Merry Christmas to One and All!

^"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth 

peace and goodwill towards men."

"...And that's what Christmas is all about Charlie Brown."

 

 "A Charlie Brown Christmas" 

Thankful Sunday, December 23, 2018

I am thankful for childhood 
Christmas memories.

Our Christmas socks hung on our steps
 since we didn't have a fireplace.

As we have been going through some of the Christmas decorations from my mother's house, I've been thinking about Christmastime when I was a child. Christmas was a magical then. The anticipation of Christmas was very exciting and the whole idea of Santa was so grand it was almost more than I could handle.

The excitement of the Christmas season began after Thanksgiving when the stores started to decorate and the Sears Wish Book came in the mail. I would study the catalog thinking about what I would ask Santa for. Santa was very busy so he didn't always make it to my town, but I would write him letters. When I did get to talk to him, I really did believe that his reindeer were parked behind the store although I never saw them.

Each year, I watched the evening news on Christmas Eve because they would report a strange object on their
radar that looked like a sled being pulled by flying reindeer. I did this every year even long after I knew the truth about Santa because that blip on the radar still held its enchantment.

After watching the news and knowing that Santa was on his way, my sisters and I would start preparing for bed. We would take the toaster and bread and butter with us upstairs so we could have breakfast in the morning without going down to the kitchen. We were not allowed downstairs, where the tree was, until my aunt and uncle arrived. As soon as we caught the first glance of their car, we would rush downstairs to see what Santa had brought. He always left one unwrapped present for each of us.

There is so much more to tell you about my childhood traditions and the wonderment of Christmas, but I don't have time for that now. But I will say that even though Christmas celebrations have changed over the years and my excitement has mellowed, I can still remember how I felt when I was six years old. And for that, I am thankful.

Christmas This and That

I wrapped most of these and I couldn't tell you what is in half of them. 

BTW, we don't put our presents under the tree until Christmas Eve. 

A practice that started with small children and curious cats.
The kids have grown up, but the cats are still curious and like to rip paper.

Christmas preparations are going well. Meaning, I'm not worrying about the details too much. For instance, I usually keep a careful list of of the gifts I have gotten and wrapped for people and try to make sure that the gifts are somewhat balanced between my kids. Not this year. I know I've gotten each of them a couple of things they needed, but I can't remember exactly what they were or if one is getting more than the other. It doesn't really matter, and since I wrapped them weeks ago, Christmas morning will be a lot more fun as I try to guess what's in the packages from me.

Also, I've opted for the easy things to cook and take to the different Christmas parties. Some brownies, red and green sprinkles, and some cupcake papers and we're good to go. Christmas dinner will be a little more complicated, but I'm still holding out for maybe going to the store to get some of it pre-made.





Our decorations are usually pretty simple. Here are a few of them.

We got this wreath for our front door last year and plan to use it for many years to come.  It's big enough, that it makes a statement from the street and it lights up.

Are any of you out there old enough to remember the reflectors that you had to put around the Christmas tree lights? We found a few in my mother's things and my sisters and I each took a couple for old times sake. Growing up, we spent a lot of time unscrewing light bulbs, putting on the reflectors, and then screwing the bulbs back in.

This little tree belonged to my grandmother and she used it for her Christmas tree many years.  I've always liked it as have my sisters. This year it lives at my house.

This little tree didn't belong to my parents, grandmother, or any other special person. I got the wooden ornaments on it last year on clearance and got the tree to hang them on this year on sale. The tree lights up and adds a nice touch to the living room. The picture doesn't capture it's charm.

We have some felt mice and a cat that we put on our tree every year that the kids made when they were little. We tell stories with them and they move around. This year we added two dogs that have my parents name on them that came from my mother's Christmas things. 

I hope all of you out there are having a little holiday fun with some This and That however big or small that is.

Until next time...

Thankful Sunday, December 16, 2018

I am thankful for my 

stainless steel mixing bowls.

We got a set of stainless steel mixing bowls for a wedding gift many years ago. They are still as good as new, and we use them daily. I was thankful when I got them, and I am even more thankful for them now.

Do you have something simple like my mixing bowls that is invaluable to you in the kitchen?

It shouldn't have been so hard

Note: This post is a little long. If you want the short version, here it is.  Our Christmas letter took longer to produce this year than normal. Read on if you are curious about details of this first world saga.

I have written a Christmas letter every year for the last 20 years and this year was no exception.
However, what should have a been a fairly simple process, did not turn out that way.

Sending out the letter is one of the early things we do for the Christmas season so I start thinking about it in November.  My thoughts are usually something like, "I need to work on the letter," but sometimes I come up with a clever idea for it. This wasn't one of those years, but I got it written all the same. And I got family pictures to include. So far, so good.

Then I checked around and found the best prices for making copies using stationery that I got on clearance last year after Christmas.  I got the letters copied and I was good to go. (BTW, I have found the local UPS store has the best copy prices in my area.)

And then the trouble began. First, I switched to address labels last year and had no problems printing them. But this year, for the first several tries, the addresses were everywhere but on the labels. Very frustrating, but eventually solved, when I found one more drop down menu that had a setting that I needed to change.The money I saved on the paper, I think disappeared with the address label fiasco.

But I powered on. I sat down with the printed letters to write personal notes to each person we were sending them to. About a dozen or two into them, I read the letter one more time to see what I had said and what I might want to say on that friend's note and found out that somewhere along the way a paragraph disappeared from the letter. ##$&*! I was not happy. I had already sealed the envelopes, so I just wrote on the back of them saying, "Alert: Copy error inside. #7 is missing. Oops!" I was tired and that was all I was willing to do.

I showed it to Ward the next day and he gently suggested, that since it was early, maybe we could fix it and recopy them. He was right. A few friends would have enjoyed the mistake, but most people would just be confused. So I started over.

I had various batches of leftover stationery from other years, so I decided I would print some of the letters at home. I fixed the mistake in the letter, adjusted the margins and after tests and samples, I started the printing. But things did not go well. The printer was acting up and so was I because of that. Ward came to help and even with his calm and knowledgeable advice, things were still a mess.  Because of hardware, software, and user errors only 4 out of 16 pages we were working on were good to use. I was ready to give up.

But I didn't. I began again looking for more holiday paper. That was easier said than done. Holiday letters are a dying breed, so many places that used to carry stationery for them don't anymore. However, I eventually found some. We adjusted the letter to the new paper, had it printed, and I began again getting them ready to mail. The notes were not as long as the first time and got smaller and smaller as I went along. But I finished.

In hindsight, perhaps we should not  have been trying to work on them when I was so tired and Ward was barely a day out from a surgery he had had.  He was on good pain meds and was still in the window where they tell you to not make any important decisions or sign any important papers. Who knew that could mean Christmas letters?

Anyway, they're all in the mail now and I've moved onto other things. But, golly. it shouldn't have been so hard.

Thankful Sunday, December 09, 2018

I am thankful sunrises.

Sunrises show up on my blog then and again, so you may have already figured out I enjoy them. This time of year, the sun rises around 6:30 am and I'm usually up to see it. The first thing I do each morning is look out the window to see what show the sky has for me. It's a routine, I'm really enjoying. So for the colorful sky each morning, I am thankful.

First light, yesterday

10 minutes later

Christmas Smiles

My mother, last Christmas

Tears flow easily these days. I miss my mother. I have always heard that the holidays are especially hard when you have lost someone, but I've never really experienced it like this. It's taken me by surprise because in my logical mind, I thought that I would be thinking about all of the special Christmas times I had with her and be sad. But logic is not necessarily at work here. It's not the Christmases I miss. I miss the emotional connection.

My mother had dementia and slowly left us over the years in many ways. It was discouraging and sad to watch, but no matter what her outward appearance was, I always felt a connection between us during my visits. Towards the end, she was usually quiet, often with a distant stare. But then I'd say something and there would be a little glint in her eye or a slight smile and I knew that she was communicating in the way that was available to her at that point in her life.  We were connecting and it made me happy. Before I experienced the last couple of years with my mother, I never would have thought that those difficult times would be the ones I missed the most. But for now, they are.

However life goes on no matter what the circumstances and this grief is not consuming my life. It's just a part of it. I am happily preparing for Christmas. I am ahead this year in many things and feeling more relaxed than normal. I am enjoying the Christmas lights and the Christmas music. I am having good times with my sisters and friends. Ward and I are having long talks and making fun plans.

With all of those things, I'm trying to live what my mother taught me up until the end of her life. She kept living even when it seemed to the outside world life wasn't worth it. So as I think of her little smiles, I smile, too. Through the tears.