T'is the Christmas Season

I love this time of the year.  I love the smells that are in the air, pine trees and cinnamon, and apple pie.  I love going to the stores and seeing all the decorations and hearing the Christmas music.  I love looking at all the decorations and seeing all the wonderful Christmas light.  I love the way people decorate their homes and the way towns decorate their streets and parks and the special events that happen in preparation for the holidays.  I love reading Christmas stories and watching the many Christmas movies and programs that we are able to see on TV.  I love the Christmas devotionals and the message they bring. I love the Christmas parties that we have at Church and with family and friends.  I love the special Christmas programs we have to celebrate and to remember the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ.  I love sharing all this with my family and my love ones.... and I love the memories that this season brings...

At the Dixie Center each year there is the "Dickens' Festival."   This is such a fun experience and something I look forward to each year.  It is always held the week after Thanksgiving.  Inside the Dixie Center, the entire hall has been transformed into an olde English street scene straight out of London. Over 165 booths resembling quaint English cottages border a network of walkways.  The shops, manned by artisans dressed in olde English attire, are filled with a variety of arts, crafts, home items, and presents.  There's food, music, and lots of entertainment, always going on... and to enjoy...

I have such a sweet and wonderful daughter-in-law, in fact I have two.  I am very blessed in this area..  but for this occasion I have a Christmas tradition with Susan.  We take off for the day, go to the Dixie Center and just enjoy strolling down the streets of olde London, were the light are low and Christmas music is playing in the air and caroler's are singing.  We always stop at this one booth and have our pictures taken, with a different hat on each year.. The pictures are free and a keepsake for us to remember...  that day, that year, that time ....

This is a special day for me and I feel very blessed that Susan enjoys sharing this experience with me.  She says she enjoys this special time and she too looks forward to it. We plan what we are going to wear and about our hats, she laughs about that and says, it reminds her when she was a teenager and would call her friends, to see what they were going to wear, and then we both laugh.  As we stroll along our way, we stop, look and share, we talk, laugh, and just have a good time.  Sometimes I think I have lost her in the crowd, but she's a little taller than I, so I don't worry, she seems to always find me, besides we have our cell phones... 

This is the beginning of my Christmas Season, although I have been busy planning and preparing for Christmas for sometime.  I have been busy with my knitting needles and crochet hook, plus my trusty sewing machine for a number of months, but today I am reminded that there is only 20 more day till Christmas day, needless to say, I must now switch to fast speed to be completely ready.

Tomorrow is Monday and the beginning of a new week.  My plans are to decorate my Christmas tree, (I already have it up and the lights are burning.)  I will also decorate my home, put my Christmas music CD's on and have a Apple Pie candle burning.

Sweet Smell of Christmas, my heart is ready......  we even had snow last week, the first of the season and more to come.  I think I'll have a cup of hot chocolate and the fireplace going, my sweet husband just brought me a bowl of popcorn...  yes,..  T'is the season for ...