God bless you and send you a Happy New Year!

Hello, friends!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

I love this time of the year so much. I mean, Christmas. Duh.

But there's something pretty fantastic about New Years, too. It's like...New Years. NEW!

New is good.

I'll get back to that, but for now....

CHRISTMAS!

Our day was so beautiful. In the happy, crazy, chaotic way it always is with my family. *Wiggle eyebrows.*

We had midnight mass at our house, which was awesome and a little bit difficult. I mean, not having to leave your house for church? Niiiiice.

Having to wait till a quarter after 2am to put the presents out and fill stockings? Buuuuummmmer.

We had the little kids write a letter to Santa to let him know not to come till after mass. I mean, we can't have the fellow dropping down the chimney in the middle of church, now can we?

We think of stuff like that.

It turned out to be quite lovely. :) But, being that it was midnight, I have no photos of the whole ordeal. *sniffle*
And it was fabulous, too. Moments that would have been nice as a picture.Like leaving a very shakey 'thank you' from Santa on the "Enjoy the cookies!" note that the little girls left. *Nods knowingly*

Awesome. Just take my word for it, honky-tonky?

Christmas morning, 6am, coffee (lots of coffee), and general giddiness. Candles and singing Joy to the World. Stockings and Christmas music. And then....
Squealing and shouting and laughing and crying.

We are emotional people, okay? Happy things make us cry.

Here. Pictures sum things up better.

That terrifying gray head? I LOVE HIM!!

Treskie is the best. How many people do you know would be thoughtful enough to get their totally weird sister a giant, rubber head? Not too flippin' many!
It is so fun to hit him. My whole family admitted to that after a little persuading. *Grin*

Then my little sisters went out and skated on the street. Yep. We're those people. It's delightful.

After the whole morning thing, I forgot about my camera and just enjoyed the day to it's fullest.

You know, music, family and Christmas stories. 

And here we are; New Years Day! Hot diggety-dog! 

We brought the new year in with style, let me tell you! Which means we had a wonderful dinner, took a lot of selfies, watched "The Librarian" waited around till midnight, had a toast, and went off to bed. *Insert noise-maker sounds here*

I was going to post something meaningful, inspiring and beautiful. But that didn't happen. Clearly.

I'll be popping back on later this week to do some New Years-y stuff. But for now I'm going to grab my notebook, a cup of something delicious and a pen (In that order) and do doodley/creative/lyric-writing stuff. It's gonna be epic!

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, 

and Happy New Year!

God Bless!
Amy

Song of the Week.

Hello, All!

IT'S ONLY A WEEK UNTIL CHRISTMAS!

To commemorate how freakin' exciting this is, I am going to post a song............

I suppose you probably guessed that from the title of the post. 

It was fairly obvious.

*Shrug*

This song has been a lot more a favorite of mine this year than it's been before. Isn't it funny how you can know a song for ages, and then suddenly you relate to it more, or for whatever reason you appreciate it more, and then it's like hearing it for the first time. I love that about music. It always manages to grow up with you.

 It's not a super Christmas-y song, I suppose. It's pretty much a sadder, prettier version of I'll be Home for Chrismtas. It makes me feel all nostalgic and fluttery inside. Happy and sad, you know what I mean?

~All With You~

On the wind the snow is drifting

Dances 'round my weary feet

Faraway a bell is ringing

Echoes through the empty streets

Oh, I can see you

I can still play make believe

Oh, I can feel you near me

I'll be sending a thousand kisses

I am far but I am all with you

On the night the air is bracing

Lights are gracing every street

I can hear the children singing

Midnight bringing hopes of peace

Oh, I can see you

I can still play make believe

Oh, I can feel you near me

I'll be sending you a thousand kisses

I am far but I am all with

I'll be sending a thousand wishes

Know on Christmas I am all with you

I'll be sending you a thousand kisses

I am far but I am all with

I'll be sending a thousand wishes

Know on Christmas I am all with you.

Well, there's that. Isn't it pretty? 

God Bless!

Amy

Christmas Tag!

Good to my word, I'm back! You didn't think I was gonna do it, did you? Well, that's what you get for being a doubting Thomas. *Smirk*

I got a very unexpected afternoon off yesterday. 
We had wind. Impressive, I-do-what-I-want wind.
It knocked the power out of most of the town and thus, I got to leave work three hours early.

It was Da Bomb. 

And since there was no power most places, my sister also got off early from her job. So we took full advantage of this freedom and put up our Christmas tree which we've been wanting to put up but haven't had time to do.

Amazingly, our little house still had power! Yay for us!

It was quite possibly the nicest day I've had in a months. 

`This is also the fourth tree I've decorated this year! 

I did two at my job, helped with my parents, and finally got around to my own. And you know what? They've all been fun!

Okay. A tag from Bella. A tag especially designed by Bella. Bella's tag.

That tag.

The Rules are: *Drum roll please*

1.) Link back to the person who tagged you----Bella!

2.) Answer the Questions

3.)Tag five (or more) people.----Not gonna happen! lol.

1.) When does the Christmas season officially 'start' in your house?

I tend to split hairs over this question. The Advent season starts four weeks before Christmas and right around the 6-8th of December is when some decorations start to sneak in and Christmas music begins to take over. 

2.) What is your earliest memory of Christmas?

Getting up at some ridiculous hour on Christmas morning (Like...2am) to watch the Christmas tree blink. 

That sounded kind of creepy. 

All us kid would wake up and move out to the living room with a pile of blankets and spend most of the night dozing on and off on the couch. There was always Christmas music playing gently in the background, and the only thing lighting the house was the tree. It was so beautifully magical and peaceful. 

3.) What is something that is iconic-ally Christmas for you or your family?

A mad-house of cooking and baking on Christmas Eve. Seriously, stuff gets real on Christmas Eve! Everybody has one or two cookie/something-sweet recipes that they're working on, not to mention all the prep-work for our Christmas dinner. 

The house smells Ah-Maz-Ing.

4.) What are some of your Christmas Traditions? 

There are really too many to talk about. *Eyeballs list of traditions*

5.) What is one of the traditions that you want to carry on even after you're married?

This is going to start off sounding really depressing, but it isn't.

My Grandpa died very near Christmas when I was just a baby, so Mom and baby-me weren't home for Christmas that year.

So Dad had everyone save a present for the Epiphany so that Mom could still have a 'little Christmas' with the family.

And we've done that every year since. It's my favorite of the traditions we have. 

6.) What if your favorite thing when preparing for Christmas? The Baking, decorating or cleaning?

I'd have to say....All of the above. Is that an answer? They go hand in hand...in hand. 

7.) What is a special/unique Christmas memory?

When I was six years old, my Mummy made me a beautiful cloth doll. For whatever reason, that doll became my bff. I kid you not. Ask any of my sisters. My doll and I were tight. She was probably the best present I ever received.

9.) What are some of your favorite Christmas cartoons?
I love Mickey's Christmas Carol. In fact, that might be my favorite version of the Christmas Carol.
The Grinch...just because.

The First Christmas, which is an adorable puppet cartoon about a little shepherd boy that goes blind...But it has a beautiful, happy ending. 

11.) Do you have a real Christmas tree or an artificial tree?

It's a fake. *le sigh*....I really love real trees,so this is a source of a little sadness for me. But not too much. It's a nice little tree and it doesn't shed needles. 

12.) Do you have a favorite Christmas book/story?

Several, actually. There's a book called, The Long Winter, which is a collection of short stories that I read every Christmas. It's awesome.

I LOVE The Gift of the Magi. It's a wonderful story that makes me cry the happiest of tears. :) If you're going to read it, try to find the version illustrated by P.J. Lynch. 

I mean, look at his illustrations!

13.) What is your favorite Christmas song?
*Muses long and hard.* That question is pretty much impossible. I have more 'favorite' Christmas songs than my family has traditions!
But this version of Angels we have Heard on High was just released on youtube and it's awesome! The live nativity at the end of the video broke the Guinness Book of World Records as the biggest ever! Which sort of gives me chills. :) It's gorgeous!

All done. 

I'm quite done-in from all those question! Time for Doctor Who Christmas Special, I think.

Good night and God Bless!
Amy

In which I do stuff.

Hello.

It's been over a week since my last post.

I feel ashamed.

But I have news!

1.) It's coming on Christmas...They're cutting down treeeeees! They're putting up Reindeer and singing songs of Joy and Peeeace!.....I wish I had a river.....
No. Sorry. Got a bit carried away there.
I simply meant, Christmas is coming and I have been shopping (and I really need to start wrapping!) and  work is busy with Christmas-y floral arrangements. And thus far I've decorated three Christmas Trees and I will be soon decorating a fourth. So I haven't had time to blog.

2.) My boss has decided to get me the education to be a real floral designer, so I have now found myself enrolled in an online design class. Which I can complete in as little as six months.
And as awesome and terrifying as that is, I have even less time now than before. So.....

3.) In my free time, instead of blogging or wrapping presents, I've been watching Flashpoint. And you guys should watch that show! So so good. I've got five episodes left. Which makes me very sad. Five seasons of awesome, and I'm almost done! *Weeps*

I will probably do a real review of that show sometime soon. Soon-ish. January-ish?

4.) I am reading Raven Boys and I love them. I'm only on book two, but I'm having trouble putting it down. Which is a bad thing because of aforementioned business. *Le sigh*



Whatever.

I have a couple of tags, so I shall do one of them today.

I was nominated by Hilda to do Five Fictional Places I'd like to visit.

1.) Middle Earth. 
All of it. Why doesn't Gandalf show up at my place and hustle me off on an adventure? ......Scratch that. I have a fair idea why. And I don't like it.
I would love to consider myself a good fit for Rohan. But I think we all know I'd be a hobbit. Family, Food and comfort.

2.) Redwall. 
I'm not exaggerating one tiny bit when I say I was obsessed with all of the Redwall books. I lived in Mossflower Woods for a good three years of my life.
It was my first and probably most consuming  fandom.

3.) Eddis. From the UNBELIEVABLY AWESOME ATTOLIA SERIES!
Reason number one--Eugenides. He is wonderful and amazing and I'd like to meet him. He is my favorite fictional character right now. *Grin* I luf him.
Reason number two. The land sounds beautiful, full of hills and olive trees and ocean and cliffs.
Reason number three. It reminds me of ancient Greece.

4.) Ingary--Which is where Howl is from. You know,  Howl's Moving Castle.

I feel like a terrible person! This is hard for me!....The first three came like, BAM!  Four took a little though and five is....really hard.

5.) AH! Asgard! I'd totally visit Asgard. Sign me up for that!

Right. I'm off.

I have some pictures to post and that sort of thing, so I PROMISE I shall return soon. Tomorrow, most likely.

Take care, you all!
Amy

Respect the thing!

It's the first week of Advent! 

So.....

Blogging.....

Or the lack thereof.......


Oh well. I'm a rotten blogger these days and I'm really not sure how to remedy that. Other than to start blogging more regularly again....*Snicker.* Let's not get too carried away!

I read these blogs where people actually plan their posts and put some serious though into what they want to say and I'm totally impressed by them.

Me, on the other hand. Well, that's a different story.

Take today for example. I have half and hour to whip up some sort of post. Yep. Half and hour to let my brilliance ooze forth.

*Sigh*

Basically, I'm just popping by to post a song and then I have to head out to do things.

Right so, first week of advent, I am going to post an advent  song. I've undoubtedly posted it before but I don't care. It's my blog and all that. I shall post what I want. 

This is probably my favorite version of O come Emmanuel. I love how strong and wild it sounds, especially when it crescendos. Ah-maz-ing!

I have a list of posts I want to do over this upcoming month. For real! And I'm hoping to take much better care of my blog. At least for the month of December. 

Because Christmas stuff is the bomb-diggety!

And I have a tag I need to do.

So I should be around here a lot more. Here's hoping, anyway.

And now my half an hour is up! Thanks for stopping by and reading this pathetic little post. You guys are the best!

God Bless!

Amy

They say, He's here this night.

They say, there shines a star above tonight.

Here's the post where I basically unload all my pictures on you guys. I didn't want it to be like this! I wanted to do little Christmas-y/Advent-y posts throughout the last week or two, but work has been rather annoyingly busy and I've been working more (a lot more) than I was originally scheduled.

Yeah.

It was one of those weeks. *Sigh*

But it's Christmas Eve and it's been lovely. With lots of baking, and cooking and music. What with the pine and all that food being prepared, the house smelled like Christmas.

Anyway, pictures!

I wrapped presents on Saturday. All my presents.

And I made lots of pine garland. :) Pine garland is the best!

And a couple of arrangements for home and for friends and for Church tomorrow.

I've got to say, I've done a lot of arranging over the last few weeks. It's been fun.

Baby Jesus's crib. 

Pine, pine, and more pine.

The Church arrangements are my favorite.

And the poinsettias are lovely.

A bit ago, we painted the windows.

And we all rallied round and learned a new Mass for Christmas.

How many girls does it take to hang garland? 

It takes teamwork! And Skills!

 And our pretty creche.

They say to follow the light

They say it's gonna be bright 

tonight

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He lays in a manger tight

They say His birth will make things right 

tonight

That's all I've got. Except;

Merry Christmas!

God Bless!

Amy

In which I realize today's date.

Hello, Peoples.

It's one week till Christmas . One Week! This is both joyous news and a bit startling. I mean...one week!

And I haven't posted any of the stuff I've been up to. I haven't posted anything in a while. This week is looking rather alarmingly busy to boot...

But I like a bit of happy, hectic chaos. *Nods uncertainly*

I'll probably end up posting all the decorating pictures in one massive clump. :) Like, "There! It is done!"
That's how most everything in my life is. Carefully planned out--then; heck with all the plans! Now's the time to wing it! I seem to work the best under a bit of pressure. Deadlines really do motivate a person.


But enough about what I haven't done.

Sunday was a bright, clear sort of day, so Treskie and I went out into the meadow/forest to cut some pine boughs for decorating and to snap some pictures. It was rather jolly.

We found this beautiful, secluded spot where a stream had frozen over and everything was just a blinding mixture of glittering snow and sky.

It was just nice. 

I remembered to bring 'props' but didn't remember to pose with them, so I just clumped them together in a picture. It would have been a shame to have lugged them along and not use them at all! So, two ornaments, a candy cane, a pine cone and a scarf randomly stuck in the snow. Its't it lovely? lol. 

Later on Sunday, some of us went out to watch The Desolation of Smaug.

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It was great fun.

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There was not nearly enough of Bilbo.*Grin*

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Martin Freeman absolutely nails his role. The scene with he and Smaug? Teriffic!

I really loved Bard too.

sourece

I felt there was a bit too much of the elves. :) And I didn't understand the whole Tauriel and Kili thing. That was odd. Though Kili is a very cool dwarf. 

Swords.

Dragon.

Bilbo.

It was much fun.

But I have things to do and places to go, so I'm going to leave you all now. 

God Bless!

Amy