Today is mostly sunny. It is in the 40’s. Tonight will be cold. That’s the weather pattern. Last night it rained enough I could hear it on the roof. Meanwhile, Henry was banging on the dog door and opening it with his head. He wasn’t happy when the rain started.

When I was a kid, the Sears catalog was required reading this time of year. It was thick and heavy and filled with pictures of toys and games and almost anything a kid would want for Christmas. I used to circle what I wanted and put my name inside the circle so there would be no doubt as to who wanted that toy, but it seemed every time I pored through the book, my choices changed. I’d cross out the old ones and circle the new ones. I’d make my list for Santa and even provide the item numbers so they’d be no confusion. I never thought it was odd to connect Santa and the Sears catalog. I just assumed he knew.

We used to make ornaments for the tree. My mother would fill the middle of the kitchen table with all sorts of ornament making stuff like scraps of cloth, glue, sparkles, string, construction paper, pipe cleaners, crayons and styrofoam balls. One year I made an angel holding a book of carols. She had a pipe cleaner halo, pipe cleaner arms and string for hair. She was voted the ugliest ornament. I put her on the tree anyway.

I used to love to color. We had assorted crayons in cigar boxes. Seldom did we throw away a crayon so they were all different lengths. The labels were gone so the crayons were just blue and red and green instead of colors like cerulean, melon or sienna. We had Christmas coloring books. That was about the only time I used the white crayon. It was for the beard, the fur on Santa’s clothes and the snow, but you could hardly tell. I used to layer the white.

I love Christmas carols. I’m already playing them in the car. I never think it is too early. Christmas carols have a short season and deserve more attention. Our uke concerts this month are all Christmas. We dress accordingly in red. We wear Christmas fascinators and bring lots of noise makers, lots of bells. Our concerts are an adventure.

My dance card for the week is uke heavy: practice, a lesson, a little concert for a friend, and two regular concerts. I changed my uke strap to Christmas and have a pile of stuff to take with me. I’m ready to welcome the season, musically!