just about anything you want there. For instance, our youngest had joked pretty much for years that while her big sister had an ornament to commemorate her first Christmas, she did not. So, when Leslie was 12 (yes, twelve), we searched our new and exciting internet discovery—eBay—and found just the right Baby’s First Christmas ornament dated with the year of her birth.

Last year was a real milestone in our family because of the positive changes we had experienced due to attending, sharing, and ultimately becoming facilitators of Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University. We wanted to plant an ornamental stake in the ground to mark the major turning point in our lives where we changed our own family tree and especially that of generations to come. We searched in vain for gazelles and turtles we liked (any FPU fans will know why 😉 ), and ultimately decided to create our own ornament, complete with crumpled fake money and a plastic gold coin. We also designed custom notecards using Wordle.

Regardless of whether your children are younger or older, I urge you to start this tradition. We have had lots of fun figuring out what to do and how to bring the ideas to life, and I imagine you will as well.

FPU Notecard © Kim Hall

What memory would you choose to preserve for your child this year? Please share with us in the comments.

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