Thankful Trees

1 Thessalonians 5:18

No matter what happens, always be thankful

Our mantel can be a boring place.  It never gets any attention except for Christmas decor once a year.  Otherwise it's exactly the same all of the time.
On a whim, I decided to change it up for Thanksgiving.  Cue Pinterest.  I have always loved the Thankful Tree, as seen on many people's boards.  But I've never had the time (or real desire) to make my own.    
Last Friday, in an effort to make our home a little more thankful, Mary Claire and I went to work on the  coveted tree.  In our pjs, we cut branches from our trees outside, stripped the leaves, and filled vases/mason jars with them. Then I scoured all of the 'stuff' I have from flower arranging and found other decorations to interweave with our 'trees.'  Initially I wanted to have one big tree, but decided that our mantel needed extra love, so one tree evolved into four littler trees for each of us (if Robert could talk, he would have one, too), and a big tree in the middle.
Then I found some netted ribbon stuff (I know, fancy term) in a gold color that kinda-sorta went along with the fall theme.  After contorting the ribbon to go around the trees, I stepped back and laughed.  All of the decorations on my mantel were things that I already had!  Even the fabric and ribbon pinned around various vases is leftover from forever ago when my mom recovered our piano bench.  Not spending money and still getting a pretty result makes me so happy!!
So what do we do with the trees?  Every night, we sit in the den and tell one thing we are thankful for, then write it on the back of a metallic gold leaf (again, leftover from boutonnieres I made once) and hang the leaves on each of our trees.  
Mary Claire's tree may or may not have a leaf with 'Obama' written on the back.  Oh my.  We teach our children to respect our leaders, so Robbie and I just smiled and let her hang it on her tree.
Wow.  Can you tell the Keurig has been at work this morning?!  Amazing how one cup of coffee can produce so many words!!  Hmmm...I think I know what I'm thankful for today! :)