DIY Party Mom: Our 2017 Yearbook Christmas Tree

Look back on your year every time you enjoy your Christmas tree with this fun family tradition. Find or make a Christmas Ornament for each of your year memories and you'll remember the great memories every Christmas.

It's day 12 of the 12 days of Christmas. There's been so much Christmas fun that I really am sad that it's over.

I wish I could say the same about this year. It's been a hard and crazy one. I told myself at the beginning of the year that I wasn't sure that I was going to make it to the end of the year. It was still pretty rough. But we made it.

And we are celebrating by creating a new tradition at our house.

We made a yearbook tree of all the good things that we wanted to remember this past year. This way we are looking at the fun and great memories of 2017 and not the bad that can be left behind with the new year.

Welcome to the third annual 12 Days of Christmas Blog Hop!

Stop by every day from December first through the twelfth for new ideas you can use to make your season brighter!

Meet Your Hosts

They have all been busy as Elves creating, decorating, cooking and crafting tons of new ideas for you to try this holiday season!

Shirley~Intelligent Domestications I Alli~An Alli Event
Michelle~Our Crafty Mom I Marie~DIY Adulation

Erlene~My Pinterventures I Beverly~Across The Blvd.
Debra~Shoppe No. 5 I Victoria~Dazzle While Frazzled

Megan~C'mon Get Crafty I Michelle~Michelle James Designs
Amanda~Domestically Creative I Deborah~Salvage Sister & Mister
Jeanie~Create & Babble I Sherry~Olives & Okra

Jenny~Cookies Coffee & Crafts I Emily~Domestic Deadline
Bonbon~Farmhouse 40 I Susanne~Pearl Street Designs

Leanna~Of Faeries & Fauna I Pam Larmore~P.S. I Love You Crafts
Kelly~North Country Nest I Marie~The Inspiration Vault

Gail~Purple Hues and Me I Lynne~My Family Thyme
Karen~Dragonfly and Lily Pads I Trisha~Blowing Away Out West
Tomika~Life In Pumps I Rachee~Say it, "Rah-Shay" I
Ra'Nesha~Queen Thrifty I Lorrin~Embrace The Perfect Mess

Jaime~Love Jaime I Serena~The Weekend Jaunts
Terri~Christmas Tree Lane I Jessica~A Southern Mother

Sam~Raggedy Bits I Rachel~Smart Mom Smart Ideas
Surya~The Busy Mom Club I Cyn~Creative Cynchronicity

Valeria~Val Event Gal I Yami~The Latino Next Door
Jeannee~Centsably Creative I Tania~Little Vintage Cottage

Lauren~Wonderfully Made I Vanessa~DIY 180
Kimberly~A Wonderful Thought I Kim~Everyday Parties I Erica~Erica Ever After

2017 was a year of ups and downs at our house. We decided to create a new tradition this year and celebrate the good things that happened with a yearbook Christmas tree with all our favorite memories from the past year.

As you look back on 2017, take a moment to remember all the good moments and celebrate them in a fun unique way with lots of unique Christmas ornaments for your Christmas tree. You'll be able to remember them for years to come.

I started my tree decorating by making personalized photo ornaments out of my kids' First Day of School pictures. I showed you how I did this on the Christmas ornament post here. They are really easy, and the kids love to see their photos on the tree and I love to look at how they've changed over the years.

This year, my oldest son transferred from his community college and living with Grandma to being a "big boy" and going to a University and living on his own. It's been an interesting adjustment watching him learn to try and cook for himself and do all the "adult" things that we have always helped him with. We celebrated this milestone by adding some green and gold curled paper strips to a clear ornament and then used my Xyron sticker maker to make the UVU emblem and mascot into a sticker for the front of the ornament.

My kids are very sports oriented. My oldest son played tackle football out at college on a rec team. The Daredevil took up basketball and has a weekly game with some friends. While Mini Me started playing Travel Soccer this spring. I was too cheap to buy some of the expensive sports ornaments, so I found some wooden soccer, football, and basketball pieces back in the scrapbook area of Hobby Lobby and turned them into Christmas ornaments.

At the start of the year, I was called into the position of Relief Society president in our church. It has been the hardest and craziest calling of my life. I have grown to love the ladies in our ward and it has brought me out of my "moving" shell. This beach angel is perfect to remind me to try and be the serving angel to our South Carolina ward.

The Daredevil has taken up music this year. He picked up an old guitar my sister had at Grandma's house and started playing with it. She gave it to him and he has taught himself to play amazingly well. Then he decided he needed to teach himself to play the piano, the ukeleli, and the violin. It's definitely brought a lot of music into our home and I have loved it!

In 2017, I discovered Movie Pass, a subscription service that lets you go see a movie a day every day of the year. I gave a membership to both my hubby and I for our Anniversary. We have since been to see so many movies. It has been so much fun and nice to be able to go on date night whenever we want to whether there is extra money in the date night fund or not. We celebrated by popping some popcorn in a clear ornament and hanging that on our Yearbook Christmas tree.

Both my older kids live in the same town as my parents, so every chance we get, we go home to Texas to visit. This allows me to see my kiddos and to help my parents as I can. it's a fun way for us to spend our holidays and summer vacation. We celebrated this year's trip with a wooden scrapbook cowboy hat turned into a Christmas ornament.

While we were in Texas this summer, our town opened a little water park. Since Mini Me is a fish out of water, we ended up going at least once a week. This clear glass ornament has a little bit of water inside it and I made a blue floatie out of fun foam to remember the summer spent on the lazy river.

Also while in Texas this summer, I spent a lot of time watching my little niece. She was in love with Moana and would only stay still long enough for nap time if you put on the movie. Nevertheless, we watched ALOT of Moana this summer. I couldn't find a Moana ornament, so instead I bought a Funko pop Moana keychain and used it as a ornament. Which is great because I may have gone a "little" overboard working at the mall this summer across from a shop that sells Funko Pops. I might have bought one or two or five or six new Funko Pops for my collection.

I had to add some "wedding" bells to my Christmas tree this year too. After too many years to count, my sister and her high school crush miraculously reconnected this year. They ended up getting married this fall. I am so excited for her as she had given up on ever getting married and is now floating on Cloud 9 with her new husband.

This summer while in Utah, I was able to check a major item off of my Bucket List. Ever since watching The Great Food Truck race, I have always wanted to eat from a food truck. But I've never found one. This summer I found a gathering of about 15 food trucks and was able to try something from all of them. It was such a fun evening! I found this food truck and added a ribbon to the top of it to turn it into an ornament.

You can't tell very well from the picture, but this Christmas ornament is homage to our crazy medical year. I started the year by spending two weeks in the hospital. Then Dear Hubby spent 3 months in the hospital at the end of the summer. So I filled a clear ornament with band aids to celebrate our time with the doctors and hospitals.

So that's our year in review and our 2017 Family Yearbook Christmas tree. It's been a crazy year full of good, bad, and ugly. But despite my earlier convictions, we made it through alive and with good memories to share.