Tag Archives: Christmas

Another Christmas Tree

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Weekend after Thanksgiving–time to get a Christmas tree. Maybe it seems early to some, but we figure we might as well celebrate the season as long as we can. We went to Martel’s tree farm in Williston and cut a fine fir. It is worth visiting that tree farm just to get the view. It was a beautiful day so we saw snow on Mount Mansfield and Camel’s Hump and a long stretch of the Green Mountains. Lake Iroquois rippled in the breeze down the hill. And the smell of cut fir drifted over it all. We tied it to the car and hauled it over the town line.

We had to do some trimming to get it the right size. It was just a little too tall but we managed to make it work just right. The kids took a critical hand in trimming it so the bottom third is heavier with ornaments than the top two thirds. We strung lights–pink and blue and white and decked our humble halls with other delights, some made on the spot by the children who live here. They had a fine time of it. We hauled out the box of holiday CD’s and found the holiday tracks on Pandora internet radio and we made the transition to December with only a few bumps. Here is the before and after:

 

Fresh From the Hill

Decked Out for the Holidays

 

 

Christmas Tree Still Up

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January 9.  The Christmas tree is still standing.  Decorated no less.  That’s 42 days it has been indoors.  Dead no less.  It will come down this weekend, tomorrow or the next day.  So it will get at least 43 days of glory, dressed in the best we could offer–shiny glass and steel and plastic.  But it will be a fire hazard soon, if it ever wasn’t one.

Now we will have a little more space in the house.  And we will use a little less electricity.  But it has been nice to have around.  Maybe we can put something else in its place.  A basket of fruit?  A cardboard cutout of Chewbacca?  A bean bag chair?  Maybe a pile of attractive rocks?

Nah.  Let’s just get this thing out of here.  Come spring it will fertilize the blueberries.  No need to waste a perfectly good untrimmed Christmas tree, no?

Second Christmas

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We just came back from a trip down south, to Connecticut.  I grew up there and my parents and some siblings and other relatives live there, so we visited for our second Christmas.  Every year my parents host Christmas the weekend after the “real” Christmas.  This has several benefits:

1. Those of us with various family wings can worry less about the conflict of who to see.  In our house we have decided that Christmas Day we do not travel.  We stay at home, share gifts, have a fine dinner and play.  We do not, however, have to worry about a long drive, so Christmas Eve we can see my in-laws.

2. Those of us who work where there are no true holidays (my mother and brother work for a nursing home) can offer to work so someone else can take the day off.  This feels pretty good and is a great gift.

3. We can do things for others.  My sister, for example, volunteered at a homeless shelter on Christmas.

4. If we have procrastinated, and we have enough of a buffer, we can get some steals on post-holiday sales.

I admit that I have not taken advantage of this last one, but still, it could happen.

We had a good long day for our second Christmas.  It felt like a major bonus for our children who got more gifts from Santa and all their various relatives on my side of the family.  We ate together and laughed and had a generally grand time.  Three of my four siblings were there (the other lives on the west coast) so it was a full house.

But wait, there’s more.  On Sunday we made another full day of it.  We took the children to the museums in Springfield, Massachusetts, just over the state line.  Somehow we managed to hit it right and got to wander the science museum just before a puppet show began.  It was put on by a traveling performance group and was targeted at children.  It was a hit.  We had time to check out the Dr. Seuss sculptures (he was born and lived in Springfield) one more time before heading home.

We had some time before heading out to Friendly’s for dinner.  This was a treat for the children, really.  They got to eat french fries AND ice cream sundaes.  What could be better?  It was actually the same establishment where I had my first paycheck job (I had paper routes before that), flipping burgers and manning the frialator.  Ah, the times I remembered.

Then, the finale to the day, we went to the Connecticut Trolley Museum for their winter fest event.  The place was decked out in holiday lights, including lights across all the power poles on the trolley lines.  Four trolleys ran the out and back route, under the lights.  It looked like a tunnel of color in the darkness.  When they switched the power pole on top of the trolley to go from one direction to the other, we were all in the dark.  No one working said anything about this, at least not right away, so everyone was quiet.  It was peaceful, fitting for the season.

My son was a huge fan of the exhibit hall, where two trolleys are indoors and a dozen or so electric train and trolley sets zoom in their loops.  There were trains of all sizes and they were dressed in holiday garb.  One train looped through Santa’s village with elves and snow and workshops and all.  Sure, I was pretty into it as well.  And it was festive.  A woman with a guitar sang carols, lights decked the hall, and several Christmas trees glowed in the corners.  There were kids all about and everyone seemed to be having a blast.

Back home today, after a long drive, we have to settle into post-Christmas.  We have some things to put away, some things to assemble, and some things to recycle.  We have a task list for the rest of our holiday break, and some good friends on the way in a couple of days.  Lots to do, lots to enjoy, lots to think about.  Both Christmases were as good as they get.  And two is enough.

Santa in the House

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Evidence of the Fat Man's Presence

Evidence of the Fat Man's Presence

We had a classic Christmas here at our house. Our children were pumped up on treats and gifts. As it should be. Santa came in the night and did his thing. We all benefited from his visit.

The parents were awake (5:30) before the youngsters (6:00 for one, 7:00 for the other) and we got started early. Snow showers fell during the critical morning hours to lend to the air of Christmas, but it was warm enough for some icy outdoor play after lunch. In the afternoon, both my wife and I even managed to fit in a run on this not quite frozen day.

The kids opened gifts all morning. We tried to keep it going slowly. We did not stick to the one-at-a-time everyone-goes-in-turn method employed when I grew up. We will do that in time, but it just feels wrong to keep small children from enjoying the thrill of unwrapping.

By request, we had pizza for lunch. We had out usual dinner of mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce, peas and roasted maple butternut squash. That went down just fine. I realized that I did not have any candy until I had a half dozen M&M’s as I was making dinner. I did, however, have a vanilla Coke.

My daughter was so tuckered from going to bed late, rising early, and playing hard all day, that she was asleep by about 5:30. Her brother followed about an hour later. They couldn’t have had a better time. They don’t usually squabble, but had nary a disagreement all day.

Maybe we need to do this every day.

Waiting for Santa

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Cookies for Santa

Cookies for Santa

The wind blows.

The children are asleep.

All is ready.

Now we wait for Santa.

Singalong and Wrapped Stuff

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Last night we went to the town library for a singalong.  It was sporadically advertised and not on their web site, our usual source of programming information.  We did find out late yesterday afternoon that it was on, so we rallied the kids after dinner and headed over.

My daughter’s music teacher was the piano player.  She was friendly and good with the children and had, perhaps to the detriment of the event, a fine singing voice.  We used a songbook from 1960, still in use after four decades.  This particular songbook contained lots of songs for people who sing well.  Think The First Noel and We Three Kings.  We did sing Frosty the Snowman (not in the book) and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (also not in the book) and had a generally good time.

The children colored the pages left on the back table with crayons and markers.  They also offered snacks–cookies and punch.  Of course, the last thing our children needed was sweets.  Candy canes, chocolate, cookies at home.  They have been getting it all these days.  Bad parents, mostly, I suppose.  But they had some cookies, and so did I.  All the other kids did as well.

There were many children there.  They seemed to have fun.  We even checked out some new books while we were there.  Our previous books were overdue, as usual.  We had to use my wife’s libary card.  I couldn’t find my wallet before we left.  I looked and looked and I just figured I must have left it in jacket pocket or some such.  I didn’t find it last night.

This morning it showed up.  Our kids have been into pretending to wrap presents lately.  They have been wrapping everything they can get their hands on.  We recently had to impose a rule that they only wrap art that they make themselves.  Things kept going missing.  My wallet, despite the prohibition on wrapping objects that might have some value if hidden and unable to be found, was the latest object to disappear into the wrapping hole.

I was with-wallet today and used it when I took my son to the Hinesburg winter farmer’s market.  I only purchased two donuts, along with some squash.  I ate most of the donuts, maybe subconsciously to get back at him for hiding my wallet, but really more because, again, he has lots of sweets these days.  But then, maybe I do, too.

Dumb Question, Elvis

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On the album playing now, the collection of Elvis Christmas tunes we only listen to this time of year, The King asks us this question:

Oh why can’t every day be like Christmas?  Why can’t this feeling go on endlessly?

I know this isn’t a serious question.  It is a question that most would say requires no thoughtful response.  I, however, feel that a response to the master of the swinging hips is in order.  Why can’t every day be like Christmas?  I’ll tell you.

If every day were like Christmas we would, at least in the good old USA, all be broke.  How could you have a Christmas savings club if you only had 24 hours, instead of 364 days, to save?

If every day were like Christmas, we would have massive credit card debts and even more, if it is possible, UPOs* filling up our garages and basements and closets.  Who needs another snow globe or bottle of aftershave?  Who needs another gift basket of high quality and delicious and useful Vermont products?  Don’t we have enough sweaters?

If every day were like Christmas, retailers wouldn’t have the bump in sales that comes from the end of the year spending blitz.  How would they survive if they had to depend on regular sales for their unsustainable continuous growth?  But, you might say, wouldn’t Christmas every day mean huge sales every day?  I am afraid not, as we would hit our credit limits, even those of us with FICO scores of 770.

This feeling can’t go on endlessly because then we would be so nice to each other that we would learn, as a collective population, to care too much.  We could not afford to make sure everyone had decent health care, or heat in the winter, or enough to eat.  That would be too expensive.  Then again, it might mean that all of us started to see paying taxes as our duty as citizens of a free democracy.  That, however, would mean that the Republican Party would go belly up.  Think of the job losses.

If this feeling were to go on endlessly, we would be happier, would we not?  Therapists would go out of business.  Big Pharma would lose millions in sales.  Then again, if we stopped spending so much on Prozac and Ambien, maybe we could spend more on junk to wrap up.  We could afford all those tasty and well-crafted Vermont products.  But that, however, would mean a lot of stress on Vermonters who would have a difficult time keeping up with the demand.  They would need things like Prozac and Ambien to make it through.

Can you see the problem here?

Sorry, Elvis.  It just can’t be.

*Unnecessary Plastic Objects

Christmas Tree Erection

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The Saturday after Thanksgiving is the day we have gotten our Christmas tree in the past and we continued that tradition today.  We cut our own from Martel’s farm in Williston.  The place has an incredible view of the Green Mountains, Lake Iroquois and the town of Williston, so it is worth the trip just for that.  We got some help tying to the top of the car and drove slowly home.

This tree is tall and skinny, unlike the rotund jobbers of the past two years.  It is a long boy.  We stood it up and trimmed it this afternoon.  Christmas has arrived.  In a few days we start the advent calendars.  Now we just need some snow.  And it looks like tomorrow we will get some.  Snow day on Monday?

Before the Trimming

Before the Trimming

Avec Trimmings

Avec Trimmings