Call me crazy, but I'm not very sad to see this past year go. It hasn't been the easiest for many people I love. I'm ready for some new energy. More positivity. A renewed focus on things that are important to me. You know, all that comes with beginning a new year.
So here it is. My manifesto for 2012. I'm not big on the word 'resolution', only because it seems when you make them, you're so over them by February. I want to think forward to the entire year and what I want out of it. The things on my manifesto will help me get there.
I'm sure I could have come up with other things if my head wasn't still full from this bug. That said, I will add to and take away as I see fit.
What about you? Got any dreams, goals, resolutions? Got a manifesto? I'd love to know. It may help me see that I've missed things on mind, and as I mentioned, it's a work in progress.
Have a wonderful New Year's Eve and thank you so much for spending time with me this year. It means a lot.
Our New Year's Eve plans are simple. We're hanging with the neighborhoodlums. Well, some of them. We'll be heading to Sandee and Gerry's - a big two houses away- to start the night singing around the piano. The other neighborhoodlums are off to parties while Sandee, Gerry, Gar and I are hanging close to home.
After the piano session we'll probably end up here for more singing and some dancing to You Tube. We usually get the party basket down from the attic and find something silly - like masks and tinsel- to put on. There are also noise makers, but if there weren't we'd just use the pots and pans. Anything to make a little hoopla.
It's fun bopping around the neighborhood. One year we even wheeled a keg around in a wheelbarrow from house to house in a blinding snow storm. That's just how we roll 'round these parts.
I don't think we'll have a blinding snowstorm or a keg this year, but I'm sure we'll find a way to raise a little hell.
It's what we do best.
How about you?
Freeform Friday
Let me just be perfectly clear. Our dancing tomorrow night, will not look anything like this. However, we may pretend that it does. Click here if you are receiving by e-mail.
Have a great Friday and Happy New Year, a little early. Don't forget to kick up your heels!
Hi all. Sorry I've been scarce, I've had a rotten bug since before Christmas and it just won't give up the ghost.
Despite feeling lousy, I had a great holiday. I hope you did as well.
Thursday night, the neighborhoodlums stopped by.
Joanie brought Lucan a chewable Christmas card. Sandee and Gerry baked their yearly 'Coogans'........cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning. Joanie and Tom gave us a new pine bench (see it on the left?) Tom made with native wood he milled himself. It's awesome.
Missed getting a picture of Gerry, but he was here.
Gar was nice enough to help me with our Christmas baking so it was ready to give out when they stopped by (more on that in another post).
Christmas Eve we were off to sister Gloria's, as was the whole famn-damily.
Great nephew Cayd had tupperware on his list to Santa. We were happy to oblige with a big bin full of the stuff.
While he was busy getting the Santa hat he wanted out of one of the tupperware containers, great niece Sophia danced up a storm with Glo's lifesize singing and dancing Santa with help from Auntie Cait. She didn't stop all night. She just kept dancing, and dancing and dancing.
Once Cayd got his new Santa hat out of the tupperware, he gave out some Christmas lovin'.
Our family friend Donna and niece Nicole chatted in the kitchen.
Niece Maddie got a great travel bag from Grammy and Grampy. I had my eye on it.
However, I had my own presents to open. Please excuse the same sweater and shirt I've had on in every picture since November. I really do have other clothes. Feeling as lousy as I did, it was all about comfort Christmas Eve.
Some of the girls were styling and smiling.
Nephew Pat was happy to get a Kittery Trading Post shirt from Grammy and Grampy. Now he's officially one of the big boys. Right Pat?
Niece Maddie made Grammy mittens she upcycled from a sweater! Awesome!
Cayd was still busy with his Bin O'Tupperware.
He was enthralled by the sandwich bags that were in the bin and were also on his list. He was pretty psyched about the spatula too. Funny stuff.
He took a break to help Great Grammy and Great Grampy open their big gift from the gang......a brick. I know, it doesn't sound exciting, but it was.
It was a replica of the brick with their name on it, that is now part of Fenway Park! Even the Yankees fans present (me and Gar and brother Mike) liked this one.
Though I may have been even happier with my new Stanley Cup Champions Bruins Winter Hat. I know, I'm ever the Fashion Plate.
Got a picture of Mom before she got me. Take that!
Nephew Pat horned in on his niece Sophia's 'dancin' with Santa' territory.
As we left Briar Road, it started to flurry. Perfect timing just in time for Christmas.
It continued on and off the next morning.
We enjoyed our annual Christmas Mimosas as we opened our presents and stockings. Again, please keep in mind I was not a well girl and it shows.
I spent the rest of the day pretty much under the afghan on the couch, cozy by the fire. Not a bad place to be.
All in all, another wonderful Christmas gone by. I hope yours was as nice.
One of my favorite traditions is reading the reprint of one of the most famous editorial's ever written, which our local paper prints each year in their Christmas edition. I love sitting with the paper on Christmas morning, if only for a moment, among discarded wrapping paper, to read this:
By Francis P. Church, first published in The New York Sun in 1897. [See The People’s Almanac, pp. 1358–9.]
We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Sun:
Dear Editor—
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O’Hanlon
Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.
You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.
No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
About the Exchange
Francis P. Church’s editorial, “Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus” was an immediate sensation, and went on to became one of the most famous editorials ever written. It first appeared in the The New York Sun in 1897, almost a hundred years ago, and was reprinted annually until 1949 when the paper went out of business.
Thirty-six years after her letter was printed, Virginia O’Hanlon recalled the events that prompted her letter:
“Quite naturally I believed in Santa Claus, for he had never disappointed me. But when less fortunate little boys and girls said there wasn’t any Santa Claus, I was filled with doubts. I asked my father, and he was a little evasive on the subject.
“It was a habit in our family that whenever any doubts came up as to how to pronounce a word or some question of historical fact was in doubt, we wrote to the Question and Answer column in The Sun. Father would always say, ‘If you see it in the The Sun, it’s so,’ and that settled the matter.
“ ‘Well, I’m just going to write The Sun and find out the real truth,’ I said to father.
“He said, ‘Go ahead, Virginia. I’m sure The Sun will give you the right answer, as it always does.’ ”
And so Virginia sat down and wrote her parents’ favorite newspaper.
Her letter found its way into the hands of a veteran editor, Francis P. Church. Son of a Baptist minister, Church had covered the Civil War for The New York Times and had worked on the The New York Sun for 20 years, more recently as an anonymous editorial writer. Church, a sardonic man, had for his personal motto, “Endeavour to clear your mind of cant.” When controversal subjects had to be tackled on the editorial page, especially those dealing with theology, the assignments were usually given to Church.
Now, he had in his hands a little girl’s letter on a most controversial matter, and he was burdened with the responsibility of answering it.
“Is there a Santa Claus?” the childish scrawl in the letter asked. At once, Church knew that there was no avoiding the question. He must answer, and he must answer truthfully. And so he turned to his desk, and he began his reply which was to become one of the most memorable editorials in newspaper history.
Church married shortly after the editorial appeared. He died in April, 1906, leaving no children.
Virginia O’Hanlon went on to graduate from Hunter College with a Bachelor of Arts degree at age 21. The following year she received her Master’s from Columbia, and in 1912 she began teaching in the New York City school system, later becoming a principal. After 47 years, she retired as an educator. Throughout her life she received a steady stream of mail about her Santa Claus letter, and to each reply she attached an attractive printed copy of the Church editorial. Virginia O’Hanlon Douglas died on May 13, 1971, at the age of 81, in a nursing home in Valatie, N.Y.
*********************************
Thank you Virginia, for asking the question and thank you Mr. Church for answering, truthfully.
Yes, Virginia,There Is A Santa Claus.
In case I'm I caught up in all the Christmas hoopla or on the couch under the afghan (Gar gave me the gift that keeps giving......a rotten bugger of a cold), I want to wish you all the Merriest of Christmases and the Happiest New Year filled with love, laughter, health, and happiness. You've all made my year a little brighter and for that, I thank you.
Freeform Friday
More Christmas sentiment from my favorite Christmas movie, The Bishop's Wife. I've said it before, and I'm just throwing it out there again, if you haven't seen it.......rent it, buy it, just find a way to watch it. Classic.
If you're reading by email, click here to view.
Crazy, busy holiday hustle bustle kind of day. So I thought I'd just recap some of the color in our house this Christmas. This is just a taste.
Holly on what I call my 'window alter'. It's in front of me when I stand at the kitchen sink. It has wish bones, a glass from my Gram, a picture of my Great Grandmother and a beautiful wood cutting board that serves as the altar that was made by my friend's son. I think, dream, pray and wish when looking at it.
It's all topped off with a little holly right now.
My 'original' stocking from childhood. It's the only one up right now. I love it's little jingle bells.
My snowman colletion overflows to the beautiful cabinet my Dad made for me. It alsohas my holidy tea pots.
I know I've shown you this before, but I really love the vintage ornament tree my mom gave me last year as she whittled her own colletion.
OK. My 'white' mantel also includes shades of silver and gold. I also threw some pinecones in for good measure. They do have white sap on them, does that count?
This mantel has been in the works for a couple of weeks. One thing was holding me up. I wanted some lengths of birch for one of my Waterford vases. Well, Gar brought me some great birch home last night and lo and behold, they were too heavy for the vase. It was not to be.
Regardless, the mantl is done. As I mentioned before, it's quite different from what I usually do and all in all, I am pleased with how it looks.
I put my crystal to work and counted it as 'white'. Hey, it's close enough.
Then searched around the house for any little things I had that were shades of white and would fit on our little mantle. I even incorporated some of my vintage jewelry and decked out the crystal with it. Perhaps a tad over the top, but I decided not at the holidays.
This morning I crafted cream colored paper roses to put in the vase where I'd hoped the birch would go. On that note, I wedged the birch up under the mantel and love it there. I also spray painted some branches white which came out very pretty.
So, here it is. Our Christmas mantel.
Keep in mind that our stove is a workhorse, so if there is any dirt, that's why.
Now, looking at the mantel head on, it seems like it might need a little height on the right side. What you can't see is the bookcase next to it that has plenty of height to balance both sides of the mantel out.
I'm happy with the way it turned out in the end, and it is a nice change.The crystal really looks pretty with light reflecting off of it. I'm not sure why I didn't think of this before.
Do you have a mantel that you decorate? Do you have a certain theme you always go with or do you change it up every year?
Have a great Tuesday, and for those already celebrating holidays- enjoy,
PS- excuse my mis-spelling of the mantel in the pictures ---whoops.
Since I featured things I found at the most recent Gotta Have It shop link up party, I thought I better do the same for the bloggers who posted to the Gotta Blog It link up party.
Here's some of the things I overheard at the blog party.
This is not what the cabinet looked like when she found it. This is what it looked like after Traci got her hands on it. Applause, applause.
Traci also just opened up a new shop called The Dented Lampshade. Cute, huh? See the sweet rosette lampshade? Traci did a post on making that shade too awhile back. Take a look.
Bethany, from Still In St. Louis, rocked this totally romantic and lovely side swept up-do in her most recent 'What I Wore' post.
The love bows. Nice touch.
Very pretty Bethany.
Need wrapping ideas? Check out Laura's post on wrapping up the holidays on her blog, Cubits Organic Living.
How cute is the chickadee?
Jess, at Stuck In A Zoo, just did a post on some quotes that are worth remembering.
If you think your head is spinning, try to be Courtney Jo at The Everything Soap Blog for a day. Soap is not the only thing on her to do list everyday. Yup. That's right........
........Courtney Jo and her husband Jaime are raising twin toddlin' boys. Sounds like double trouble to me.
I just love checking the parties out. There is so much to find and so many people to meet.
Thanks to all who linked up this time around.
Good News and Some More Blogs
Tami, from High Street Cottage stopped by the Muse today to let me know that I was one of the winners of her giveaway and that I won the prettiest toile Flora Doora, made by Jane. Yippee!!
I featured one of Jane's Flora Doora bags before on the Muse and am so happy to know that one will soon adorn our home. Plus, I love birds and toile! Jane lines each bag with waterproof material, so that you can actually keep your flowers watered and fresh. How nice to be able to hang fresh flowers on your door or wall. Such a great idea.
I think I may have found Amy's blog, Maison Decor through Tami at High Street Cottage. You just never know where someone's blog will lead you. Amy just unveiled her tree and it's so beautiful. So is her living room.
Doesn't Amy's picture get you in the spirit?
Have a wonderful Monday. I'm going to put some Christmas music on and work on my Christmas crafting.
Happy Hannukah, a day early, to those who will be celebrating this week. Enjoy your holidays!
