Our first together

Last night the ear doctor and I finished putting up all our Christmas decorations, capping the experience off with trimming our first tree together. Here is our step-by-step tree decorating process:

1. Ear doctor slowly rotates tree around and around while I stand across the room to determine the exact angular position that shows of the most beautiful sides.
2. Pull out the new string of fancy 8-phase blinky lights and make sure they work alright.
3. Our tree is tucked in a corner of our living room, so we debate back and forth about whether we are going to loop the lights around the back of the tree, or zig zag across the front. Decide on the zig zag technique.
4. With the ear doctor on one side of the tree and me on the other we zig zag the blinky lights up.
5. Both cross to the other side of the room to make sure blinky lights are even. See that they are decently spaced and return to the tree.
6. Add two more strings of cheap normal tree lights so that our tree has a magical, only a few little lights twinkling effect (the ear doctors great idea!)
7. Add the light up Christmas star that I bought for $10 4 years ago. Not my dream tree topper, but it looks ok.
8. Stand across the room and again appraise our work. After some poking and prodding the light phase of tree adornment is deemed acceptable.
9. Have a moment where I look at my wonderful husband and realize that this is the first of many, many Christmas trees we will trim together.
10. Get a little choked up.
11. The ear doctor stations himself on the other side of the room while I get the bead garland under control. The ear doctor is very particular about the spacing/drooping/alignment of the bead garland, so he directs while I do the placement.
12. We decide the beads look alright.
13. Move on to the Christmas ornaments.
14. All special or sentimental ornaments go up in the best spots at eye level.
15. Place the reindeer my good friends got me last year dead center, next to the blown glass wedding cake from my mom and the cute little Santa I had from last year.
16. Get a little overwhelmed at how much I'm loved.
17. Decide the the tree is looking a little bare still and pull out the sparkly wide gold wire ribbon and add bows across the tree.
18. Impress myself with how good that looks.
19. Stand back and admire the tree.
20. Decide that we should get some candy canes to hang on it.
21. Look down at all our unused red ball ornaments and ask the ear doctor if candy canes are the only thing missing.
22. Wonder why he left the room for a minute.
23. Hear him call out from the other room, "there's one more thing it's missing."
24. Fall head over heels for him again when he comes back to the room with a pretty bag and an white tissue paper wrapped present.
25. Unwrap the present (I love presents) to find a custom ornament that he'd picked out for me with our last name and 2007 on it.
26. Like a jerk, ruin the moment by commenting that the little girl on the ornament has yellow hair, not red.
27. Test the ear doctor's patience....again.
28. Throw arms around man of my dreams, then turn and place the perfect ornament in the perfect spot of our perfect tree.
29. Stand back and enjoy.
30. Try to take a picture to share on my blog, but realize the camera's battery is as dead as a doornail.
31. Hope people who read my blog will have patience like the ear doctor.