Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to Everyone

Love came down at Christmas,

Love all lovely, Love Divine;

Love was born at Christmas,

Star and Angels gave the sign.
Worship we the Godhead,

Love Incarnate, Love Divine;

Worship we our Jesus:

But wherewith for sacred sign?
Love shall be our token,

Love be yours and love be mine,

Love to God and all men,

Love for plea and gift and sign.

(Christina Rossetti)

Skipping Christmas

A few years ago I read a book by John Grisham which was a good diversion from his heavy legal bound usual writings, Skipping Christmas. In a good way that book made me cringe. Why? Because I suspect that we have all been there at Christmas time. The stress of the planning, the cost of it all. So as we have all thought at times, the characters in this book decide to escape and instead of spending all their hard earned money on gifts and food they want to escape on a cruise. The cringe moments come when the whole street is decorating their houses and theirs is the only one without so much as a bit of tinsel. It is typical of how we are always looking at what the neighbours are doing and what they will think if we don’t celebrate Christmas the traditional way. The pressure is piled on to them to conform and as the stress levels increase, the scenes become more hilarious. All in all an enjoyable book.

I have been thinking about this possibility every year since. And every year I feel like a modern Scrooge. But my point is that the older I get the more I realize that the true spirit of Christmas is dead and buried. How many kids (not to mention adults) around the world know why we are celebrating Christmas, what is its real meaning? Very few. And how much do we really do for fun and enthusiasm or just because we are supposed to go along with it? I wish I could be strong enough and say no, this year there is no usual Christmas, we send the money for presents to Oxfam or Unicef, we eat what we usually eat all over the year and we don't get stuffed with turkey, chocolate, booze watching Coronation Street Christmas special....But I know it won't be like that. I’m weak and tired and on my own on this …and I will succumb to it again and again…Humbug!

No time

(My daughter's decorations made with felt and other recycled materials)

No time for anything. Time has passed so quickly from the beginning of autumn and now we are almost at the end of the year. I would have like to shared a lot more things with you before Christmas, but tomorrow (actually today! HELP!) I'm leaving for Italy and I realize there is no time left. The snow has caught me unprepared today and hopefully we will manage to get to the airport and catch our flight tomorrow (or today, whatever!) on time. I wish you all of you a wonderful Christmas together with your families and friends. I won't wish you a Happy New Year yet as I will be back home before then. All the best. Ciao.

It's Up!

Our Christmas Tree is finally up! It took me and my daughter half a day last Saturday but we managed to sort it out. It is usually down to my daughter and my dad to put up the Christmas Tree together, but this year my mum and dad are coming over from Italy a bit later than usual so Vicky and I decided to do it ourselves. To tell the truth, she did most of the work herself as she remembered exactly what her granddad did in the past. Our tree is a synthetic one and a bit “strange” as you had to insert the single branches one by one inside the main post and all the layers have different length. Anyway my only task was to pass on the branches to her and towards the end send her out of the room whilst I was trying to untangles the lights and set them up (not an easy task, I can assure you!). I did so because I knew I was going to swear badly and I don’t want that poor 9-year old to listen to my profanities…

Vicky even managed to set up the Nativity scene on her own, and although I tried to convince her that Baby Jesus arrives on Christmas night and the Three Kings on the 6h January, she decided to put all the figurines at the same time.

This is the extent of our Christmas decorations for this year!

Thanks to Sugar of SUGAR SHACK for the beautiful tag!