Thank you Cheryl for having me here during this magical time of year. And on my birthday too. :)
I love decorating for Christmas!!! I truly believe there is nothing that calls for over-the-top as much as Christmas. However, I hate packing it all up after Christmas. The holidays are over and it's time to return to real life. It always seemed kind of sad to me and more than a little dusty. Now that my kids are grown, taking down Christmas falls almost entirely to me. Oh joy.
So a few years ago I began what I call Christmas lite. It might not look lite to most people but it is for me. No entire Christmas village (just a house or two—hard to go cold turkey), no carol playing bells on the stairway, no Christmas circus animals, no musical snow globes in the bathroom . . . I really do have a Christmas tchotchke addiction. My decorations are now primarily in the living room, hallway and dining room—with a few Santas scattered here and there around the house. But I still firmly believe you can never have too much sparkle or too many twinkly lights.
The really big change though—and I know you were all thinking it was the Christmas circus animals—is the tree. I love real trees. I love the way they smell and the way they bring life to the house. That will never change. I have boxes and boxes of wonderful ornaments. Pieces collected through the years to mark occasions or celebrations. They are truly fabulous and bring to mind all kinds of Christmas memories. But packing them up properly takes days and it's not a fun way to start a new year.
And I love it. Because they're fairly new, these ornaments don't hold the memories of Christmas Past—of the year the fully decorated tree fell or the time the artfully displayed Christmas cards by the fireplace caught fire or the holiday party where a friend leaned too close to a candle and caught a tiny bit on fire . . . Why yes, many of my Christmas disasters deal with fire. :)
But there are new memories every year. Some, oh, awkward but mostly good. And there is love. And always, always magic.
May we all share the love and the magic of Christmas, this year and for all the Christmases to come.
Happy Holidays!!!
Victoria
From #1 New York Times bestselling author, Victoria Alexander, comes an enchanting Christmas story. When one very proper lady's plans for a Christmas retreat include an unexpected addition, she'll discover that one impetuous moment can lead to magic, especially at Christmas . . .
My friends have always considered me the most proper among us. But no one was more surprised than I, Portia, Lady Redwell, when I decided to escape the matchmaking efforts of my family to spend Christmas in an enchanting villa on the coast of Italy. As it happened, there was something of a mix-up in my admittedly impulsive plans in the form of a gentleman who insisted he, too, had a claim on the villa. That he was handsome and charming with the darkest blue eyes I’d ever seen, and a laugh that oddly seemed to fill my soul, was not a consideration. It was only in the true spirit of Christmas that I agreed to share the villa with him.
That I returned the next year for Christmas was due entirely to the charm of the villa and had nothing at all to do with the fact that he would be there.
My friend Veronica has often said those least likely to bend are most likely to snap.
It appears I have snapped . . .
On sale for Christmas!!!
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Victoria's website www.victoriaalexander.com is under construction at the moment,
but visit her on facebook
I love Christmas decorating, but the take down is a long job. I am very attached to my ornaments too, and the memories that flow around the tree can be overwhelming.
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas and Happy Birthday.