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“Christmas! ‘Tis the season for kindling the fire of hospitality in the hall, the genial flame of charity in the heart.”

December 25, 2016

Merry Christmas!!

Last night was wonderful fun. We sat, chatted and had a drink or two in the living room bright with colored lights from the tree, the window candles, and some lit branches by the fireplace. We moved to the dining room for food and gingerbread house construction. We noshed on an antipasto, a platter filled with meat and cheese from the Italian cheese shop, dates, cashews and mustard, including a caramelized fig sauce, hot corn dip, and bruschetta. We forgot about dessert so we’ll have it today. I made cookies and a chocolate cream pie.

We started construction on our houses. All conversation ceased. First we put up the walls then the roof then we decorated. I bought houses from a different company, and we were very pleased. The frosting tasted good which was perfect considering how much we had on our hands and how much we had transferred to things like phones and glasses. When we opened the gingerbread package, we could smell the ginger. It was divine, like being in a bakery filled with the aroma of cookies in the oven. The frosting was in a pouch, and it was so easy to be creative by squeezing the pouch to cover the roof with snow. I even squeezed swag designs on the back and front of the house. The candies were all colors. A gingerbread boy and a gingerbread girl were the finishing touches.

This morning I didn’t wake up until 10 given I was up until 3. I turned on the tree lights, made coffee and gathered my gifts from my sisters. The boxes were filled with the best gifts. One sister found the ugliest felt Christmas tree. She knows I love old, ugly decorations. The tree is already on the dining room table. She also gave me a wire bucket with peeling paint I recognized as one for quahogs or oysters and a gift certificate to iTunes. I love all the gifts. Gracie got the most beautiful dog biscuits which look more like frosted cookies than treats for a dog. My other sister too had all sorts of vintage stuff she’d found for me. She also gave me so much more including earrings because I whined that I give them but never get them, a new shirt, a red and white one I’m wearing today, Starbucks Christmas coffee, two pounds of it, and many more gifts including a gift certificate to Rings, the grocery store which gets so much of my money. I am thrilled with my presents.

In a while, I’m going to my friends’ for dinner and more presents. I love getting to watch them open the stocking stuffers I found. Some are quirky, some funny, some a bit strange and some perfectly wonderful.

Christmas is a day to be cherished and celebrated. I wish you all the happiness and joy today brings.

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“Fine old Christmas, with the snowy hair and ruddy face, had done his duty that year in the noblest fashion, and had set off his rich gifts of warmth and color with all the heightening contrast of frost and snow.”

December 16, 2016

Outside looks lovely from the window. I see sun, a blue sky, and only a slight breeze, but all of those are deceiving. Cold, freezing cold, is today’s weather. Wear layers is what we’re being told. I’m thinking 6 or 7 layers may not be enough. It is 14˚, and today’s high will be 19˚. Tomorrow and Sunday will be warm but rainy. It could reach 60˚ on Sunday. Mother Nature is indecisive.

My house is mostly decorated. The tree could use a few more ornaments so I’ll add that to my to-do list. My fake scrub pine has a dead set of lights so I’ll have to replace it. Friends are coming to dinner. The menu is set but I need to get dessert and some cheese. I have sort of a casual flow chart on cooking the meal. We’re having pork tenderloin, honeyed carrots and baby potatoes with romano cheese.

My family calls it the Christmas bug. It all started with my grandmother, the one who had eight kids. My mother, my Aunt Bunny and my Uncle Jack were bitten. Their houses were filled with Christmas. They baked and they kept baking. They loved to shop for presents. They always chose the best gifts. Many of my cousins were also bitten, as was I and my two sisters. We love all the hoopla of Christmas and traditions teem. The gingerbread house construction started 33 years ago and has now passed to a second generation. Pinatas, too, are on a second generation. I used to fill them for my niece and two nephews, and now,  their kids can’t wait for Christmas Eve and pinata whacking. Five pinatas hang from the high railing on the second floor.

When I was a kid, my mother’s kitchen always had steamed windows when she was cooking. It was a small kitchen, almost a galley kitchen. The table was by the window. It had four chairs, just enough for my parents and my brother and me. My sister was a baby in a highchair. I can still recall images of that house, one side of a duplex. The stairs had a landing where I used to sit and color or read. Upstairs was the bathroom and two bedrooms. This house had gotten too small with the birth of my sister, and we would be moving soon but only down the street. I don’t even remember moving.

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“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.”

December 24, 2014

It’s raining, and it’s 50˚, but none of that matters. It’s Christmas Eve. When I was a kid, it was the longest day of the year. The clock never seemed to move. I remember begging my mother to let me go to bed around six or seven. Tired had nothing to do with it. I was filled with anticipation, and I remember believing sleeping the night away was the quickest way to get to morning and to Santa’s surprises. It, of course, was always the one night I could never get to sleep. I remember having conversations with my brother down the hall while both of us were still in bed in our own rooms. Periodically my mother would yell up the stairs for us to stop talking so we could go to sleep. I used to wonder why she didn’t realize sleep was far away on Christmas Eve. Hers was a silly request.

Every year my mother put a few presents under the tree. Every year my sister Moe poked tiny holes in each present to see what was there. It was during these hole poking days she developed an aptitude for guessing exactly what each wrapped present was. Holes were no longer necessary. One Christmas is legendary. She was going to a Christmas party with Rod, my brother-in-law, and had nothing to wear. She felt a few presents from my parents and found her outfit, felt a few more and found new earrings to match her dress. She called to thank my mother who then became the tale bearer of my sister’s latest Christmas miracle.

We could open one present on Christmas Eve, but we never got to pick the present. We always had to open the pajamas. New pajamas were part of our Christmas tradition.

I can still see the tree at 16 Washington Ave. in its usual corner with the wrapped gifts underneath, the ones from my parents and grandparents, the ones with the tiny holes. The lights in the windows seemed especially brilliant on Christmas Eve. TV Santa, the one from New Hampshire we watched every afternoon, wished us a Merry Christmas, waved and left for his big adventure around the world. We hung our stockings on the railing going upstairs. We had no chimney. We watched a Christmas show or two on TV then we went to bed. Eons later we all fell asleep.

Today is still all about tradition. This morning I opened number 24 on my Advent calendar. It is the crèche scene, the same as it always is. This afternoon I will work on tomorrow’s dinner, and tonight my friends and I will build gingerbread houses, eat some appies and have a drink or two. That’s one of our favorite Christmas traditions.

Happy Christmas Eve! I hope you’re all on the good list.

Categories: Musings
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