Joy to the World

Thought for the day: Hang onto your hat, hang onto your hope, and wind the clock, for tomorrow is another day. [E.B. White]

Well, it's Christmas. Doesn't feel like it... but it is. The house is very quiet, making it easier to hear the ever-present high-pitched monotone ringing in my ears. Both cats sit close beside me, the feeling of their warm bodies a reassuring reminder that I'm not entirely alone. Oh, I could've gone to Alabama to spend the Holidays with my son and his family... but I wanted to stay home. Really. I'm hanging in there pretty doggone well since my husband died five month ago today, but I'm not ready for any raucous celebrations just yet. I seek solace in the quiet... the normal. Not much in the way of decorations here this year. Our same-old, same-old wreath hangs at the front door, and bright red poinsettias sit atop the shelf above the fireplace and on the coffee table in the sunroom. Also on that fireplace shelf are two candles that I've had forever... one of a jolly waving Santa, and the other a snowman with a huge smile. My kissing Santa and Mrs. Claus salt-and-pepper shakers sit up there, too... and one other cheerful snowman figure. Next to the TV is a seated fabric Santa that my mother made years ago, and the hooked rug my father made is in the sunroom. That's it, but don't you dare feel sorry for me. I didn't want all of the trappings this year. No cards, no gifts, no twinkling lights. Just a peaceful day with a minimum of tears. I'm not exactly pretending that it isn't Christmas, but I don't want to be reminded any more than I am every other day that Mike isn't here. 

It seems I'm not the only one who skipped sending cards this year. Mike and I used to get a kazillion cards, but this year, there's only been a trickle. Which is fine. Better than fine, actually, because that makes me feel less guilty about not sending any myself. But holy moley! I got cards from some of YOU. People I've never met face-to-face, but whom I've grown to love, nonetheless. Thank you. Thank you for caring. Thank you for spurring me to sit down to write this message to all of you. I know you care, and that means so much to me. I care about you, too. It's been a hard year for all of us, but today is a day for joy. For hope. Next year, we can celebrate, hopefully, but for today, let's embrace hope. Hope that each day will be a little better than the day before and that normal is right around the corner. Don't despair. We'll get there. You and me. All of us. We'll get there.

One tiny bit of normal is the following post, one I've shared almost every year since I started this blog. It's... a tradition. That's what you guys told me. So fine, let's go with that tradition. It seems I can do quite well without decorations and presents, but who knew? It appears I don't wanta do without Louise...

************************************

Thought for the day: We don't stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing.

No telling how many years this wreath has graced our front door.

We never made a huge production out of outdoor decorations, but every year, our kids made the same grand proclamation after we cruised our decorated-out-the-wazoo neighborhood on the way home from the candlelight service on Christmas Eve.

"The best one of all!" they'd lie as we pulled into our driveway.

Okay, so maybe they weren't really lying through their braces. Maybe anticipation of the hidden presents awaiting inside added a certain luster to their perception of our decorations.

Anyhow, I'd say decorating styles can pretty much be divvied into three categories: traditional, enlightening, and inflated. Us? We're traditional. That means, except for an occasional new acquisition, I've pretty much used the same decorations every year. For a LOT of years. Like the ornaments that hung on my parents' tree when they were first married, some of which are now paper thin, and considerably faded with age. And a slew of decades-old goodies fashioned by our children with copious quantities of felt, glue and glitter, construction paper, walnut shells, clothespins, eyeglass lenses, and even a Mason jar lid. A black spider in a golden web and a huge decorated crab shell, both made by my sister-in-law. Boxes of tinsel painstakingly applied, strand by strand, and then painstakingly removed to store in a box for yet another year. Like I said, traditional. Well, to be more accurate, I suppose we've become more traditional cum lazy, because each year, I use less and less decorations, and some of them don't even make it down out of our attic anymore. This year, very few decorations found their way out of the storage boxes. (A RED tablecloth counts as a decoration, right???)

These carolers once belonged to my grandmother.

Everybody knows the enlightening type of decorator. They're the ones with so many lights blazing in their front yards, they risk causing a blackout across three states every time they turn 'em on. Very flashy. Sometimes, they even incorporate animation and music, too, and carloads of people stop by every night to ooh and aah over their winter wonderland. It isn't at all unusual for a competition of sorts to begin when multiple enlighteners live in close proximity. (Those neighborhoods can be seen from the space station.)

                                         We're more like the house on the right these days:

And then, there's the inflated. This is a fairly recent category. I sure don't remember seeing this sort of display when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can purchase just about any character you can think of ... inflate it ... and stick it on your front lawn. And if you can't find a particular character, for the right price, you can probably have someone make one for you. Then, all those characters can weave and bob all over your yard.

Now then, to the point of today's post. Time for a tale about a Christmas inflatable of an entirely different ilk. This story originated in 1999, and was alleged to be the winning entry to a Louisville Sentinel contest about the wildest Christmas dinner. Turns out, no such newspaper ever existed, and the writer remains unknown, but the story lives on, thanks to the good ol' Internet. (WARNING: Better put your drink down before you read it.) Now here, after a bit of minor editing on my part, is that story:

As a joke, my brother Jay used to hang a pair of pantyhose over his fireplace every Christmas Eve. He said the only thing he wanted was for Santa to fill them, but what they say about Santa checking his list twice must be true, because every Christmas morning, the other stockings would all be bulging with treats, but Jay's poor pitiful pantyhose were always left dangling as empty as ever.

So one year, I decided to make his dream come true. I put on sunglasses, a fake nose, and a ski cap, and went in search of an inflatable love doll.

Know what? They don't sell those things at Wal-Mart. I had to go to an adult bookstore. By the way, if you've never been in an X-rated store before, two words: don't go. You'll only confuse yourself. I was there for an hour saying things like, "What does this do?" "You're kidding me!" and  "Who would buy that?" 

So anyway, I finally made it to the inflatable doll section. I wanted to buy a standard, uncomplicated doll that could also substitute as a passenger in my truck so I could use the car pool lane, but finding what I wanted was difficult. Love dolls come in many different models. The top of the line, according to the side of the box, could do things I'd only seen in a book on animal husbandry, but I settled for the bottom of the price scale: Lovable Louise. To call her a doll required a huge leap of imagination.

On Christmas Eve, with the help of a bicycle pump, Louise came to life. My sister-in-law was in on the plan, and she let me in during the wee morning hours. Long after Santa had come and gone, I filled Jay's pantyhose with Louise's pliant legs and bottom. I also ate some cookies and drank what remained of a glass of milk on a nearby tray. Then I went home and giggled for a couple of hours.

The next morning, my brother called to say that Santa had been to his house and left a present that had made him VERY happy, but his poor dog was very confused. She would bark, start to walk away, then come back and bark some more. We agreed that Louise should remain in her pantyhose so the rest of the family could admire her when they came over for the traditional Christmas dinner.

My grandmother noticed Louise the moment she walked in the door. "What the hell is that?" she asked.

My brother quickly explained, "It's a doll."

"Who would play with something like that?" she snapped.

 I had several candidates in mind, but kept my mouth shut.

"Where are her clothes?" she continued.

"Boy, that turkey sure smells nice, Gran," Jay said, trying to steer her into the dining room.

 But Granny was relentless. "Why doesn't she have any teeth?"

Again, I could have answered, but why risk it? It was Christmas, and nobody wanted to spend it in the back of an ambulance saying, "Hang on, Granny, hang on!"

My grandfather, a delightful old man with poor eyesight, sidled up to me, waggled his eyebrows, and said, "Hey, who's the naked gal by the fireplace?"

I told him she was Jay's friend, and a few minutes later, noticed Grandpa standing by the mantel, talking to Louise. And not just talking. He was actually flirting. It was then we realized this might be Grandpa's last Christmas at home.

The dinner went well. We made the usual small talk about who had died, who was dying, and who should be killed, when suddenly Louise made a noise that sounded a lot like my father in the bathroom every morning. Then she lurched from the pantyhose, flew around the room twice, and fell in a heap in front of the sofa. The cat screamed. I passed cranberry sauce through my nose, and Grandpa ran across the room, fell to his knees, and began administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. My brother fell back over his chair and wet his pants, and Granny threw down her napkin and stomped outside to sit in the car.

It was indeed a Christmas to treasure and remember. Later in my brother's garage, we conducted a thorough examination to decide the cause of Louise's demise. We discovered that she'd suffered from an acute case of hot ember to the back of her right thigh. Fortunately, thanks to a wonder drug called duct tape, we restored her to perfect health.

After that, Louise went on to star in several bachelor party movies, and I'm pretty sure Grandpa still calls her whenever he can sneak out of the house.

                                                     *****************

             Merry Christmas! May all your dreams... no matter how inflated...  come true.

                           Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

                                                                As for 2020?

For Aaron

Thought for the day:  The most precious jewels that have ever been around my neck are the arms of my grandchildren.

Because I wrote the past few posts prior to the holidays, this is the first one written since the new year began, so Happy New Year, y'all!

We spent the Christmas holidays with our older son and his family, and it was fantastic, as always.

Have you ever baked cookies with four grandchildren and three dogs? Um, not that the dogs actually did any of the cookie-making or baking, but they were definitely a presence. To say it was a chaotic and joyful experience would be a gross understatement.

While we were there, the kids asked me which of them I loved the best, so I did what any grandma would do. I told each of them, "I love YOU best, because..." followed by a list of wonderful things that makes each of them special.

Reminded me a little of when a bunch of my cousins had a reunion a few years ago. An older cousin said she was the only one of all the grandchildren that Nana ever allowed to spend the night with her. Then the rest of us piped in about all the times WE'D spent the night. Nana had a LOT of grandchildren, but somehow, she managed to make each of us feel like her favorite. Was your grandmother the same way? What a wonderful talent to have.

During our visit, our eight-year old grandson Aaron asked me why I call Grandpop Smarticus. Turns out, he's been reading my blog. (!) (Which, of course, means he has impeccable taste. HA!) He lamented that when he Googled his siblings, he found links to my blog, but when he Googled his own name, he came up with a lot of pictures of some old guy with the same name. So this post is just for Aaron. By tagging it with his name, hopefully, he'll find himself when he does a Google search next time. Along with some fun pictures.

Check out all those curls! This is a pic of Aaron from Thanksgiving of 2012.

Also from Thanksgiving of 2012, here's a pic of our son with his whole crew. The children, from left to right, are Aaron, Jaiden, Devyn, and Kymber.

Aaron, in August of 2013. What a smile! He looks like a professional model, doesn't he?

The cutie crew, Christmas, 2012.

Also Christmas, 2012. Who can resist Devyn's smile? (I can't.)

First day of school, 2015.

July, 2015. We all went to the premiere viewing of Minions. (Loved it!) The cutie between cool cat Aaron in those snazzy sunglasses and his sister Kymber is their cousin McKenzie.

Christmas, 2015, and the Minions are still the best thing ever... both for Aaron and Grandpa Smarticus.

Christmas, 2015, and even Grandma has a pair of Minions softies. Smarticus and I are still big Minions fans, but alas, the kids have outgrown them. (Hmmm, not sure what that says about US...)





Now for some pictures from this Christmas...

Kymber & Devyn

When I asked Aaron to stand still so I could take his picture, he wanted to know if I was gonna put it on my blog. (Which gave me the idea to do this post for him...)

You've gotta love a gal who not only wears Elf pajamas, but happily poses in them so her goofy mother-in-law can take a picture.

Jaiden was thrilled to get a compound bow for Christmas.

Smarticus putting said bow together. (HA! And he thought his putting-stuff-together for Christmas days were over...)

Kymber was sooooo excited to get an adorable little hamster... and just a tiny bit apprehensive.

Leo and Troy were also very excited about the hamster. So was Stormy, but she was temporarily exiled for being a wee bit TOO excited. I'm sure it didn't mean a thing that Troy (the Huskie) kept licking his chops while observing the little critter...

Books written by two fellow bloggers provided great reading material for Aaron and Kymber.










Okay, y'all. Thanks for indulging me so I could make Aaron happy.


We saw the new year in with our friends in Tennessee. We stayed up waaaaay too late, but we had a terrific time. Lots of games, lots of laughter. The PERFECT way to end one year and begin another.

Before Christmas, I posted this cartoon on Facebook, which initiated some funny comments from our Tennessee pals, suggesting Smarticus and our buddy could maybe benefit from a similar air freshener...

I must say... the fresheners didn't work, but they did make for a great photo op...

So again, Happy New Year. Let's hope this year doesn't stink.










                                         Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

                                                          Grandparents are just antique kids.

Merry Christmas, Y'All!

Thought for the day:  North, south, east, or west, old traditions are the best.

Hi-ya! I hope you all have the merriest Christmas ... and happiest Hanukkah... ever. Lots of love and smiles from our house to yours.

Talking about smiles, it's time for me to share that old chestnut Christmas post with you again. What can I say? Don't wanta buck tradition. So with a few revisions, here ya go... again... (Oh, and if you're here because you're looking for my WEP post, you'll find it one post back.)

Traditions don't have to necessarily be classy, you know. Sometimes, they're just plain fun... or funny. Candlelight services on Christmas Eve, singing the Hallelujah Chorus with the church choir, and caroling with the neighbors... especially when it's snowing... those things are all both traditional and classy. This post? Not so much. But this is the eightth year I'm running it, so I think it has now officially become a tradition. Because I said so. And because I'm lazy it's just plain fun... and funny.


 So, here it is, my classic tale, although not exactly in the same category as Dickens, about (ahem)  inflated dreams... 

Enjoy.

****

Thought for the day: We don't stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing.

No telling how many years this wreath has graced our front door.

We never made a huge production out of outdoor decorations, but every year, our kids made the same grand proclamation after we cruised our decorated-out-the-wazoo neighborhood on the way home from the candlelight service on Christmas Eve.

"The best one of all!" they'd lie as we pulled into our driveway.

Okay, so maybe they weren't really lying through their braces. Maybe anticipation of the hidden presents awaiting inside added a certain luster to their perception of our decorations.

Anyhow, I'd say decorating styles can pretty much be divvied into three categories: traditional, enlightening, and inflated. Us? We're traditional. That means, except for an occasional new acquisition, I've pretty much used the same decorations every year. For a LOT of years. Like the ornaments that hung on my parents' tree when they were first married, some of which are now paper thin, and considerably faded with age. And a slew of decades-old goodies fashioned by our children with copious quantities of felt, glue and glitter, construction paper, walnut shells, clothespins, eyeglass lenses, and even a Mason jar lid. A black spider in a golden web and a huge decorated crab shell, both made by my sister-in-law. Boxes of tinsel painstakingly applied, strand by strand, and then painstakingly removed to store in a box for yet another year. Like I said, traditional. Well, to be more accurate, I suppose we've become more traditional cum lazy, because each year, I use less and less decorations, and some of them don't even make it down out of our attic anymore. This year, very few decorations found their way out of the storage boxes. (A RED tablecloth counts as a decoration, right???)

These carolers once belonged to my grandmother.

Everybody knows the enlightening type of decorator. They're the ones with so many lights blazing in their front yards, they risk causing a blackout across three states every time they turn 'em on. Very flashy. Sometimes, they even incorporate animation and music, too, and carloads of people stop by every night to ooh and aah over their winter wonderland. It isn't at all unusual for a competition of sorts to begin when multiple enlighteners live in close proximity. (Those neighborhoods can be seen from the space station.)

                                         We're more like the house on the right these days:

And then, there's the inflated. This is a fairly recent category. I sure don't remember seeing this sort of display when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can purchase just about any character you can think of ... inflate it ... and stick it on your front lawn. And if you can't find a particular character, for the right price, you can probably have someone make one for you. Then, all those characters can weave and bob all over your yard.

Now then, to the point of today's post. Time for a tale about a Christmas inflatable of an entirely different ilk. This story originated in 1999, and was alleged to be the winning entry to a Louisville Sentinel contest about the wildest Christmas dinner. Turns out, no such newspaper ever existed, and the writer remains unknown, but the story lives on, thanks to the good ol' Internet. (WARNING: Better put your drink down before you read it.) Now here, after a bit of minor editing on my part, is that story:

As a joke, my brother Jay used to hang a pair of pantyhose over his fireplace every Christmas Eve. He said the only thing he wanted was for Santa to fill them, but what they say about Santa checking his list twice must be true, because every Christmas morning, the other stockings would all be bulging with treats, but Jay's poor pitiful pantyhose were always left dangling as empty as ever.

So one year, I decided to make his dream come true. I put on sunglasses, a fake nose, and a ski cap, and went in search of an inflatable love doll.

Know what? They don't sell those things at Wal-Mart. I had to go to an adult bookstore. By the way, if you've never been in an X-rated store before, two words: don't go. You'll only confuse yourself. I was there for an hour saying things like, "What does this do?" "You're kidding me!" and  "Who would buy that?" 

So anyway, I finally made it to the inflatable doll section. I wanted to buy a standard, uncomplicated doll that could also substitute as a passenger in my truck so I could use the car pool lane, but finding what I wanted was difficult. Love dolls come in many different models. The top of the line, according to the side of the box, could do things I'd only seen in a book on animal husbandry, but I settled for the bottom of the price scale: Lovable Louise. To call her a doll required a huge leap of imagination.

On Christmas Eve, with the help of a bicycle pump, Louise came to life. My sister-in-law was in on the plan, and she let me in during the wee morning hours. Long after Santa had come and gone, I filled Jay's pantyhose with Louise's pliant legs and bottom. I also ate some cookies and drank what remained of a glass of milk on a nearby tray. Then I went home and giggled for a couple of hours.

The next morning, my brother called to say that Santa had been to his house and left a present that had made him VERY happy, but his poor dog was very confused. She would bark, start to walk away, then come back and bark some more. We agreed that Louise should remain in her pantyhose so the rest of the family could admire her when they came over for the traditional Christmas dinner.

My grandmother noticed Louise the moment she walked in the door. "What the hell is that?" she asked.

My brother quickly explained, "It's a doll."

"Who would play with something like that?" she snapped.

 I had several candidates in mind, but kept my mouth shut.

"Where are her clothes?" she continued.

"Boy, that turkey sure smells nice, Gran," Jay said, trying to steer her into the dining room.

 But Granny was relentless. "Why doesn't she have any teeth?"

Again, I could have answered, but why risk it? It was Christmas, and nobody wanted to spend it in the back of an ambulance saying, "Hang on, Granny, hang on!"

My grandfather, a delightful old man with poor eyesight, sidled up to me, waggled his eyebrows, and said, "Hey, who's the naked gal by the fireplace?"

I told him she was Jay's friend, and a few minutes later, noticed Grandpa standing by the mantel, talking to Louise. And not just talking. He was actually flirting. It was then we realized this might be Grandpa's last Christmas at home.

The dinner went well. We made the usual small talk about who had died, who was dying, and who should be killed, when suddenly Louise made a noise that sounded a lot like my father in the bathroom every morning. Then she lurched from the pantyhose, flew around the room twice, and fell in a heap in front of the sofa. The cat screamed. I passed cranberry sauce through my nose, and Grandpa ran across the room, fell to his knees, and began administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. My brother fell back over his chair and wet his pants, and Granny threw down her napkin, and stomped outside to sit in the car.

It was indeed a Christmas to treasure and remember. Later in my brother's garage, we conducted a thorough examination to decide the cause of Louise's collapse. We discovered that Louise had suffered from a hot ember to the back of her right thigh. Fortunately, thanks to a wonder drug called duct tape, we restored her to perfect health.

After that, Louise went on to star in several bachelor party movies, and I'm pretty sure Grandpa still calls her whenever he can get out of the house.

                                                     *****************

 Merry Christmas! May all your dreams... no matter how inflated...  come true.

Hanukkah is the festival of light that celebrates the triumph of light over darkness, of purity over adulteration, and spirituality over materialism. Whatever our religion or non-religion, these are all things worth celebrating, don't you think? Here's wishing you all much light... and love.

I'll be taking off the rest of the year, and will be back on January 2 for the IWSG post.

                              Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

WEP: A Christmas Miracle

Thought for the day: At Christmastime, anything is possible.

I enjoyed participating in the last WEP challenge so much, I decided to submit something for this one, too. Why not? It's fun!

As you can see, the theme this time around is ribbons and candles, and for lack of a more inspired title, I'll call my offering A Christmas Miracle.














                                               A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE

Ella’s eyes sparkled as she bounced in place, fairly vibrating with excitement. “Hurry UP, Nana! Open it!”

Gertrude shakily removed the last bit of wrapping paper, revealing a laminated bookmark decorated with enough gold and red glitter to fill a small bathtub. A gold cross shone at its top, and down its length, glittery red hearts alternated with equally glittery red letters that spelled L-O-V-E.

Ella clapped her hands. “Do you like it? Do you?”

 “Oh, my goodness!” Gertrude gushed, pressing one gnarled hand to her chest. “This is so beautiful a famous artist must have made it!”

“NO-O-O! It was me! I made it for you!” Ella giggled, her face more radiant than ever. “Now you can throw away that icky ribbon.”

Gertrude looked at the faded ribbon peeking out from the pages of her well-worn Bible on the table beside her. Then she patted Ella’s cheek. “I’ll happily use your bookmark in other books, sweetie, but my ribbon stays right where it is. That’s where it belongs.”

“But why?” Ella asked, her bottom lip trembling. “I thought you’d like something new and pretty.”

“Oh, I do like it, dear. I promise you I like it very much, but not for my Bible, because that ribbon is much more than just a ribbon.” With a smile, she whispered, “It’s a miracle.”

Ella sniffled. “It just looks like a dirty old ribbon to me.”

“Looks can be deceiving. Would you like to hear about it?’

The little girl nodded and climbed into her grandmother’s lap. “I like your stories.”

“Oh, but this one isn’t make-believe. It’s about something that happened a long time ago, when I wasn’t much older than you are now.” She tweaked Ella’s nose. “But I wasn’t nearly as cute as you.”

When Ella stopped squirming and giggling, Gertrude hugged her and continued. “It was just my parents, my younger brother and me back then, and we didn’t have much money, but we were happy. We had a roof over our heads, and we never went hungry. ‘Course, most of what we ate, we grew ourselves, and we rarely had meat, but we were fine. We had each other, and like I said, we were happy.”

Gertrude stroked Ella’s hair, a faraway look in her eyes. “Mama cooked a chicken on Thanksgiving, and after all these years, I still remember how good it was.” She closed her eyes and smiled. “The best meal I’ve ever eaten.”

“Why didn’t you have turkey? We always have turkey for Thanksgiving.”

Gertrude kissed the top of Ella’s head. “We didn’t have enough money, pumpkin. Hardly anyone did back then. Anyway, Papa lost his job a few days later, so we all knew it’d be an even simpler Christmas that year than usual, but Mama made me a new flour sack dress and told me I could have one small toy.”

Ella laughed. “NO-O-O! That’s silly! Nobody can wear a flour bag.”

Fabric flour sacks

Gertrude chuckled. “We sure did! Back then, flour bags were made of pretty fabrics, and lots of people used them to make clothes. The dress Mama made me was covered with tiny purple flowers. It was beautiful.”

Ella nodded her head solemnly, absorbing this new information. “What toy did you ask for?”

“I didn’t. I told my parents to get my brother two, because he was younger. But when I said my prayers on Christmas Eve, I asked God for a piece of purple ribbon to match my dress, so I could wear it in my hair when we went to church on Christmas. And Papa heard me.”

“So he got it for you?”

“He tried. Mama told me he walked all the way to town in a snowstorm and knocked at the door of every single store, but they were all closed. She said he was really sad when he got home.”

Ella kissed her grandmother’s cheek. “I’m sorry, Nana. So you didn’t get your ribbon until after Christmas?”

“Oh, no,” Gertrude said. “When I woke up on Christmas morning, it was lying on my pillow. One uncut piece of ribbon that was the same deep purple as the pansies I used to plant in my yard here every year. It was the perfect length to put in my hair, too, as though it had been created just for me.”

Wide-eyed, Ella gaped at her grandmother. “Where did it come from? Your mother?”

Gertrude shook her head. “No. She was just as surprised by the ribbon as my father was, and they both cried when they saw it.”

Ella gasped. “Elves?!”

“No, dear,” Gertrude said gently. “I believe God answered my prayer.”

Ella looked at her grandmother’s Bible with awe. “Wow,” she whispered. For once, the fidgety little girl sat perfectly still, as though deep in thought. Then she turned to her grandmother, her eyes aglow and an angelic smile on her face. “Think he’d give me a pony for Christmas?”

Gertrude laughed. “Do you think one will fit on your pillow?”

Ella giggled. “I was only kidding. Can I help you plant purple pansies next time?”

“Oh, I’m afraid my planting days are done, but thank you for offering. You’re a sweet child, Ella Bella.”

The little girl jumped down from her grandmother’s lap and faced her with hands planted firmly on her hips. “Then Mama and I will have to plant them for you!”

Tears sparkled in Gertrude’s eyes. “That isn’t necessary, sweetheart. I don’t need to see purple pansies to remember how beautiful my ribbon was. To remember the miracle.”

“But I do!” Ella insisted. “I want to plant purple pansies every single year until I’m old like you, so I never ever forget.”

Gertrude smiled at her beautiful thoughtful grandchild, every bit as much of a miracle as that piece of ribbon ever was. “Well then, Ella Bella, purple pansies we shall have.”

                                                              ******************

                                              May all your Christmas dreams come true.
                                    Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

P.S. This story was inspired by a lovely old song called Scarlet Ribbons. 

Wishing Y'all Lots of Love and Smiles

Thought for the day:  North, south, east, or west, old traditions are the best.

Hi-ya! I hope you all have the merriest Christmas ... and happiest Hanukkah... ever. Lots of love and smiles from our house to yours.

Talking about smiles, it's time for me to share that old chestnut Christmas post with you again. What can I say? Don't wanta buck tradition. So with a few revisions, here ya go... again...

Traditions don't have to necessarily be classy, you know. Sometimes, they're just plain fun... or funny. Candlelight services on Christmas Eve, singing the Hallelujah Chorus with the church choir, and caroling with the neighbors... especially when it's snowing... those things are all both traditional and classy. This post? Not so much. But this is the seventh year I'm running it, so I think it has now officially become a tradition. Because I said so. And because I'm lazy it's just plain fun... and funny.


 So, here it is, my classic tale, although not exactly in the same category as Dickens, about (ahem)  inflated dreams... 

Enjoy.

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Thought for the day: We don't stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing.

No telling how many years this wreath has graced our front door.

We never made a huge production out of outdoor decorations, but every year, our kids made the same grand proclamation after we cruised our decorated-out-the-wazoo neighborhood on the way home from the candlelight service on Christmas Eve.

"The best one of all!" they'd lie as we pulled into our driveway.

Okay, so maybe they weren't really lying through their braces. Maybe anticipation of the hidden presents awaiting inside added a certain luster to their perception of our decorations.

Anyhow, I'd say decorating styles can pretty much be divvied into three categories: traditional, enlightening, and inflated. Us? We're traditional. That means, except for an occasional new acquisition, I've pretty much used the same decorations every year. For a LOT of years. Like the ornaments that hung on my parents' tree when they were first married, some of which are now paper thin, and considerably faded with age. And a slew of decades-old goodies fashioned by our children with copious quantities of felt, glue and glitter, construction paper, walnut shells, clothespins, eyeglass lenses, and even a Mason jar lid. A black spider in a golden web and a huge decorated crab shell, both made my by sister-in-law. Boxes of tinsel painstakingly applied, strand by strand, and then painstakingly removed to store in a box for yet another year. Like I said, traditional. Well, to be more accurate, I suppose we've become more traditional cum lazy, because each year, I use less and less decorations, and some of them don't even make it down out of our attic anymore. This year, very few decorations found their way out of the storage boxes. (A RED tablecloth counts as a decoration, right???)

These carolers once belonged to my grandmother.

Everybody knows the enlightening type of decorator. They're the ones with so many lights blazing in their front yards, they risk causing a blackout across three states every time they turn 'em on. Very flashy. Sometimes, they even incorporate animation and music, too, and carloads of people stop by every night to ooh and aah over their winter wonderland. It isn't at all unusual for a competition of sorts to begin when multiple enlighteners live in close proximity. (Those neighborhoods can be seen from the space station.)

                                         We're more like the house on the right these days:

And then, there's the inflated. This is a fairly recent category. I sure don't remember seeing this sort of display when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can purchase just about any character you can think of ... inflate it ... and stick it on your front lawn. And if you can't find a particular character, for the right price, you can probably have someone make one for you. Then, all those characters can weave and bob all over your yard.

Now then, to the point of today's post. Time for a tale about a Christmas inflatable of an entirely different ilk. This story originated in 1999, and was alleged to be the winning entry to a Louisville Sentinel contest about the wildest Christmas dinner. Turns out, no such newspaper ever existed, and the writer remains unknown, but the story lives on, thanks to the good ol' Internet. (WARNING: Better put your drink down before you read it.) Now here, after a bit of minor editing on my part, is that story:

As a joke, my brother Jay used to hang a pair of pantyhose over his fireplace every Christmas Eve. He said the only thing he wanted was for Santa to fill them, but what they say about Santa checking his list twice must be true, because every Christmas morning, the other stockings would all be bulging with treats, but Jay's poor pitiful pantyhose were always left dangling as empty as ever.

So one year, I decided to make his dream come true. I put on sunglasses, a fake nose, and a ski cap, and went in search of an inflatable love doll.

Know what? They don't sell those things at Wal-Mart. I had to go to an adult bookstore. By the way, if you've never been in an X-rated store before, two words: don't go. You'll only confuse yourself. I was there for an hour saying things like, "What does this do?" "You're kidding me!" and  "Who would buy that?" 

So anyway, I finally made it to the inflatable doll section. I wanted to buy a standard, uncomplicated doll that could also substitute as a passenger in my truck so I could use the car pool lane, but finding what I wanted was difficult. Love dolls come in many different models. The top of the line, according to the side of the box, could do things I'd only seen in a book on animal husbandry, but I settled for the bottom of the price scale: Lovable Louise. To call her a doll required a huge leap of imagination.

On Christmas Eve, with the help of a bicycle pump, Louise came to life. My sister-in-law was in on the plan, and she let me in during the wee morning hours. Long after Santa had come and gone, I filled Jay's pantyhose with Louise's pliant legs and bottom. I also ate some cookies and drank what remained of a glass of milk on a nearby tray. Then I went home and giggled for a couple of hours.

The next morning, my brother called to say that Santa had been to his house and left a present that had made him VERY happy, but his poor dog was very confused. She would bark, start to walk away, then come back and bark some more. We agreed that Louise should remain in her pantyhose so the rest of the family could admire her when they came over for the traditional Christmas dinner.

My grandmother noticed Louise the moment she walked in the door. "What the hell is that?" she asked.

My brother quickly explained, "It's a doll."

"Who would play with something like that?" she snapped.

 I had several candidates in mind, but kept my mouth shut.

"Where are her clothes?" she continued.

"Boy, that turkey sure smells nice, Gran," Jay said, trying to steer her into the dining room.

 But Granny was relentless. "Why doesn't she have any teeth?"

Again, I could have answered, but why risk it? It was Christmas, and nobody wanted to spend it in the back of an ambulance saying, "Hang on, Granny, hang on!"

My grandfather, a delightful old man with poor eyesight, sidled up to me, waggled his eyebrows, and said, "Hey, who's the naked gal by the fireplace?"

I told him she was Jay's friend, and a few minutes later, noticed Grandpa standing by the mantel, talking to Louise. And not just talking. He was actually flirting. It was then we realized this might be Grandpa's last Christmas at home.

The dinner went well. We made the usual small talk about who had died, who was dying, and who should be killed, when suddenly Louise made a noise that sounded a lot like my father in the bathroom every morning. Then she lurched from the pantyhose, flew around the room twice, and fell in a heap in front of the sofa. The cat screamed. I passed cranberry sauce through my nose, and Grandpa ran across the room, fell to his knees, and began administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. My brother fell back over his chair and wet his pants, and Granny threw down her napkin, and stomped outside to sit in the car.

It was indeed a Christmas to treasure and remember. Later in my brother's garage, we conducted a thorough examination to decide the cause of Louise's collapse. We discovered that Louise had suffered from a hot ember to the back of her right thigh. Fortunately, thanks to a wonder drug called duct tape, we restored her to perfect health.

After that, Louise went on to star in several bachelor party movies, and I'm pretty sure Grandpa still calls her whenever he can get out of the house.

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 Merry Christmas! May all your dreams... no matter how inflated...  come true.

Hanukkah is the festival of light that celebrates the triumph of light over darkness, of purity over adulteration, and spirituality over materialism. Whatever our religion or non-religion, these are all things worth celebrating, don't you think? Here's wishing you all much light... and love.

I'll be taking off the rest of the year, and will be back on January 3 for the IWSG post.

                              Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.