Christmas in Williamsburg

Last year at around this time and after seeing several specials on the subject, my sister and I decided we would spend Christmas 2008 at Disneyworld. Silly us. :-) As this Christmas drew closer (like, around sometime in August), I decided we should go to Colonial Williamsburg instead.

However, as the good Governor Gumpas would have objected, had he been around when I menitoned the idea at breakfast one morning...it was quite out of the question...an economic impossibility.

I was determined to do something beautiful and historical, though. So far, I have spotted three of our neighbors whose idea of Christmas decorating is to erect inflatable figures of The Grinch in their yards, not to mention all the others who have a variety of other "Christmas" characters well-lit and inflated in their yards. I wanted something lovely and elegant and real. After browsing around Paperbackswap, I settled on two books about decorating at Williamsburg.

Ever since Thanksgiving, I've been collecting fresh fruits and greenery whenever it was on sale. I purchased a fresh balsam wreath, a 25' red cedar garland, and a large bag of Red Delicious apples at Costco. Sixty key limes came home from Sunflower Market for only $3. Four bags of pine cones for $2.50 each from Michael's. Five pounds of oranges arrived from the grocery store for only $1.

A little thing called Operation Bridesmaid Dress (more on that later) had kept me from doing any decorating until today, but I finally managed to get my wreath done this afternoon. I think it's rather nice, if I do say so myself. Hopefully, the blizzard tomorrow will let up enough for me to get a picture of it hanging in its Red Delicious glory on the front door tomorrow. The garland is primarily to decorate the front door, and whatever is left of it will go on the piano and the buffet. My sister will be making pomandered oranges to arrange in pyramids for the tansu and the piano. Then it's only a matter of finding spots for the 18 candlesticks we discovered we own. (I always knew it was a lot...just not quite *that* many...)

As of now, I'm off to eat a hot bowl of oatmeal for dinner (yum), and then I will be hanging pinecones on velvet ribbon in all the windows...

The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within our reach, is joy. Take joy!
~Fra Giovanni

And she's back...

My poor little blog has been quite neglected of late, hasn't it? I just finished taking a killer (there's a genteel word for you...) modular class, and now I'm looking forward to getting back to real life.

As an apology for my absence, I extend to you friendship with my little guy, Toby. Is he not the cutest?

Wordless Weekend: Take Time for Tea

In the Garden

I've been learning all about dry country gardening since my family moved here a year and a half ago. It's certainly different from where I grew up in Japan, which is semi-tropical!

In Japan, the perfect, balanced garden has three elements. Trees of the evergreen variety, rocks, and water. Flowering perennials and annuals are traditionally found only in vegetable gardens, although most Japanese homes will have several pots of bright blooms on their front stoop. Still, Japanese homes and yards are not designed to accommodate flower beds and so, I always had to follow the rest of the population and limit myself to what could be grown in a few containers.

Though American life has been full of challenges for me, one thing I'm liking very much indeed is that there is space for a few garden beds. Figuring out when it's safe to plant things has been tricky...to the point that the sweet peas I planted are just now beginning to bloom.

Oops.

They are the flower of the month of April, after all. Next year, I'll plant my seeds earlier. Thankfully, it has been cool enough that they are doing quite well, and I have a sweet little bouquet in my room, just freshly picked after dinner.

Kindred Spirits

I had the chance to meet the lovely Laura from Quietude and the lovely Cheri from A Joyful Handmaiden this week. Laura's fiancé was gracious enough to let us borrow Laura for a couple hours to go fabric shopping! Mind you, three days earlier, before I had any idea I'd be meeting people at the fabric store, I had no intention to buy any more fabric. I've been trying to be on a fabric buying (and vintage pattern buying!) fast. But...I fell under irresistible temptation, and bought some anyway.

It was so much fun to meet some more lovely ladies from the internet. I've met quite a few now, and it's always been a lovely experience. Lord willing, I will see these ladies again sometime!

Past and present, cars and memories

My parents are leaving at zero dark thirty (as they say in the military) tomorrow morning to drive to Omaha for my mom's 40th high school reunion. They are, in fact, driving my dad's mint condition 1962 Chevy, which will make its debut as a parade car in the 4th of July parade in Omaha. The Chevy just turned over 300,000 miles a couple weeks ago, which, in car years, I suppose is rather like a very important birthday, and so it had to have its picture taken.

Because of the upcoming reunion, my mom dug her high school yearbooks out of the garage to carry along on their trip. I was browsing through them, giggling at the big hair and bobby socks, and noticed that nearly every friend note scrawled in the front mentioned "Those great water balloon fights!" When I asked my mom about that, she broke into a riot of laughter, explaining that over the summers she would go out with her friends in her car (a convertible, no less...oh the jealousy...), and have water balloon fights with other high school friends in their cars. Car water balloon fights! Can you imagine?