For many non secular reasons Christmas is a magical time to a 3 year old. Some of the houses in the neighborhood are decorated with bright lights outside. Ironically, more often than not it’s those houses without a 3 year old that do decorate outside. Our children are all 3 or younger and I’ve observed that the magical ‘decorate outside age’ is when the oldest is 5 and up.
Until that time our children have established different roles inside the house. The 3 year old ‘decorates’ the tree and the 1 year old takes ornaments off of the lower branches. It’s like some bizarre game of Jinga where two sides are trying to do the exact opposite thing.
The 3 year old ‘decorates’
I’m far from a Martha Stewart type, but when our 3 year old ‘decorates’ it requires some decoration clean up. The ornaments are on the tree, but they’re a bit heavily weighted on the branches four feet and lower.
The ornaments are dirty
Splashing sounds are not something that you should hear around a Christmas tree. In this case it was heard and when I asked a certain 3 year old what he was doing he said, “I’m washing the ornaments.”
Double check the breakables
Goofy had been with me for about 15 years. He was far from vintage valuable, but he somehow managed to survive my multiple moves along the east coast and overseas. I’m now very thankful for shatterproof ornaments and healthy children.
The Christmas tree to a 3 year old is a fluid instrument of being helpful. They love helping with the tree, it’s just up to us parents to ensure that it’s safe and provides great memories. For us this could be the last Christmas that our oldest is into animals. Next year it could be cars, dinosaurs, LEGOS or ninjas. As long as he’s happy, learning and being a good kid we’re happy with that.
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