The best part of Christmas? The tree.

My kids keep asking, day after day.

Can we put the tree up, mum? Can we put it up yet? There is a tree up in the square have you seen it?

Please can we? The kids at school have ALL put theirs up.

We’re the only ones who still haven’t put it up mum.

Can we put the tree up mum?

So far, I’ve resisted. Soon, I tell them. It’s nearly time.

It's almost time to decorate. Image: Giphy.com

The truth is I’m a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to Christmas and I like to drag out the good bits, savouring them.

They are right about the tree up at the square, that’s been up since October and many of the kids at school have put up theirs. We see the fairy lights blinking at us as we drive home from cricket practice and the begging and pleading starts all again.

But I make them stick to tradition and the tree goes up on the same day each year.

If they knew that I felt the same kind of excitement they do they’d probably have a great giggle, but I do.

Don’t you?

In the whirlwind of Christmas, the ballet concerts and school plays, the class picnics and teachers’ presents.

In the rush to get all the gifts bought and the turkey ordered and the fight each year over who brings what and where you’ll all go, putting up the tree is my own private celebration. My own little bit of piney, sparkly nostalgia that I can hold tight to and try to breathe in just a little bit more of my children’s childhood before they are too big to join in.

This year I am thinking of a theme.

Usually it’s a smattering of this and a scattering of that but this year I’m thinking of going heritage.

Can’t you see it? The red and gold baubles, the Target Vermont pine tree, the traditional fairy lights.

Though maybe I am more of a Nordic Noel woman. The Target Nordic Noel range is a snowy white, an icy blue and a glimmer of shimmery silver delight. There’s even a frosty fun peek-a-boo ornament and a gorgeous $8 Light up Disc Deer Scene*.

Images: Target

But I can’t decide. I’m tempted by the Retro Brights range from Target, and so are my kids.

The bright colour scheme is fun and a little bit cheeky. I’m thinking a silver tree, the LED Coloured Sparkling Ball Lights and the $5 Glass Robot Ornament*.

Though possibly my favourite, as hard as it is to call, is the Organic Luxe range. There’s something about the golds, taupes and soft mauves just makes me want to relax into Christmas and celebrate the little things.

I’ll have to decide between the copperwire lights and the gold crackle ball lights and the $15 Christmas Gold Capiz Star Treetopper or the $20 Angel Tree topper. But of course, a huge part of the fun is in the decisions.

Which to choose to top the tree? Images: Target

My kids are starting to realise the tree decorating is imminent, together we are scrolling through the options for new decorations, digging out the favourite Chrissy songs and getting ready for OUR favourite day of the Christmas season – the day we put up our tree.

Because it’s our time.

A time of cocoa too hot for an Aussie Saturday in December, a time of laughter as the old decorations are dragged out of that cardboard box.

A time of new decorations lovingly picked from our favourite store.

We eat mince pies and suck peppermint candy canes and our Christmas begins.

In my mind, each precious decoration is a memory, I see them wrapped in tissue paper waiting to be unveiled and strung upon the tree.

But, in reality, the torn old box is a jumble of decorations hastily thrown in last January.

The tree is cut fresh from the “forest” (well, just dragged out of the attic) and the lights are as tangled as the hair on your three-year-old’s Barbie.

But we are there together.

"We eat mince pies and suck peppermint candy canes and our Christmas begins." Image: iStock.

One of us has put on the Christmas mix and the kids’ dance around the tree, grabbing at broken reindeers and the toilet roll angels made in Christmases gone by.

There’s the personalised baubles sent from a distant shore by some relative whose name you’ve forgotten and the tinsel, so much tinsel that later that night when they are asleep I will strip back so that we can see the baubles and animals and snowmen hanging from their strings.

Oh, the kids will fight over who gets to put the star at the top and maybe the lights won’t turn on when we plug them in but no one will mind ‘cause it’s Christmas.

*Available in-store only.

How do you and your family celebrate the holidays?