i love christmas.

love love love this holiday.

it's magical really.

want proof?

let me tell you a little story that always reminds me the magic of this holiday. so imagine me freshman year, i was rooming with the wonderful gal who is now my best friend and together we had set up this mini christmas tree my parents had bought me. it was about 2.5 feet tall with lights that flashed on and off. that year my roomate and i had decided to theme decorate our room in a theme and the theme was america. yeah im not even kidding. yes we laugh about it now, but i think if you would've seen our room you would've been impressed. we had flag curtains, red white and blue blankets, flag everything. and thus, at christmas time our mini tree came complete with mini flag ornaments.

i used to love looking at that tree. it wasn't as grand or beautiful as the trees my family had put up but it held it's own. so much so, that it i woke up- in the middle of the night to stare and it and demanded that my roomate take it in as well. poor courtney. as if your roomate waking you up at 3 in the morning isn't bad enough, her demanding for you to look at the patriotic mini tree and making sure you take in it's beauty really takes the cake for crazy. i mean seriously. i think my exact words were "look at how beautiful it is - our tree looks magical....courtney, wake up, i'm serious...look at it. magic. pure magic"

and it was. i mean obviously. magical enough to wake me up in the middle of the night and magical enough to demand everyones attention. the funny thing was the next morning when my poor roomate told me of what i had done the night before, i literally couldn't remember a thing. i never remembered waking up or demanding her to take in the trees beauty.

so to this day when i think of this holiday i think of laughter, christs birth, the gift of giving, and the our little patriotic tree that was so...magical.