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As I write this, Christmas is here! The season we have been preparing for since Hallmark started showing Christmas movies in late October has finally arrived. The Arctic blast of cold also arrived. The weather here keeps us off balance. We blow hot and cold in the same week. Christmas comes either way.
I have had some wonderful Christmas adventures this past week without having to travel far.
One adventure was traveling to an antebellum home in Nanafalia to see it decorated for Christmas. Every room, even the bathrooms were all decked out.
It is a family affair to put all the decorations out, not to mention keeping the house clean all times for visitors. The house owners have help from their relatives to get it done.
There are two eighteen-wheeler trailers parked out back that hold the Christmas bounty all year around until it is needed inside. The whole house had a theme – The Night Before Christmas. A banner announcing it was in the entrance hall.
Each room had a little snippet of the poem on a blackboard in each room. Each room had a color-coordinated theme as well. We left there with visions of sugar plums dancing in our heads. It was beautiful and a positive trip full of joy. We enjoyed refreshments beforehand and afterwards with a friend, so it was a full evening.
The next spark of Christmas spirit was supplied by the Flying Bricks Christmas concert at the Civic Center. We attended the Merry Market there beforehand. I didn’t have room for one more holiday decoration, but I couldn’t resist a set of three little green wooden Christmas trees and a set of handmade earrings.
The music was delightful. I noticed one of the musicians who usually is dressed in black decked out in a red sequined dinner jacket. He is not usually a flashy sort of guy so I just thought he was taking Christmas very seriously.
It turns out he was the star performer in the grand finale, playing a bagpipe solo to Auld Lang Sine. I love bagpipes. It must be the Scottish in me. Hats off to Gene Clarke!
The next Christmas fete was a Ladies’ Tea at our church on Sunday afternoon. I found out I was an old lady when the young ladies of the church entertained us.
Each table was decorated with a themed tablescape. I love fancy tablescapes. The food was exceptional, too. It turns out that the younger generation knows just as well how to entertain fancy as their grandmothers did.
In fact, one grandmother’s Russian Tea recipe was served. The funniest thing that happened there to make our spirits bright was when one of the hostess’s two-year-old son ran up to the music player and turned it up full blast.
It scared him so bad he ran away and hid. His grandmother who was babysitting him while his mother entertained, said he had recently acquired a habit of doing that. This time the music machine was a professional model and when it rocked the house, he was greatly shocked.
His grandmother thought this might have actually broken him from doing this toddler trick.
The final thing that established my Christmas spirit was a late afternoon tea and a trip to see the locally famous light display out at a farm in the country.
I had heard about this display for years and had never been able to get there. One reason might have been that it was way out on a dirt road that I didn’t know about.
Our driver, who was familiar with the area, took a circumlocutious route to get there by turning onto a dirt road that was all muddy and wet from all the rain that was pelting down on us.
We slipped and slid, but made it there thanks to some excellent driving by our fearless leader. Her husband washes their car regularly, but I don’t think he was expecting the mud we brought home.
Now I am sitting here safe and cozy in my house listening to the rain pelt down outside. I am listening to Christmas music and sitting by the Christmas tree as I write.
I wish all of you Happy Holidays. I wish you to enjoy your holiday with family, friends, food and lots of Christmas movies. It’s time to enjoy it all because it will be gone before we know it!
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