christmas clothespins tradition

my favorite christmas tradition chase and i have

started thanks to his mom is these clothespin

christmas ornaments. his mom has done these 

with her sisters every year, always making a 

little handmade clothespin representing 

something from that year to hang on the

tree at christmas. when i was engaged to chase

and heard about this i loved it right away, and

knew we had to start our own! it's so fun because

you can look at their tree at all of the different

darling clothespin people and there is a story

attached to every single one. it is a tree full of

handmade memories and their entire family

cherishes these. i want the same thing! so, from

the first year we got married we have made them

and this year i wanted to document them here too.

the first year we went cliché with the bride and groom,

since that was a pretty major happening of 2012 :)

^^ bride and groom in process our first year :)

for 2013 we made a teacher since we were both in TFA:

and this year we had to make a googler since we are both

working at google right now! we write the year on the

bottom foot, and over time we will have such a fun

collection of these meaningful little creations. 

^^ confession: chase is the crafty one, not me!

his mom is the real talent and she collects all

these tiny items to make her clothespins each year!

^^ here's an example of just ONE of my mother-in-law's

that she made for the year we went to paris. she always

makes the best ones and keeps them a secret each year

until christmas when everyone finds it on the tree!

i love this tradition {thank you shel!}

and can't wait to see what other little

characters our tree is filled with over the years.

xo