Lanier texted me yesterday: Double digits. (sad-face, broken heart emoji) me: What??? (Fearing GH’s stats had suddenly gone into the toilet. Was our first podcast attempt that bad?) Lanier: December 10. Oh, that. Yes. The month goes by way too fast for our liking. me: I know. I need to cut back on sleeping… How these…
I hate the word: rules. I’ve lived decades as a to-the-letter rule follower, bending over backward to please others and seeking to satisfy my own stringent standards. But—phew!— somewhere around birthday number forty I began to want to *defenestrate anything that smells like a rule. This happens when we get older—I breathe easier now and seek…
I took my mother to a Christmas luncheon for her widows’ group yesterday. It was held at a lovely old tearoom downtown—a real Atlanta institution—with gilted fixtures and age-spotted mirrors and crimson roses on every table. The restaurant is located in the former coach house of a magnificent Shutze mansion, and after the luncheon we…
Laura’s note: We’re honored to bring you a post by our friend and expat, Charles McNair, who tells of Christmas in Colombia–and tells it darn well. Charles is an acclaimed (Pulitzer-nominated!) two-time novelist (if you haven’t read Land O’Goshen or Pickett’s Charge, I’m jealous–you’re in for a treat) and continues to write full-time for his…
It is my pleasure to announce that the winner of the drawing for a copy of Phyllis Tickle’s What the Heart Already Knows is Julie Morgan! Julie, if you will send me your mailing address via the secure Contact form, I will dispatch this wonderful book without delay! Thank you all for your warm response…
For twelve years, Laura and I have been getting together in early December to celebrate our excitement in the unfolding season—and to remind each other of our highest ideals in the midst of manifold opportunities to over-do. From the beginning we’ve called it our Advent Tea, and though the location changes from house to house,…
My tree is up! Around here, we mark tree-trimming day with great celebration. (One must make a big to-do where one can.) Before we attacked the unsuspecting Fraser fir standing in our den, the five of us kicked off a rainy weekend morning with a leisurely breakfast, followed by reading out loud from God With…
December 26th of 2003 found me rather blue. I’ve never done well with Christmas Day being over, and it was too early in our now long-standing practice of observing the twelve full days of Christmas for it to seem “real” yet. The rest of the world had moved on, and I felt very solitary in…
Lanier’s note: Luke Boggs is not only a talented corporate speech writer, he’s married to our own dear Laura. Here’s a piece he wrote (and the Georgia Public Radio broadcast of it!) on the joys of the manly side of putting up the Christmas tree. Enjoy! Oh Tannenbaum! A Regular Guy’s Guide to Handling…
Greetings from my fireside on this cozy December day. The tree is up, bright against the dreary weather outside, and I’m intentionally savoring its gentle radiance in company of three of my five cats on the sofa beside me and a sleepy dog curled up in a chair close at hand. It’s been a busy…
In Lanier I have a partner in Christmas crime—if overdoing the holiday is delinquent behavior, we’re convicted felons. ‘Tis the season when we meet for Advent Tea and promise each other (once again) we won’t hustle but savor. All month long, we hold each other accountable as we walk the line between the fanciful and…
Dear Lanier, Having gone to bed just after midnight, I couldn’t sleep with the realization that today is December 1. For so many years you and I have pinged each other on this day and said, more or less, let it commence! I tossed and turned through the wee hours, not out of trouble or…
Few things are as dear to me about Advent as my quiet morning times of prayer and devotion by the Christmas tree. With a sturdy mug of cinnamon-laced coffee and maybe a candle or two, I love to sit in my low chair watching the twinkle lights dance with their own reflection in the windows,…
Before there was Lanier, one of my co-conspirators in Christmas was my dad’s mother, whom I called Nanny. Standing at just under five feet, Nanny was a spunky clothes-loving, perfume-wearing, kitchen floor-scrubbing (every single morning!) British Canadian. My dad was her only child, and, being her sole granddaughter, I was the beneficiary of countless games…
It was a long, happy Thanksgiving weekend of traveling over the river and through the woods (and back). The children were home from school in all their chaotic glory, and out came the first hints of real Christmas–not October’s Costco Christmas. But today I am savoring this quiet morning at home. I put my youngest…
I just love this weekend—it’s so delightfully tangled with the remnants of Thanksgiving and the beginnings of Advent. Gratitude, tradition, anticipation and longing all have their place in these shifting days wherein pumpkins and Christmas trees meet each other in passing and late autumn dusk gives way to twinkle lights. We celebrated Ivester Thanksgiving on…
Every year on the first Sunday in Advent I pull a tattered scrap of paper from last year’s Christmas folder and tape it between my kitchen windows–the one place in all the house where I know I will see something every single day. Perhaps eventually I’ll get around to having this prayer made into a…
We won’t bring our tree home until Sunday–an excursion in which our Australian shepherd, Bonnie, is an invaluable member, and which generally includes the once-a-year fuel-up at Waffle House (followed by a gingerbread latte from Starbucks for me). But that doesn’t mean that the holiday spirit isn’t already stirring in Ruff House. I’ve been bustling…
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