Not a creature is stirring, not even a mouse.
Well, unless I count myself. 🙂
It is 4am, and we are getting closer and closer to Christmas. I’m sitting on my couch in my soft robe with a cup of hot chocolate—laced with a peppermint stick, of course—in my hand and my computer in my lap.
It’s a blissful morning since I’m writing by the lights of my Christmas tree.
December is my favorite time to write, a time like no other, no matter the month, season, or holiday. I don’t know how to explain it, but there is something different about sitting in the shadows of such a timeless symbol and elegant reminder of the innocence of Christmas.
The red, blue, green, and yellow lights reflecting off the tinsel bring not only an inner peace I don’t know if I could justify with simple words but memories of Christmas’s long since passed of unwrapping gifts as a child from family and friends, decorating the tree year after year, and now watching the spirit and magic of Christmas in the eyes of my daughters.
With each year, more homemade ornaments fill the pine-scented branches of our yearly tree, bringing more memories that will last throughout the years just as much as the ones they join. Nearly all of the ornaments on my tree are the same ones I put on each tree growing up–old Hallmark ones with the years 1988 and 1989 written on them. Handmade ones my Grandmother stitched and stuffed when my mom was a child and money was tight. Ones I made as a young child in school, and now ones my daughter has made. It’s funny how a badly painted ball by a two-year-old or a Styrofoam star covered in glitter can melt your heart.
I will take each ornament down in less than a couple of weeks, boxing them up for another year. I will miss them as I am not ready to let go of Christmas yet. I feel this way every year, and this year is no different. Of course, with the end of Christmas comes the last holiday of this season. Our time to celebrate 2017 is just around the corner—another year of everyday life and another year of counting down the days until I can write by the soft glow again.
So, what is your favorite holiday tradition? Or, if you don’t have any, what is your favorite thing about Christmas?
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