I Saw Mama Kissing Santa

IMG_20181214_115826 — Santa and the Mrs. by the tree

I have Christmas all over my house, even in the bathroom. No room left undecorated.

The woodland forest in the bathroom with it’s pine cone hedgehogs cuties.

While Christmas giving has gone way overboard in some cases and in my belief the true meaning for Christmas revolves around Christ’s love for us, there is the fun side and history surrounding the fat guy in the red suit. So today’s fun story is about good ole Santa.

According to history, in 280 AD they was a young man born to a well off family. They lived in Patara, Asia Minor now known as Turkey. His name was Nicholas. While he was still a young man, his parents died and left him quite rich. But Nicholas was a gentle soul and was aware of those less fortunate than he. So he would secretly give gifts to those in need. Now in research I was uncertain if he was a monk or later became a monk but regardless he was christened as St. Nicholas and was favored by children and sailors. Not sure how all that happened but he was prayed to for safe journeys on the seas with many legends and stories of his help and appearances.

During the 16th century in Northern Europe the stories, legends and traditions became unpopular but they still wanted a deliverer by which presents came at Christmas. So the UK came up with Father Christmas or Old man Christmas and France had Pere Noel. Other countries like Austria and Germany had Christkind which was a baby with golden hair and wings that represented the baby Jesus. Early settlers in the US used the Christkind idea but revised the name to Kris Kringle. Later Dutch settlers in the US combined the old stories of St. Nick with Kris Kringle and he became Sinter Klaas which later became what we now use as Santa Claus.

In the 19th century the poem The Night Before Christmas was written making him an elf with 8 tiny reindeer. Coca Cola has always had wonderful pictures of full size Santa on their cans. asanta coke

This is a very special time of year where good laughter, great love and cheer is spread to all. So in the Ho Ho Ho laughter of Santa I wish you the very happiest Christmas. And in the love of Christ of this wondrous season I wish you peace and good will. I have an ornament on my tree that shows even Santa shows a love and gentleness to baby Jesus.

IMG_20181118_144005 — Gentleness of Santa, Love of Christ

May you share the gentleness and love of both of these Christmas joys and share them with others through the gift of kindness, the best gift of all.

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Mischievous Ole Elf

OK, its time for some Christmas humor. Most everybody loves Christmas decorations, except for the Grinch and Scrooge. Hope you are not one of those ass I have been blasting my love of decorations here since November. For those who may not know, I am healing from foot surgery and am currently not able to walk. I don’t sit well without something to do and as much as I love the Hallmark channel, there is only so much of that I can watch. So I pulled out the possible Christmas projects and wreaths to see what I and the glue gun could come up with. Also for those who may not know I also am a face painting clown – real clown – not circus clown but Christian clown using this medium to help spread cheer and the love of Christ. I explain all of this so you can understand my mental age is …12… on a good day. It will help you appreciate where I came from on this project. I saw the cutest thing on Pinterest with a small wreath and the letter J and Y – to make a JOY wreath. I painted the J red and the Y green and the O is a straw wreath. The I saw a small house like my village houses and thought I could make a cute scene inside the O.

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So the plan was going great until assembly time. That’s when the mischievous Elf show up. This is what he did to my JOY wreath. I call it now “The Elf of No Help” wreath.

IMG_20181203_203321 — Thanks for the help Elf.

Combined with the beauty of Christmas lights, we must never forget the laughter and JOY of the season. Sorry for my beat up door – Mimi is very protective.

As you spread the JOY of Christmas, remember the kindness a hug can bring. The gentleness of love and kindness during his season can brighten anyone’s day.

November Thankful Challenge, Last Days

What a wonderful month this has been as I have shared on a few of the many many things I am thankful for during the month. It is important that we tie in thankfulness and gratitude for our many blessings like waking up today, being able to read this post, having friends we share with over the internet that are across the world. It is all so fascinating how very close we can be with a simple reach out. This month brought the (hopefully) final surgery on my feet. I have great hopes for being able to go walking in the spring and share the many beautiful things I see. But for now, we are healing and enjoying some down time with my fur baby who currently can not get close enough on the sofa while I try to type this message.

So lets finish up that challenge list but always remember daily the many blessing we are given from family, friends, life and God.

Nov 26 – I am so very thankful for my daughter who has been taking care of me why I recover. With all the snow we got over the weekend, she shoveled the driveway(with snow plow) but still…and she cleared off the sidewalks in the front.

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Nov 27 – I am thankful for the ability and understanding of the importance of helping others.

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Nov 28 – I am thankful that I can laugh and joke about myself as I age. Laughter is a strong medicine.

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Nov 29 – I am thankful for the people in my life that made me realize the most important decision I would ever make in my life – Accepting Jesus as my Savior. I could not have survived some of the things I have been through in my life with out His help.

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Nov 30 – I am thankful for someone suggesting this challenge to remind us all of the many things we need to be aware of that are gifts to be thankful for.

As I close off the challenge of my thankful November I remind everyone to be kind. I ran across this quote which I though was very appropriate from Mark Twain. He said –

“Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see.”

So I close in reminder saying of it’s the tiny things we do in life that can bring the greatest thankfulness and the brightest joy.

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Fun with Hymns

Did you know that hymns were written for specific occupations or needs? Or that hymns were written to help you get into heaven…quickly? I saw this list and it made me laugh as I hope it will bring a chuckle to you as well. We can’t be serious all the time and if we look at things from a different point of view, we can sometime see a smile across God’s face. He loves us, wants us to follow and love him and he wants us happy. After All he did create laughter. Enjoy! And I bet you can come up with others yourself.

Songs

And always remember to be kind. It will bring a smile as well.

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Three New Fun Ornaments, TPC

Tuesday’s Photo Challenge made me giggle as I just bought a trio of new ornaments for my “Fun Tree”. This tree has the quirky ornaments, the ornaments my children made over the year and then back filled with colored balls to reflects the light and love of the tree. This tree is located in my bedroom in a large bump out window. Perfect place for a tree.

IMG_20181113_095417 — Mermaid S’More at the top, Angel S’More in the Center and S’More with Reindeer

The S’More collection started when my kids were in high school and pranksters. My oldest gave me the first one and that started a trend where now I try to find a new one each year. This year I found 3 that I didn’t have that I liked. I think I now have over 30 of them and the fun tree is quickly becoming the S’More tree.

When we were told we could be humorous for today’s challenge, I could not resist. And remember humor like art is in the eye of the beholder.

And I close as I always do in reminding myself and others to always be kind. Today is World Kindness Day, so an extra reminder to be kind.

world kindness

Fun and Memories

Tomorrow is the big day and while I can still do nicknacks inside, the outside must be complete as I will not be able to traverse the front stoop. My style for Christmas decor is a mix between quirky cute and semi formal nice. So outside will be mostly fun. I wrapped concrete blocks in cute Christmas cloth added bows and solar lights and hope they can withstand the coming snow.

IMG_20181108_140824 — Frosty, Bing and Dasher

I have been waiting 2 years for this “fast growing” evergreen to get big enough to decorate. Its still small but I don’t care, it is now covered in solar lights. They are small enough where their weight should not hurt the limbs. Frosty is a bird feeder and filled with sunflower seeds. Bing is a penguin and of course everyone knows who Dasher is. His nose is not red so he can not be Rudolph. Both of these critters are solar lights that light up in the evening. Christmas should always be fun, something to help you create wonderful memories and enjoy the season. That may be why I do so much Christmas. If you missed my post yesterday and want to see the first posted tree, that is the most formal tree and is all white. It is located in the dining room and beneath it is my village. Check it out here if you wish. The tree that is in my bedroom is my fun tree.

IMG_20181108_154144 — The tree with Santa and Chris Moose

The angle at the top, my oldest son made when he was 3, in 1981, you do the math. Wow, where did time go.

Other things on this fun tree are other ornaments my children made over the years, fun ornament gifts from friends and quirky things I have found over the years. I am a big fan of the S’More ornaments. If you are not familiar as to what a S’more is, its a campfire treat with graham crackers, chocolate and marshmallows – way too sweet for me but I love the funny ornaments. I will post a few today and post some throughout the season. Do I have enough to last all season long, maybe not but I did find another bag today of ornaments I bought at the end of the season last year. So at least you can join in on my fun memory time.

IMG_20181108_154326 — My Patriotic Group

The Patriotic group has a S’more dressed up like the statue of liberty and an eagle carrying the American flag.

IMG_20181108_154255 — S’More and his snowman

IMG_20181108_154314 — Roasting a hot dog over a pine cone

And as I always share my thoughts on kindness, remember to always be kind.

More gallery of village buildings

IMG_20181105_142920 — Lawyer and Police Station

IMG_20181105_143039 — The Holiday Store and the Dress Shop

Its Beginning to Look…, #1 Liner Wed

Sometimes as adults we forget to have fun and enjoy the simple activities of fun shared with friends. That is a lot of what blogging and prompts for fun are. A chance to share with blogging friends around the world the things that we enjoy doing. That is what Linda G Hill has done for us to share with each other activities that make us smile using One Liner Wednesdays.

Back in 2000, a friend of mine and I decided to make our own village for Christmas. They were just beginning to get popular but were expensive. The craft stores has ceramic ones that were unpainted that fit more into our budget so we bought a few and spent time in the evenings enjoying each others company and painting houses and business for our own villages. Soon as we got one finished, we would go see what else they had and is was a fun filled summer of adult painting. Sharon even went to Florida to see her family and found a different ceramic store that had other version and brought more home. By the end of the summer we looked at each other and went oops…guess we had too much fun. We both had well over 50 houses and businesses…and no where to put anything that large. I also dated and numbered mine just to keep track of them.

It was such a fun summer of talking and sharing we did not pay attention to how many we actually did. It was “oh, look at this one and gotta have that one” and so on. I gave away several then realized the ones I gave away were houses and almost all I had left was business, so I quit giving them away and found a way to display them. I currently have 41. Here is a picture of the main village located on the dining room table with the 4.5′ white tree. However, there is the outskirts of town grouping in a different location where the country church, the Red Lion Inn and the new addition this year of a Christmas Tree farm and covered bridge. I will post closeups of the houses/businesses throughout the holidays.

IMG_20181107_085732 — Skeeterville Township

Remember as this is the holiday season of Thanksgiving to be thankful for all your blessings. And as I remind myself, always be kind. An act of kindness can bring ease not only to your hurting soul but to the receiver of that kindness as well.

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Gallery of Christmas Village

IMG_20181105_142905 — City Hall, the Clock Tower(also new) and The Library

IMG_20181105_142929 — The Fire Station including a fire truck