Its Beginning to Look a lot like Christmas…

As you may have noticed, we have been a bit on the quiet side around these here parts. We have been doing a series of specials and sales through our newsletter these past few weeks and that has kept us just a bit busier than expected [btw, you really ought to sign up if you haven't already]. 

But also, we have been purposefully trying to slow down this holiday season and to not do as much so that we might enjoy the meaning and the wonder of this time of year. 

I have found that its much easier to say that than to do it, by the way! But we're working on it!

So I am happy to share that our home is now finally more or less decorated with some of my favorite little decorations. Plans are made and gifts are being wrapped. The kitchen is seeing more use than normal and the over seems to be on every day.

The tree has been up for a while and we finally put the angel on the top- this year it was Zack's turn and somehow we could never get him in the same room as the tree and at the same time remember that the angel was still sitting on the coffee table!

The kids have made some cookies and some gingerbread houses. There are grand plans to make a lot more tonite!

Each evening after everyone goes to sleep, I sit with a cup of my favorite vanilla and caramel tea [a wonderful Lipton tea blend available at Safeway] on the left side of my couch and I stare at our Christmas Tree. The kids decorated it mostly on their own this year… that's definitely a first around here and I can look at many of the ornaments and remember which one of them put it where it is.

There is something about the Christmas tree for me, glittery and soft and romantic and nostalgic and traditional and a symbol for everything else swirling around during this time of the year. It makes me smile or tear up depending on what it is that I am thinking of.  I know its just a tree with a bunch of stuff on it but it has come to represent so many different things, hasn't it?

I try to sit still and think through the day. Funny things my daughter said. A new quilt pattern completed or swatches decided on. A discussion that my hub and I have had. A project completed for January. A generous thing that one or other of my boys has done. A moment of quiet in the middle of the day.

And my wonder grows. 

My greatest wish for you this season is that you would be able to slow down and to reflect even just a little about what it is that you celebrate this time of the year. The meaning and significance behind it all. And that your wonder would grow. Even just a little.

Talk to you soon. Joanna