On the Fourth Day of Christmas

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, everywhere I go. Except at my house.

This is my super-busy time of year at work, fundraising for the kids at Woodbourne, and arranging all of the donations of the Christmas presents for them. We shot a video on Saturday, which will be on-line shortly.

I recently found an old picture of Christmas at the house where I grew up. We had a great time decorating the house, because we always had a large party on Christmas night.  We had two columns on the front porch and we wrapped them in ropes of pine. The front door, with its fanlight window, was always decorated with a huge wreath, and sometimes even more. This particular year, I made a huge della robia-style piece, with magnolia leaves, apples, oranges, lemons, and a pineapple as the centerpiece. It was on a huge piece of foam and I remember that it was a warm winter and everything started dripping!  Looking at this picture, I realize that I should have divided the roping and hung it so it was facing down on both sides.

Inside, we wrapped the mahogany columns with pine, too. The large fireplace in the living room had pine roping draped on it, and my mother always used bright red candles in the candlesticks. The image below is my favourite shot of the house. I love the way the light is hitting the fireplace. Just out of view is a long window seat where we used to pile down pillows, and read or nap in the sun. There were little pieces that my parents had collected on their travels, scattered around the house. These pieces only came out at Christmas and included things like nativity scenes from Spain, tiny angel orchestras from the UK and much more. We always hung a tiny mobile of Santas from the large chandelier in the hallway. It danced in the breeze anytime the front door opened. While you all can’t see the house decorated for the holidays, I can.