THE Box

Years ago (Mother's Day 1993), my family started a tradition with "THE" box.  At the time, we had no clue the journey this box would take, but this Christmas we thought to take a picture of it.  Here it is:

Since that time, we have made sure that every family holiday, birthday, or gift-giving occasion has included a gift wrapped in THE Box.   For some reason, we started documenting each gift received in the inside flaps of the box.  

This Christmas, Dad went through and read all the gifts inscribed on the flaps, and it was so much fun to tell our memories from them as he read.   In the bottom picture you see my thumb next to BRAVES TICKETS.  That was my first set of major league baseball tickets EVER.   Everyone didn't have video cameras on their phones back then, but we could still all picture my crazy-excited reaction to opening those almost 20 years ago, just from simple words marked in a box.  It may seem silly to keep recycling the same old box year after year, but for us, it's much more than saving a dollar on wrapping paper.  It's fun to see that, no matter how many things have changed, our family has remained throughout it all.  While the three kids have now all gone our separate ways, there are pieces of our lives that tie us back together and bring us back to THE box.   I am so thankful for each time one of us took a few seconds to record a memory on paper so that it would remain forever in our hearts.