The house is now decorated in ribbons, greens and lights. I left the rest of our Christmas paraphernalia in the barn. Somehow, once the greens were up and the golden lights turned on, I couldn't even bring myself to unpack the rest of our decorations. What we have up is just enough. There's still space in our house – a blessing in our small space. I'm not missing a thing and I'm actually surprised by that.
Also, we finally got rid of the fake greens we've been trying to hide from the girls for years. First we put them up because they were decorations passed on from Jon's family when his mom passed away. Nostalgia is all well and good, but these things weren't pretty. Then the girls got hold of them and it was a trauma I couldn't deliver – to refuse to allow them to be put on the walls. This year, they didn't even make it into the house. They went to the free shelf at the dump and went to the home of a little old lady – he said they went to a good home. (P.S. to any of my/Jon's family, we will always keep the tree light and the ornaments.)
And what a simple blessing, decorations looking and smelling of our natural world, are. We collected all of the greens this weekend and I wrote about our brunch afterward for this week's column in the Portland Press Herald, The Maine Ingredient.
Recipes included:
Pumpkin Oatmeal Pancakes
Fresh Ricotta Cheese
Cinnamon Whipped Cream
Grapefruit, Orange and Dried Cranberry Fruit Salad
Annie
Hoping our Charlie Brown tree doesn't break from the weight of all our decorations – okay, not everything stayed uncluttered.
© 2008 Baggywrinkle Publishing
No Comments