Christmas Blog Tour

The winner of a copy of The Chamomile is    Nancy Shuman!

Nancy, contact me through my email, give me your address, and I'll mail you a copy right away. Merry Christmas, Nancy, and to all who visited and to those who left a comment. May God bless you with a very Merry Christmas!

 

Welcome!!!  Merry Christmas!!!

      On this Christmas Blog Tour you’ll find out from a bunch of authors about our favorite Christmas reads, movies, recipes, songs…

     You get the picture --  anything Christmas!

     Once you’ve read the blog, please, leave a comment for a chance to win a copy of my Revolutionary War romantic suspense, The Chamomile.

I wanted to share two of my family’s Christmas traditions with you.  The first one, I think, is a sweet story. The second, especially the picture that goes with it, might get me in trouble. (I’m tee-heeing here.)

A Very Special Tree Topper

When my husband, Rick, and I got married on December 19, 1969, I was still in college, and he had just gotten out of the Army and had only been home from Vietnam a few months.  He had a new job, but we were so poor we couldn’t afford a Christmas tree nor the ornaments to go on it. One day along with several couples at our apartment building, we went to some land owned by relatives and cut our trees.  We wound up with one that truly looked like Charlie Brown’s tree. We took cards from our weddings gifts, as well as some of the Christmas cards we had received and hung them on the tree using paper clips.

When we were done, we stepped back to view our masterpiece and Rick said, “Something’s missing.” He cocked his head. “I know. A topper.”

He went into the bedroom where we had stored our wedding gifts. I could hear him rustling around in the boxes, but I couldn’t imagine what he was doing.

Finally, he came out hiding something behind his back and told me to close my eyes.

“Okay, open your eyes.”

I looked at the top of the tree, and there to my delight was the bride and groom from our wedding cake.  Each year that has passed, even though our financial situation improved, we never even thought to replace our tree topper (even when the kids were young and embarrassed by it--though they appreciate it now).

This year we celebrate our 43^rd Christmas together as a couple, and our tree topper remains the same.

 

Christmas PJs

Every year since our children were little, I bought matching Christmas pajamas for us to wear. On Christmas Eve, I handed out their mystery pjs and everyone would run to their rooms to put them on and we'd all come running out at the same time.

One year, we wore white T-shirts and green boxer shorts with happy faces wearing Santa hats –  oh, and they glowed in the dark too. One year I found short pjs with candy cane stripes. Another year we wore red plaid flannel pjs and I found sunglasses that had LED lights in them that blinked a bright red. When our daughter married, her husband gladly (?) became part of the tradition, and when our granddaughter was born, I made her a matching nightshirt. The year our grown son brought his dog home, we wore T-shirts with a design of carolers singing the song from the movie The Christmas Story, “Fa-ra-ra-ra-ra. Ra-ra-ra-ra! So,  I made the dog, Steeler, a matching scarf.  Oh, and one year I almost had a mutiny on my hands when I bought them red unit suits complete with flaps in the back. Now that was hilarious.


The year of green plaid nightshirts.

 

The year of the candy cane pjs, I entered a State newspaper contest that wanted you to explain your family Christmas tradition.

When I walked into the choir room one Sunday morning, one of my friends said, “I never in the world thought that I’d ever open my Sunday paper and see my dear friend in her pajamas!”  Sure enough, our story and the picture were in the paper for all to see.  We were in our Christmas jammies!!!!!

 

My 2012 Christmas Recipe

Laughing Deer Hors d’oeuvres

 

12 triangles of Laughing Cow cheese, any flavor

4 olives, thinly sliced

1 tblsp. poppy seeds (or small bits of black olives)

24 small heart-shaped pretzels

Slice the olives and place one slice on the pointed tip of the triangle – this will be the nose.

Make two eyes with poppy seeds or black olives.

Push two pretzels into the top of the cheese triangle for the antlers.

Now that I’ve shared some favorite Christmas traditions with you, why not swing by and visit some of my friends’ sites who are posting the rest of this month?

Gail Kittleson – December 10th  http://gailkittleson.blogspot.com
Linda Maran – 11th http://lindamaran.blogspot.com
Karen Wingate-14th – www.graceonparade.com/blog
Karla Akins-15th http://envisionpublishing.tumblr.com
Patty Wysong -- 18th www.pattywysong.com
Davalynn Spencer – 19th www.davalynnspencer.blogspot.com

Tamara Kraft – 20^th http://tameralynnkraft.com

Wishing you and your family a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.