Balance and the Christmas Tree

Started out an absolutely gorgeous day with yoga. I didn't get to it last week because of Thanksgiving, but I had no such distractions this morning. We worked on "inner spiral," which meant balance poses that involve twisting. I can walk up the wall now without breaking as sweat, but I still have a hard time standing on one leg or other balance-on-one-foot poses. My trying hard must have impressed some of my classmates. After class, two college students came up to me and kindly told me how impressed they were. They seemed really sweet, and I was glad to have met them.

Went right to the Collingswood Library after leaving Yogawood. In addition to shelving and organizing DVDs, the head of the library had a fun job for me. He asked me to pull Christmas or holiday-themed books from the fiction section for the displays on the front of each fiction shelf. I came up with everything from a book of Charles Dickens' Christmas stories (including A Christmas Carol and Cricket on the Hearth) to John Grisham's Skipping Christmas to Joanna Fluke's two holiday Hannah Swenson books.

It took me longer to do the display than I thought it would. It was quarter of 1 before I finally made it out of the library. It was even nicer by that point, chillier than earlier in the week but not too bad, probably in the upper 50s. I had a pricy but tasty Turkey Ranch Foccacia sandwich at a very busy Saladworks, then went across the street to run some errands. I needed contact lens solution at Rite Aid and finally got around to getting their store savings card. Desperately needed milk at WaWa - the milk I got from Rite Aid had finally gone sour a few days ago.

Rode straight home after leaving WaWa and found quite a surprise when I arrived. My first Christmas present of the year was sitting in the mail box - my annual Vermont Country Store gift card from my best friend Lauren Miller. She always gives me a couple of gift cards, including that one. I'll have to take a look at their sales.

When I got upstairs, I made Cranberry-Pear Dark Chocolate Chip Bread to get rid of the last of the cranberries from Thanksgiving and the final Farm Market pear that was getting mushy. When the bread was in the oven, I began my favorite part of holiday decorating - the Christmas Tree.

The tree takes me a while to do on my own. I did manage to get the lights right, not too much or too loose, but I somehow popped one of the lights off and had to chase after it. (I found it right inside the closet across from the tree, next to the dining area.) I use three gold garlands to get the right fullness, but the effect is so pretty. I also use bead garlands (one silver bead garland I've had since college and two bead necklaces in holiday colors, plus a pretty swirl-bead necklace my grandma gave me that has a broken clasp) and a small ribbon garland (also from Grandma - it came on a package she gave me and was too festive to throw away). The deep red cloth wound around the base of the tree is an old tablecloth of Mom's. It was too big for my table in Wildwood, so I threw it around the tree...and it looked so nice, I've used it for the tree ever since.

I went for a short walk between doing the garland and doing the ornaments. I'm glad I did. It was too nice to spend the whole day indoors! It was so nice, I was perfectly fine in my black coat, no earmuffs or scarf needed. A lot of people already have their Christmas lights out. Last week's unusually warm weather must have encouraged people to pull them out early.

It took two hours just to put up all of the ornaments I've collected over the years. Some of the fancier ones, like the glitter-covered movie clapper, the beautiful Victorian-style glass heart, and the elegant magenta teardrop one that looks like a 50s ornament were Christmas presents from Mom, who picks up elaborate ornaments at gift shops in Cape May. Most of the character ones - the Winnie the Pooh angel and his honey, Scooby and Shaggy on a sled, Yogi Bear with a pic-a-nic basket full of candy canes, the WebKinz Google and Zangoz, Rudolph and the Misfit Toys, the Disney Cinderella - were given to me by friends or bought from thrift shops or after-Christmas sales.

It took me so long to do the tree, I didn't get to dinner until past 7:30...and I began at 4! I made a quick dinner of salmon with sauteed broccoli and mushrooms while I watched the documentaries Christmas Past, on English holiday customs, and part of Christmas Unwrapped, a similar History Channel show on the origins of Christmas in general and of customs in the US.