One of the strongest emotions I have always associated with Christmas has been waiting. I know “waiting” is not technically a dictionary-defined emotion, but I have no other word to describe what a kid goes through during the month of December. The endless, tortuous, cruel,twisting-your-gut waiting.

Waiting until the cookies are cool before you eat them. Waiting for school to end and vacation to start. Waiting until it is light on Christmas morning before you get out of bed. Waiting for that Saturday afternoon when you can finally get the tree.

My single mom always took my sister and me over the hill to Half Moon Bay to cut down our tree. When I think about it now, that couldn’t have been her favorite holiday tradition. Sawing down a tree with two little girls in tow and then tying it to the top of a Honda Accord for thethree mile per hour trip back over highway 92. It would inevitably be raining when we got home, so even though we were all covered in mud, she would force my sister and me to help her carry the tree inside. We would always forget that we meant to buy a new tree stand the yearbefore and so we would spend at least an hour struggling to get the freshly cut tree to stand up properly in the living room before we could even begin to decorate it.

As painful as the whole rigmarole must have been for my mother, those are some of my favorite memories from childhood Christmases. We’d patiently wait while my mom untangled the strings of lights. More waiting as she strung them and searched the boxes in the attic for the spare bulbs. Then we’d finally open the water-stained cardboard boxes and place the ornaments carefully on the tree.

When at last we had emptied the boxes and hung the stockings, we’d build a fire and sip hot cocoa. With only the sound of our Charlie Brown Christmas album, we’d curl up on the couch and fall under the spell of pine perfume.

Of course I want this same tradition for my own children. So each year on the Saturday after Thanksgiving my husband and I pile all three kids into the car and we make the same trek over highway 92 in search of the perfect tree to cut down. And I do mean the “perfect” tree. Mydear husband is a perfectionist, and not just any tree will do. Last year we visited four different tree farms in search of our tree. “That one has scoliosis.” “Why, a small jungle village could like the hole in the side of that one.” “Charlie Brown’s had more needles on it than that baldthing.”

Once a tree with just the right height, lack of holes and impeccable shape was chosen, my whiny, hungry children were forced to sit still in the car while my husband spent another hour rigging the obtuse bush to the roof of our SUV with 47 bungee cords. I tossed candy canes to thewaiting children, promising stove-popped popcorn and hot cocoa when we got home.

We finally reached home at nightfall and since I was unprepared to spend six hours searching for a Christmas tree, I was unprepared for dinner. The kids had Super Mario fruit snacks, because nothing says Merry Christmas like gummies shaped like Luigi.

While we enjoyed out gummy dinner, my husband started the process of stringing the lights. Did I mention he is a perfectionist? No light can be strung until the tree is secure enough in its stand to withstand a 6.0 earthquake. No ornament could be hung until each of our 51 strands of white lights was hung at precise intervals. By now, the kids were begging to dig into the boxes of ornaments so I distracted them by giving them a bath and putting them in their pajamas. How cute, I thought, tree trimming in jammies! With popcorn! And hot cocoa! I will create a happy, cozy memory if it kills me.

When we came back downstairs I was intent on creating a magical family evening. My husband was intent on sitting on the couch and relaxing as he saw his job as over. He was reluctant to supervise the kids as they unwrapped and hung delicate ornaments while I simmered the homemade cocoa, melted butter for the popcorn and searched for just the right Christmas station on Pandora. So my children waited for me to finish and I gave them the go-ahead to start.

Soon there was bickering over who got to hang the most ornaments, whose turn it was to stand on the ladder, who had more marshmallows in their mug, who gets to put the star on the top, who has the best “Baby’s First Christmas” ornament. I may or may not have yelled, “You will all be of good cheer dammit!!”

Meanwhile I ran around hanging wreaths, replacing plain hand towels in the bathrooms with holiday-themed towels and clearing the mantel to make room for stockings and nutcrackers. And because I am incapable of having a happy, cozy, magical family evening with clutter and chaos strewn all over the living room, once again I made my children wait patiently as I cleared all the empty boxes and broken ornaments so I could take some photos of our happy! cozy! magical! family tree decorating evening.

At long last, we curled up on the couch to admire the lights and discuss our Christmas wishes. As I watched their faces, serene and angelic radiating in the cool glow of that perfect tree, my five-year-old son said, “It’s beautiful mama.” I realized some things are worth waiting for.

Here’s a toast to all of us, the parents everywhere, the friends and volunteers, working themselves into a holiday tizzy. May we have little moments to remind us that it’s beautiful and magical and so worth it.