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Emily O’Brien, Age 10 – Trafalgar Oakville
The first Christmas my husband and I were married, we lived in a tiny apartment. At barely 400 square feet, it had just enough room for us to live happily, although my father reminded us often that it was so small, “You have to go out into the hall to change your mind!”
We liked our bright coach – house apartment in Longbranch with its big windows and pretty bedroom. Still, in such a limited space, there was little room for a Christmas tree. Carrying it up the two flights of stairs would be a chore, and putting it up might mean there was no room to sit down. We reasoned that since we really had no budget for such an extravagance anyway, perhaps we would forgo a tree altogether. We would just visit friends and family and enjoy their’s instead.
As the December days crept by, with me writing university exams and my husband helping his family’s business in their busiest time of the year, we just didn’t feel quite right about our tree decision. This was our first year as a family together, in our first ‘house.’ It just didn’t feel like Christmas without the smell of a fresh evergreen.
We scrounged everywhere looking for bits of forgotten change, looking under couch cushions and in coat pockets. We took our few dollars and went out to find the smallest tree we could. We found one—a slightly scraggly fir tree just a few feet high. Perfect. We would even be able to get it up the stairs without too much trouble.
Our first – ever Christmas tree was glorious! It was dark green and smelled of Christmas carols, turkey dinners and presents under the tree. We even managed to fit it into a corner, leaving enough room for our loveseat and one chair. Once we had it propped up in a bucket, however, we realized we had a problem: there were no decorations.
When a man and woman get married, two become one. That necessitates taking some things with us into our new life together, and leaving others behind. Staring at our new tree, my husband and I suddenly noticed that for all the warm memories we brought with us, we had left behind all of the Christmas ornaments from our childhood. Since we had spent all our available money on the tree itself, we were at a loss.
That was when I realized we had a few things in the pantry: flour, spices, eggs. I looked up a gingerbread recipe and soon had cookie stars, wreaths, and holly leaves. Red ribbon from the box of wrapping supplies tied them to the tree. We made popcorn and used a needle and thread to string it into long white garlands. Some leftover scraps of tartan ribbon and a few kitchen twist ties made a handful of pretty little bows, too. It may have been short and scraggly, but we were quite pleased with our little tree that year.
It is never very much fun living on a tight budget. On and off over the years, we have felt the pinch of difficult times and know that it can be awfully depressing. Still, I look back now and realize that as bereft of money as we felt, we did have an abundance of gifts: a bit of spare change, food in the cupboard, creativity, ingenuity, each other.
Yes, even in those years that my parents would have called ‘lean,’ if we look carefully enough there are still blessings to be counted. As you celebrate this year, may you be able to look beyond whatever challenges you face and discover the good things that God has tucked into the unnoticed corners of your life.
