Christmas Courtesy of Prair...

There are lots of ways that kiddos interrupt your otherwise perfectly scheduled (lol) life, but trying to turn your environment into something that won't pose imminent harm is one of those new challenges. 

To be fair, the extent of our "baby proofing" has been pretty much limited to taking a few sharp objects off of low shelves and instilling a firm concept of "HOT" with regard to the fireplace. 

But the notion of my big, beautiful glittery Christmas Tree festooned with all my cherished (and breakable) ornaments made even me, Queen of don't-accommodate-the-baby-too-much, pause and think.

Instead of scrapping the tree all together, or leaving it bare at the bottom where curious hands can grab, I attacked the ribbon walls in the garage and decked our halls with Prair's lovingly collected tri-colors.

By rolling up the streamers and paperclipping them to the back, I turned the rosettes into pretty, varied ornaments.  It was actually kind of fun to read the back of each one and reminisce on certain shows or rounds or especially treasured championships. 

It was one of the first times I've been truly grateful for my OCD note taking on my ribbons.  It's fun to chuckle at "FIRST PLACE!!! (judge missed our blown lead change.. tee hee)" before crimping the ribbon onto a branch.

The Baby got in on the action and loved climbing the step stool with a ribbon in hand and tossing it at the tree. 

Initially I was going to do a traditionally "red and green" tree, but Prair hasn't gotten enough 6th place ribbons to trim out a tree yet.   She can claim far more Blues... so we stuck to a Blue, Red, Yellow theme and called it good.

I wasn't totally expecting to love how the tree turned out, but now that I've stared at it for a couple days, it's festive and bright and nothing will shatter if the kiddo gets a little grabby-grabby. 

I imagine that *when* we have a big beautiful barn of our own, I would put up a Ribbon Tree in the tack room every year....  

Bad light, but fully festive!

The only downside to this whole plan is that my usually cheerful ribbon wall is slightly less uplifting when I pull into the garage now.... it's a tad sparse and a little sad looking, but worth the sacrifice I think.

Visited by a Ribbon Thief

Funny enough, The Boy was the one running to and from the garage to gather ribbons as needed, and I'm sort of curious as to his selection process... he definitely cherry picked the ribbons (especially the tri-colors) but I haven't figured out what the theory was... Ahh the mysteries of marriage. 

I'm just grateful he let me make a RIBBON TREE, so I am unlikely to criticize his contributions...

But the big thanks go to Prair, for gathering such a lovely collection for our Christmas Tree.