As an early Christmas gift and in honor of my first ever holiday tree, Liza and Maddie picked out these two ornaments.

The boat represents Savannah, where we first met (Maddie and I first met in Savannah as well when she was just 3 months old. And she spit up in my mouth.) and of course the NY ornament represents our adult lives here in the city–except for Maddie. I guess it represents her childhood here in the city.

It was a sweet and meaningful gift and for the rest of my life, these ornaments will hang as a representation of our friendship. And every year in December, I’ll look at these and think of this friendship and what it means to me.

I’ve never owned a Christmas tree in my adult, NY life. So this holiday while my parents were in town, I got my first. We threw a tree trimming party which a handful of my friends joined me for. Everyone (by rule) had to hang at least one ornament.

Now, for me being so creative in my profession, I am ridiculously UNcreative when it comes to tree decorating. The brunt of the work of this tree was done by myself, my friend Emily (check out The LAMP organization!) and Maddie–my seven year old niece. The problem was, I had the same decoration sense as the 7 year old. Maddie and I would lazily clump all of our ornaments together, throwing them haphazardly onto the three. Then, Emily would follow behind each of us, cleaning up the mess and making the spacing more even. Without Emily, the tree probably would have had entirely bare patches. Thanks, Em!