HAPPY NEW YEAR FRIENDS!

It’s Monday, just after a bittersweet weekend.   It was the last weekend of blasting my exterior house lights and we just completed celebration of “Little Christmas”, the Epiphany.  This is the final day of Christmas if you’re counting the Twelve Days of Christmas, the festive days beginning Christmas Day (December 25th).   This period is also known as Christmastide and Twelvetide.  The Twelfth Night of Christmas is always on the evening of 5 January, but the Twelfth Day can either precede or follow the Twelfth Night according to which Christian tradition is followed.  Twelfth Night is followed by the Feast of the Epiphany on January 6th.  For most people this ends the Christmas season and they will begin packing away their decorations.  Last weekend, a Twitter friend said “There is nothing more depressing than the dying Christmas trees lining the streets of Soho” – THAT is the truth.  I am so saddened that the most wonderful time of the year is on “pause”, but instead of falling into depression I intend to keep the spirit alive all year!

I love my Father in Heaven, the Lord, Jesus Christ.  I love church.   I love gold, silver, green and red (are my favorite colors) and I love everything shiny.  I love the fall weather; maybe because I was born in October.  I love shopping and wrapping gifts; and I am drawn to my local Hallmark store because I adore the Christmas scent that lingers throughout the year.  I love making big dinners and I LOVE cookies.  I love the smell of Christmas; the pine, cinnamon and spice.  I am prone to listening to Christmas music all year long and if you ask me what color sweater or bathing suit I want, I say “red”!  I have to admit that I will definitely be playing that new Michael Buble Christmas CD all year long for sure.  I love the trees and Oh my goodness — I LOVE decorating and sparkling lights.   But is all that I love the spirit of Christmas?  One friend recently said the SPIRIT is Jesus.  Christmas is a blessed holiday and the season is full of love and miracles… that MUST be what it is.