At Home in Wyoming

Taking Back Christmas

Not all Christmas trees have to be green!  Sometimes in December I spray paint bush or tree branches white, and hang some dollar store snowflakes on them.  The best part about snowflake trees is that they don't have to disappear once Christmas is over...they can stay up through January, which is good because the house looks so drab without all the Christmas lights and decorations.

I attend a church that is called a Bible church...basically the doctrine is Baptist.  BUT I was raised a Methodist, and still somewhat follow the Protestant liturgical calendar as a way to order my days and as a tool in my Christian walk.

(You can take the woman out of the Methodist church, but not the Methodist methods out of the woman).

I have been thinking a lot about the 12 days of Christmas, which starts on Christmas Day and ends on Epiphany ( the celebration of the gift of the Magi...or the Three Wise Men) on January 6th.  It seems a bigger deal in the European cultures and the Catholic church, but not so much the Protestant western churches.

Why?  Because our church calendar morphed into the commercial calendar...that says once the Christmas shopping season is over, Christmas is over.

So what's up with that?

During the advent, we prepare our hearts and home for Christmas.  We spend a lot of time getting ready.  But when Christmas Day arrives, it is over so quickly...you are left feeling a little exhausted and a little deflated...which is exactly what rampant and unchecked commercialism will do to you. 

So this year I observed the full 12 days of Christmas.  I took the tree down, but left everything else up.  I still listened to Christmas carols, read Christmas readings (both spiritual and secular) and really pondered what the birth of that child in the manger means to my life, today. 

And for the first time, I felt that I fully experienced Christmas.

Whether you follow the Protestant liturgical calendar or not, consider separating the commercial from the observation of Christmas.  I have tried doing that before Christmas...and in our culture with our traditions it is dang near impossible. 

But if you take the time to fully observe the 12 days of Christmas, STARTING with Christmas day, you will find that the commercial fades away, and the joy will kick in. 

And that, folks, is how you take back Christmas!

 

 

356 And Counting...

A western Christmas tree, made out of sagebrush.  Kinda pretty, isn't it?  Just the thing to grace one of the cabins at Old Trail Town...

Have you bought your datebook for 2012 yet?  If you are super organized, you probably bought it in November...and because you are so organized this post will be useless to you.

BUT...if you are poorly organized, absent minded or just plain a mess, you were probably standing in line at Walmart buying one today.  Like me!  If that is the case, I am going to give you some advice that will have you loving me next December.

Flip to December 2012, and jot down what worked and didn't work for you over the holidays, before you forget.  For instance, my sister found that going through her spice cabinets and pantry in November saved her time...she was able to stock up on her holiday baking needs before the rush, and didn't waste time running back and forth to the store. 

BUT her boys gobbled up all her cut out cookies before Christmas (as teenage boys are prone to do), and she ran out of cookies Christmas Eve. She ended up missing Christmas Eve service to roll dough, because Christmas wouldn't have been Christmas without the cut out cookies for one of her sons.  

NOW we now why our mother baked her cookies in quanity in November, and bedded them down in the deep freeze.  Next year she is going to try that...and join a Christmas Club at the bank.

OK, now you get the picture.  What worked, what didn't...and what you will change next year.

While you are at it...what were you out of that you need to buy next year?  Did some of your Christmas lights burn out?  Did you deplete your wrapping paper stash, or need more hooks to hang bulbs?  Whatever it is, jot it down. 

As you are out and about this month, you will find that stuff for 75% off...I know it is hard to have the stomach to buy more red wreath ribbons in January, but come December 2012 you will be happy that you did.

So that's it, that's my advice.  Take it or leave it, but remember...

It is just 356 days till Christmas!

 

 

Relax

The day after Christmas...nothing more to bake, to buy, to mail, to trim, to deck...enjoy it folks!  Just think, in just 365 days, we are going to have to do it all over again!

Hope your Christmas was Merry!   DLB

In The Days Before Walmart

For all of you that are bone tired from plodding through the mall shopping for Christmas presents...I am going to flash you back to a simpler time...when what wasn't homemade or homegrown was probably purchased at the frontier general store.

Can't you just hear the cowboy boots clomping on the wooden floor?

To be honest, Cody doesn't have a mall.  You have to drive clear to Billings, Montana for that dubious pleasure.  Nor do we have a frontier general store...the one pictured above is no longer open for business...it is part of the group of buildings that comprise Old Trail Town in Cody. 

But I thought you might like this reminder of what Christmas shopping USED to be like...in the days before Walmart.   

 

Keeping The HO!HO!HO! This Christmas

It is beginning to look a lot like Christmas in Cody.  This picture was taken outside my house last week...it snows, melts, snows, melts.  Typical December.

Inside, I have been decorating.  I may have overdone it.  (My husband said it's 'Christmas until you puke').  I can't help myself...it wouldn't feel like Christmas if I didn't deck the halls (and the bedrooms, the bathrooms, the porch, the kitchen, the dining room...ok, maybe my husband has a point).

But I do it because I enjoy it.  It is something that I love doing at Christmas.

Did you ever notice that during the Christmas season everyone uses the talents that God gave them to celebrate?  Decorators decorate, writers write, bakers bake, cooks cook, and shoppers shop.  It is an expression of love.

So I suggest this year that in order to get the most out of the season, focus on what brings you joy...and scale back on all the rest.  (For instance, I love to decorate but hate to bake...so I can simplify things by buying my cookies from Peter's bakery). 

Before things get too out of control this December, pour yourself a cup of hot chocolate, and sit down and figure out how to make it a merry Christmas instead of a stressful Christmas.  What can you eliminate that you don't particularly enjoy...that would free up more time for what really DOES make you happy? 

What can you scale down...and what can you devote more time to?  What makes you smile, what makes you crabby?

(I decided that my new rule is no Walmart after 8:30 in the morning.  Before 8:30 it is quiet, no crowds or crying children.  I can think...after 8:30 the crowds thicken, the canned Christmas carols on the loudspeaker get on my nerves and I begin to get grouchy.  I remember telling the woman at the checkout counter last year that all I wanted for Christmas was not to have to come back to Walmart!  Humbug!)

So how about it, folks!  Before things get hopping, let's figure out how to keep the HO!HO!HO! in Christmas this year!

 

 

The Merc

 
This is the Mercantile Store in the tiny town of Meeteetse...sadly it is out of business/closed right now.  I think that they held the Labor Day dance in there last year, or was it the year before? 

I want to go in there and buy bolts of calico.  Does anyone use calico anymore?  Or has calico gone the way of old merc stores in small western towns? 

I saw in the newspaper that one of the town goals was to get the Merc back up and running.  I hope they do, and I hope they sell groceries so all the elderly folks in town don't have to drive clear to Cody for food.  It is too far, especially in winter.

Meeteetse always has "BIG DOINGS" over Labor Day.  A rodeo, dance, parade...and it is lots and lots of fun.  I will miss it this year as my husband is on call, so we are stuck in town. 

But if you are out this way over the holiday, swing over to Meeteetse for some small town western fun!

Antlers, Dried Flowers and Potpourri

 
If you live in Wyoming, you generally have elk and deer horns hanging around...I finally found a good use for them!  They make the perfect place to hang flowers upside down to dry them.  The above peonies, once dry, were added to the lilacs that I dried on elk horns, and turned into this.

 
A dried flower arrangement for a bedroom.  If you are interested in this sort of thing, some of the easiest flowers to dry are roses, lilacs and peonies, because you can just hang them upside down and let the air do all the work. 

The lilacs are a little delicate though (i.e. they make a big fat mess when you are working with them), so the less that you have to handle them, the better.

I like drying these three flowers for Christmas potpourri too.  I kind of gather flower petals and pinecones and things all summer...but if I get lazy (which happens often) I will buy some cheap potpourri at Walmart for the base, and then mix it up with what I collected and dried, like slices of oranges or orange peel. 

Once really dry, I scent them with the essential oil that I get at Walmart (it is cheaper there) and put eveything into a paper bag to absorb the scent for a month of two.

Then at Christmas I go to the florist and talk them into selling me some of the little celephane bags that they put corsages in.  Tied up with a silk ribbon, homemade potpourri makes a pretty but inexpensive Christmas gift.

Because Ho Ho Ho, Christmas will be here before you know it!

Thanks Thomas Jefferson!

 
This picture was taken on Main Street in Powell, Wyoming, a little western town about 25 miles from Cody.  Powell is home to NorthWest College, which used to be a community college (2 year).  Now, however, it has also become a satellite college for the University of Wyoming, so it is possible to get a Bachelor degree without having to move to Laramie, Wyoming.

Today is President's Day, so I reread a little book about Thomas Jefferson...his life AFTER he left public life and returned to Monticello. 

Thomas Jefferson was interested in EVERYTHING, I was astonished at his skill as an inventor, a decorator and especially as a vegetable gardener.  Not to mention (but I will) his skill as an architect.  He was an avid reader up until the end of his life, did you know that his library was the basis of what is now the Library of Congress?

When Thomas Jefferson left public life, it seemed that he never looked back.  He lived fully in the present.  He lived IN the moment, and didn't waste time pining for his 'glory days'.  After retiring to Monticello, he wrote...

"The motion of my blood no longer keeps time with the tumult of the world.  It leads me to seek for happiness in the lap and love of my family, in the society of my neighbors and my books, in the wholesome occupations of my farm and my affairs, in an interest or affection in every bud that opens, in every breath that blows around me, in an entire freedom of rest, of motion, of thought, owing account to myself alone for my hours and actions."

Further, he nailed what motivated him during this season, this twilight of his life when he wrote...

"It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquility and occupation, which give happiness."

Life consists of different seasons or stages, and maybe what I can learn from Thomas Jefferson is not to live in either the future nor the past, but to be as alive as possible in whatever season of life that you happen to find yourself.

Thanks, Thomas Jefferson...all these years later your life still serves as an inspiration to the rest of us. 

Happy President's Day!

 

 

Happy New Year!

I woke in the middle of the night, probably due to the party goers at the Irma on Main Street whooping it up at midnight, and got up and dug out an extra blanket.  I flicked on the weather channel really quick, and saw that the temperature was minus 14 degrees, and I have no idea what the wind chill was, nor did I wait to find out before diving back under the blankets.

So here is hoping you started off the New Year a little warmer than we did!  Happy New Year!

And P.S.   I am all done whining about Christmas!  Tomorrow I am packing all the decorations up until next year, and am moving on!

But I am really going to miss those twinkle lights...

 

 

The Gift Thing

 
^{I got bored with this room being a library, because I always read in bed and never went in there...so now it is a dining room, and it is getting a lot more activity...mostly because it is one of the warmest rooms in this drafty old house.}

There is something about the American culture...and that is if a little is good, a whole lot more is gonna be better.  The problem is, more is just sometimes plain overwhelming.  And that is what I have found to be the case with Christmas presents.  Welcome to Step 3 of simplifying Christmas!

America is consumer driven.  I read that this is not the case in Italy, where Christmas presents are usually the homegrown type...a jar of olive oil or something edible.  But in America we mostly go and buy something...and knowing that, the commercials begin to bombard us around September.  Honestly, if I see that coffee pot robot commercial one more time I am throwing a brick through the TV. 

And if I really did that my husband would probably throw the brick at me. What is it about men and TV?  But, I digress...

Gift giving is really a personal thing, so I don't really have any advice about simplifying it, but I will tell you that this coming year I am going to give more homegrown type presents.  Framed pictures, photo albums, homemade potpourri or flower arrangements that are dried.  And to do this I am going to have to be really disciplined, or else I will leave it too late and end up buying stuff.

Also, I am going to scour garage sales.  Yes, garage sales.  You wouldn't believe the antiques you can pick up for a song at a garage sale.  I will especially look for antique vases to arrange flowers in.  Old copper kettles, unique picture frames...you never know what you are going to find that you can turn into a creative gift. 

I had an aunt this year that had some old Christmas ornaments, over 35 years old.  She sent one to me and one to my sister...I have it hanging on my tree and just love it.  I will think of her every time I look at it.  What a great idea, to give something with memories attached to it!  How much more treasured than the Walmart present.

The other thing that I am going to do in 2011 is to add one or two people that I buy gifts for to my calendar each month, and spread out the shopping over the year.  Because I end up buying everything late, I have to mail it Priority to get it there by Christmas.  Much cheaper to be  organized and just mail it First Class.

And last but not least, Walmart and most other stores have wrapping paper and bows on sale for 1/2 price now.  I bought some and threw it into the drawer where I keep wrapping paper. 

So now that is ONE LESS THING that I will have to do NEXT Christmas!