Saying goodbye to Christmas

This year's Christmas season was absoulutely crazy for me. I saved alot of vacation days for December as I always do. This year the days were spent boxing and bagging things to be moved to the new condo. If I wasn't such a pack rat I would have been moved in a long time ago and December could have been spent attending Christmas events and concerts, tree lightings and holiday open houses. So to my mind, Christmas was all messed up this year.

I even worked some of my vacation days and came in to work on Saturdays I was not scheduled to work. So forgive me, if I linger just a little while longer over my Christmas decorations. They are old friends I hate to put away in January. The good thing is it's just me and the kitties in the condo so I can leave my tree up until April if I want to.

So I decided this weekend was the time to pack away the Christmas things. So here goes:

Goodbye Starbucks snowglobe. I'll toast you with the last gingerbread latte of the season.

Goodbye, to the very stylish Dixie Hackett in her faux mink stole. She got a little tipsy from the
cinnamon eggnog. And goodnight to Carol Lynn and Charles, her neighbors who are sitting behind her in the sleigh. They are camera shy.

Ok, this egg I will keep out through the winter because it's sooo special (and unfortunately does not photograph well). My sister gave it to me as a Christmas gift several years ago. Actually it was 1994. I collect Russian lacquer eggs and I have a few with characters from the Nutcracker on them. I gave my sister one with a Snow Queen on it. Russian lacquer eggs are gorgeous. Anyway, my sister knows I love ice skating, gazebos, and anything Victorian so she painted me the most spectacular egg. The egg is made of wood and she painted it black. Then she painted two Victorian ice skaters on a frozen pond on the front of the egg. On the back of the egg? A beautiful gazebo, brown wooded with icicles dripping from it's beams, there's a bridge too and some children skating in the background. This is absolutely my fantasy place where I would want to hold an ice skating party. Do you now how hard it is to paint on a round surface? And the detail of the icicles on the gazebo, oh my goodness! Perfection! My sister has unbelievable artistic talent. The egg is phenomenal and very precious to me. Ok, I just convinced myself it is staying up all year round!

I got this plate at an antiques store in Winchester many years ago. It reminds me of England. One year I used it as the center of my Christmas wreath for my front door. It has a mate but it's packed away, somewhere in a box I hope.

Another gift from my sister. This Christmas she gave me a Jim Shore angel. Since I rescued my kitty Oscar from my building parking lot last June and my other cat, Molly was adopted by me after she was rescued from a trailer park in Hooksett, NH, my sister said I was a kitty angel. So

I proudly display my angel on top of my dining room hutch. I have another kitty angel given to me by my friend Debbi. It was a housewarming gift. So the collection begins.

I love my brass reindeer and he's pulling a brass sleigh. I think he's so elegant. Sometimes he carries ornaments and sometimes candy. I think he was mentioned in a prior post too.

The wooden skates I've had for years and I can't even remember where they came from but I know I like them. And who doesn't love books published by Victoria Magazine? I think I have all of their Christmas books. They used to publish them every year and I have about six of them. I was missing just one year. One time my friend Lisa gave me one of these Christmas books and it was the book for the year I was missing. She didn't even know I collected them. Isn't that a happy accident?

Pottery Barn had a sale on velvet stockings so I bought one for Oscar and a matching one for Molly and had them monogrammed. Don't worry they're mini stockings. As much as I love the kitties I don't think I overindulge them!

Here are the french doors between the living room and dining room. My first Christmas decoration that I put up was the red berry garland you see here. Friends Don and Debbi were helping me move and we decided why not put it up instead of packing it away. This was in November so it was a little early for Christmas.

I hope you enjoyed reading about my Christmas decorations. It's still very wintry outside and so it's been fun to stay inside and reminisce about past Christmases.

Until next time, stay warm wherever you are.