We aren’t far enough along in our journey to have many “last times” yet. Mostly we are working through the penultimate of events, knowing that the “last time” experiences are coming in the next year. Starting in May, we will begin our last summer in this house. After that, pretty much every month will contain a “last.” We will be paying attention to all of these and documenting them here.
Our first “last”
There is one “last” that just happened and it took us a bit by surprise. Every year right before Thanksgiving, we pull all of the Christmas decorations out of the attic and set them up so that the kids can decorate the tree on Thanksgiving day. Then, around New Year’s Day, we box it all up and put it all back in the attic.
This year, on New Year’s Eve, we packed up the Christmas decorations and the tree and put it all back in the attic on the shelves they have lived on for the last 17 years (we’re pretty sure the shelves came with the house). During the process, we realized that this is the last time we will be packing away our Christmas decorations.
An empty attic?
We will, of course, pull all of the Christmas decorations out of the attic again next Thanksgiving (for the last time), but we will not be putting them back again. Next year when it is time for the house to be de-Christmased, the decorations will be divided among the kids. We have decorations that each of them remember from their childhood, and almost every ornament on our tree has a memory for one or more of them.
Anything that isn’t claimed by the kids will be offered to our friends or donated. The tree, which is too tall for any of their homes, will probably go to someone in our local Buy Nothing group. It is a good tree, but it is almost 20 years old and who knows how many more years it has left.
Christmas 2026
In December 2026, we will likely be living in an Airbnb or other short-term rental (remember we will be staying in town for the kid’s first year of college, whatever that may look like). We are prepared that we won’t be decorating for Christmas; we likely won’t even have a tree. But there will be presents, and the traditional lasagna Christmas dinner, and the family will all gather. In some ways Christmas will feel different, but in others it will feel very much the same.
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