My daisy lupin Christmas memory

I have many, many memories of Christmases past ~ but the one that is most special for me is a Christmas not long ago ~ Christmas of 2001.

The year I finished my radiation treatment. During that year as I 'did' my treatments, I had met many wonderful women online on a cancer support forum.

My gorgeous darling, sensitive husband gave me a 'reward' for being 'brave' ~ a trip to New York city to visit my bestest friend Gin. She and others helped me get through those weeks of treatment. So at the end of July we began our preparations for this huge 5 week holiday (the trip alone is daunting - I think a 14hr+ trip from Sydney to Los Angeles then from LA to NY - so many hours, on a plane)

Sept 11 dawned and as we all know - New York was attacked.

what to do? do we go or not? we had to make some pretty fast decisions in the days following - against the advice of many, we decided to continue on with our plans. And I am so glad we did!
Gin lives on Staten Is. Her husband is a NYPD detective. her parents were italian. She is a New York yankee fan. She is an all round nice person and she welcomed us into her home and heart.
Before we left Australia, Gin emailed me and asked me to make a list of what I wanted to do. my list went something like this:
to pay my respects at what was now known as Ground Zero ~ we arrived at the site and while we were there, a news show was being made and we were all asked where we came from, once we said Australia, the news crew came running over to film us ~ we were on the news that night ~ oh gawd, I looked a sight: my nose was red from the cold, I had a woollen beanie on and really looked like a homeless waif - ahh well such is fame!
to eat pastrami on rye in a traditional New York Deli ~ and we did and it was delish!
chestnuts from a street vendor ~ an aquired taste - not my kind
a ride in the carriage in Central Park ~ such fun - we were wrapped up under a blanket and off we went!

to have an 'affair to remember' by visiting the Empire State building ~ we got to the Empire state building and had to produce id. of course we had left all our passports back on Staten Is - Gin flashed her 'detective' badge and they let us in - thank heavens - it was sooo cold up the top, it was raining ice, but the view was amazing
I wanted to visit 34th street and we did and I danced to the Christmas music in Maceys! those New York people thought I was hilarious
I wanted a white Christmas - even though Gin and Ron assured me they had done the naked snow dance, it didn't snow on Christmas day - although at first I thought it had - you see, I woke early Christmas morning and looked out the window - seeing white! snow! I woke everyone up and made them look and then realized I was looking at the next doors drive which was covered in white pebbles - it was funny!
We visited the huge toy store in New York city, we travelled on the Staten Is. ferry, unfortunately we couldn't visit the Empire State building as it had been closed to the public, we went to see the famous Rockettes, we had New York hotdogs with the lot,

we had our photo taken with New York police

~ we met friends of Gins who had worked on the rescue after Sept 11, we visited people we didn't know and talked to them about life. We, strangers from Australia were welcomed with open arms into their homes.
We had a traditional Christmas eve italian dinner ~ we went to midnight mass ~ we had a traditional Christmas day with our friends.

Then we travelled for 3 weeks to Pennsylvania and Indiana to 'meet' some more online gal friends...then came back to New York to fly back to LA.

The day we were driving to the airport - it started to snow.

I cried all the way from New York to California - knowing that I would miss this gal with all my heart.
and that dear friends is a little peek into one of my Christmas memories.

another ghost of Christmas past

I would like to know:

just why is Santa holding my hands down?

and why was I crying? (was it because I didn't want to be here on earth? or was it because I was born in the southern hemisphere and knew in my soul that I was in the wrong place. Lord knows I was supposed to be living in Cornwall. Was it because I was thinking - oh gee, here we go again..another life - I wanna go home to the angels! or was it because I am a TRUE Wednesdays child - full of woe added with the ruling planet of Saturn * serious) ~ whatever it was, I wasn't a happy soul this day - 1959 - my first Christmas, ME ~ not quite 1 year old

a little more decorating

our Christmas tree

we have our main Christmas tree in our sitting room. Each year, we buy this from our local bush fire brigade and the money goes towards buying fire fighting equipment.
This year, I really cannot get into the spirit of Christmas, I don't know why. I am leaning towards a very simple Christmas, towards a more earth based celebration.
we put the tree up and I got the lights out and put them on. To me, that was enough. It looked perfect. Until I voiced those words. Cries from the gallery, that I call my family; 'mum! you can't JUST have lights' ~ 'oh we have to have all our special ornies on the tree' ~ and on and on it went - so I trudged out to the store room, dragged the million or so boxes in~ full of ornaments. But my heart is not in it.

AND! I would like to know where everyone is? while I decorate? sitting by my lonesome ? ?

So I fume, rant and rave until I explode. then they are scared! Yep!

'can we help?' ~ 'is there any thing we can do?'

I burst into tears. WELCOME TO MY CHRISTMAS.

Is it worth it?
anyhow - no more from miss Robyn bah humbug. . . . . I am really wanting to share my Christmas home.

this ornament , above, was made by my son in kindergarten - it was the first handmade ornament I had ever received as a mother and I treasure it. It has to be my favourite.

the nativity scene was made by Sophie at her art class - I use a small piece of vintage lace to sit it on

and this is Mr plum pudding - made by Sophie when she was at pre- school.

the tangle that is Christmas and other stuff

can someone please explain how this happens?

last year after Christmas, I carefully took the lights of the tree in my dining room and wrapped them round & round my arm. carefully. I then tied them up with some gorgeous gold ribbon and placed them on top of the decorations in the 'dining room' box. On Thursday, I decided it was time to put this tree up and decorate it. So I took the lid of the box and there were the lights all neat and tied. Until I took the ribbon off. It was like they had a mind of their own, like they had had enough of being constrained for 12 mths, tied up like a turkey. And in a blink of an eye - I had the tangled mess that you see above. Or maybe - this happened to show me what my poor frazzled Christmas brain is like - a big tangled mess.

so I got on with my decorating - this tree is not my main tree {I have a real tree in my sitting room as my main tree}. This tree is a tradition now - when I first put it up about 15 years ago, I lived elsewhere and my kitchen was huge. In one corner I had an old kooka stove that was for show only. One Christmas, my home was featured in a country magazine so I had to pull some pretty fantastic ideas from my brain. I decided to do a kitchen themed tree - but didn't really want to go hanging my utensils all over it. So I made some cloth gingerbread men - with a little cinnamon stick, some cloves and a teenie tiny cookie cutter all tucked into his pocket. I made about 20 or so and decided to give them away to friends after the photo shoot. A tradition was born. Each year from then on, I have put this tree up and made a different decoration, sometimes more than one design.

I haven't been as industrious this year - I have made decorations to send to my friends but not enough to give away as friends visit - I plan to give them some Christmas cake & awhile back I bought some Christmas soaps from Peggy. The idea was to have them in a little pressed glss bowl at my door to give out to my friends instead of my home made decoration. But when I unwrapped the soaps, Peggy had packaged them up into individual cardboard boxes and tied them with raffia! Just like a gift. so this is what I decided to do :~

don't they look wonderful? Just perfect!

and here are some close ups of my decorations ~ most I have made myself, some were given to me (there is a little ball that Leeann sent to me in my Christmas stocking) & some were purchased at some time during my travels - all with a meaning.

as I go along decorating

Be it Chanukah or Yule,
Christmas time or Solstice night,
All celebrate the eternal light.

for those of you who know me - you know that today, Monday is the day I usually change the sheets on my bed & give both my bathrooms a good scrub. yay for me !

Once that was all done today, - I got to thinking about how I would decorate my bedroom for Christmas. In past years I have always had a vintage themed Christmas tree in our bedroom - full of old lace, buttons & vintage decorations, but this year - my soul is saying - keep it simple. I have a lovely vintage angel that Joe bought me at a garage sale ages ago and in keeping with the simple theme - it is perfect. Along with candles. oh and of course, the obligatory gardenia from my garden. You see, this year - I must keep Christmas as simple as I can ~ to help me relax, to unwind, to settle the messed up jigsaw that is my mind. Decorating with candles, mostly. what better for this magick time of year? LIGHT - is it a coincidence that the birth of Jesus, is around the same time as the Northern Hemispheres' WINTER SOLSTICE? the time when the olde religion that I practice celebrates the return of the light to the world in the form of the sun. what about us down here in the southern hemisphere? does that mean our light returns for us in June, when our winter solstice occurs? questions, questions. I celebrate Christmas because it is a tradition but I celebrate it in a different way to most - I bring hedgewitchery into it if I can ~ and I believe that Christ came to earth to bring light into our hearts, into our souls, to teach us to love. And that is what I strive for. So I will use light to decorate my home. Hopefully bringing that very peace that I am trying to find.

blessings, bliss & peace xo

gratitude on Advent Sundays

above is the first stage of my advent wreath on my altar - the first mauve candle in a fake pine wreath next to a vintage statue of the Holy Family. I will light the candle each night at dinner time & let it burn for an hour or two. Each Sunday a new candle will be added.

setting up my advent wreath today, I wondered to myself, what I could say that I was grateful for. I have many blessings, many wonderful friends & my health is good. I lit the candle and as I did, I realized that I am grateful for my spirituality - that spark inside that has me constantly asking questions * celebrating, when I 'realize' something about life & the bubbling joy inside that I feel this time of year. I am grateful that I know what I believe is true for me, even if I find it hard to put into words. During this past week, ~ a friend pointed out to me that I am trying to blend two totally different beliefs and it's hard to achieve clarity of thought if my two paths haven't joined. And asked me the question: Do you think you have been able to join these two paths?

I hope that during this advent that I can somehow blend my two paths (the catholic and the old religion that was my great Nans') - I am sure I can. I have to. I am going to search the internet for information and ideas. You will see me grow . And I am sure my wise women friends will give me input as I go along.

so setting up my advent wreath on my altar - saying prayers & spells as I went & decorating the wreath with some vintage flowers which I will add to each Sunday ~ is one step towards the bringing together of my beliefs. During the week - I am going to add some crystals and other bits n pieces to my advent wreath to make it my very own - my yule time advent wreath with a touch of the olde religion and alot of me.

where it begins

where my Christmas journey begins - in my store-room. when we renovated this house, I wanted a store-room, so we designed a little room off the verandah - outside. Thank God it is outside, 'cause it is an absolute mess!

come, take a peek

I try so, so hard to keep it tidy, I really do but ...... well the pixies get in there sometimes!

the angel above is one I made a few years ago - she was actually in a country magazine which led to orders for her - I made so many that year, I haven't made one since.

and following are some bits n pieces that I use to decorate my home. There is a vintage nativity scene that is home-made - I saw it in a window of a junk shop one night - the next day I was on the doorstep begging the owner to sell it to me - which she did for $30. My santa collection and my nutcracker collection are packed into vintage suitcases.

christmas wonderland

welcome to my Christmas home - the beginning.

the door which I use to go in and out of my home. It squeaks when I open it - I refuse to put oil on the hinges. The Christmas wreath that has been put on my door for the last 20 years wherever I may have lived. The sun coming through the apple tree - dappling sun that skips and sparkles across the door, like the faeries that I believe in

* Christmas in summer - welcome to my world