Christmas on the Porch

Leave it to Facebook or Pinterest to inspire? You betcha. A couple of weeks ago I was scrolling along and eyeing all the Christmas seasonal porches, and I just felt the urge to try just even a little with the front porch here. Of course, I texted my partner in all things festive, my sister/cousin, and she agreed it would be great to decorate on our front porch. I told her there was no hurry, and then went on a mental search of the house for fun things to go outside.

Well, true to her own personal flair, she showed up with reinforcements a few days later. She brought her husband and his leaf blower, and she was ready and able to decorate. I had only MENTALLY prepared, now mind you. So we began to search for little snippets to go outside. I had a tree and a skate... and a few things stored in the barn.

Filter in all this time, my mother was NOT deciding to cooperate and didn't want me out of her sight that day, so she just YELLED at me to get in the house, even though I was technically only about four feet from her bed. It was kind of a zoo, I'll tell you...

However, the results showed a very festive porch, especially after she returned with red ribbon, which I couldn't find in my attempts to delve through my treasures. I will find that holly ribbon right in time though.... FOR Easter!

The day moved on through a full blown argument with Mom and a little scrape with leaf burning and a little more that scared the fairies right out of their hollow (dead) locust tree home... But finally, all was well, and the very next day friends arrived to celebrate a birthday party here, and you should have heard them exclaim about the pretty porch.

I will add one final note. During the holiday decorating I continued into the early late evening...  I met up with a bonafide casualty. I lost my great gandmother's china head doll. As in...  "Call it, Doc. We've lost her." I decided to move my mother's collection of china heads to Daddy's bed for at least Christmas... except for this girl. She was huge. I have a picture of my great grandmother, Amanda Miller, as a very young child holding this china head, which endured a fire and was professionally repaired and refired. She was exquisitely dressed in a replica of my great grandmother's wedding dress, which was black of all things, and had been ceremoniously presented to my dad's dad at one of his last Christmas gatherings...  My dad had selected her as a choice when the family divided up the belongings in his mother's home..  Yep. I cleaned around and under her and went half way across the room when I heard a horrible crash. I turned around, and there she was...  that perfectly refurbished doll... with a scattering of porcelain that used to be that repaired head...

I gathered up shatters, the body (and it felt like I was disposing of a murdered body) and the forlorn little black and white  picture and put them in a double sack in the back of my closet. I worked up the courage to tell my sister/cousin (because it was her great grandmother's, too) and she was very calm and not at all angry...  I have three more cousins with the same relationship to tell, and I am sure they will be kind to me, as well...  I don't think I will tell Mom unless she mentions it because it will just bother here.... which, yeah, bothers me in the rebound... and technically, since I'm being an honest little doggie this morning, Mom just might not be so very kind about it.  haha...  She is what she is.

So...  I'm really okay with it because I have the memory. If I don't have the memory, I'm REALLY okay with it...  ya know? I was trying my best to protect her and it was just not in the cards. I have always tried really hard to save pieces of irony to teach the concept to my students. Now that I'm retired, this is a good example....

Have a super week. Tonight is advent night number three....

P.S. Oh, by the way. This is the inspiration from Pinterest. I know. Isn't it always the way? I wouldn't be able to do this anyway because...  um.... oh, well.... I wouldn't want to clean it all up after Christmas, that's for sure!

Whimsy and Hugs!