What a beautiful time of year this is! I love it so much.
Last week, we went to some of our grandkids' Christmas concerts; one night, it was our 3rd grade grandson G-Man's show at his Catholic school; the next night, we got to watch five of our grandchildren performing together: two of G-Man's younger sisters, who are in 2nd grade and kindergarten, and our triplet grandchildren (also in kindergarten, two siblings in one class together and the other with his cousin); and finally, the next day, we watched two of our granddaughters, younger siblings of the aforementioned kids (4-year-old cousins who are BFF's and classmates), perform in their pre-K concert at their Christian preschool. It was a busy week! It is so special that these cousins are schoolmates/classmates. It is a joy to their Papa and me to see them experiencing all of this together.
My husband and I also squeezed in a movie date over the weekend and went to see
The Shift, a new film out by Angel Studios (they also did
The Sound of Freedom). It is just SO GOOD, we highly recommend it! The theater that was showing the movie was in danger of closing not too long ago (thanks to all that Covid business, ugh!); but they didn't. I'm so grateful, because every now and then, it's a huge treat to go out and watch a movie on the big screen. And they have a giant, glorious Christmas tree outside this multiplex, so we snapped a date night selfie in front of it.
On Sunday, son #4 and his kids (the triplets plus one, who calls herself an "honorary triplet") came over for brunch after Mass. And the 6-year-old girl triplet couldn't stop looking at the "quilted" ornaments on our tree. For some reason, she was fascinated by them, especially when her Papa told her that I had made them. I learned this simple and rewarding craft more than 40 years ago, when I was a young Navy wife who wasn't even a mom yet. I used mostly traditional red and green Christmas fabric scraps from other projects for the first ones I made. Since then, I have used materials that have special meaning to "quilt" the balls.
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I made NY State Lottery ornaments for my mom, my siblings, and myself
after my dad died, using scraps from his old T-shirts. |
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I used some old baby garments that my boys wore to make the blue and yellow
one. (The smaller one on the bottom right is one of the originals from 1981.) |
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The maroon, grey, and white one was made out of bits and pieces of
my boys' old Catholic grade school uniforms. |
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Yesterday, I made this one for the granddaughter who was so intrigued
by them, and I plan to give it to her tomorrow for her family's tree. |
Not much else is new. We're just trying to get all of our must-watch Christmas movies in before the 25th, if possible. Last night we watched my favorite, It's a Wonderful Life.
This morning before daily Mass, I sat in my living room, reading a new book by a lovely Catholic author with whom I became online friends back when I was writing
Finding Grace and
Erin's Ring. (Her latest novel,
The Charter Class, just came out. It's a work of historical fiction about the very first class of students at the College of Our Lady of the Elms, an all-girls school in Massachusetts that opened in 1928.) I was enjoying the book's uplifting story; the tree lights were sparkling; and for the first time ever, I was drinking my coffee out of one of the Santa mugs my husband gave me for Christmas last year. It all felt a little too good to be true.
And I thought to myself, "Yes, it truly is a wonderful life."
God bless you, dear readers, at Christmas and always!
I too love my quilted NY Lottery ornament. I also found in our basement the quilt that you made me for Tia sooo many years ago. It has much of the same material as the small one from 1981 that you made. I am going to give it to her when they get here!
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