Dear Reader:

Yesterday I dropped by Steve and Lassie’s house to drop off a package for Lassie. After I parked the car I just sat a little longer in it… admiring the Christmas decorations on the porch. I could feel myself ‘tear’-ing up at the memories of that old house.

Today is Poppy’s birthday and perhaps it was this realization that put me in such a nostalgic mood. Happy Birthday Poppy…hoping all the angels (including Dee Dee) bring you the biggest, best birthday cake ever! May you now remain forever young!

Steve and Lassie bought this house from Dee-Dee and Poppy after they decided it was just too much up-keep with retirement looming and so, they decided to move into a rental house they owned close by and fix it up.

But oh…the celebrations that were spent there were so special…from the famous Dingle Easter Egg Hunt for the children each spring… to the mouth-watering Christmas dinners …the memories of which lasted longer than any gifts. This house was my children’s second home and they loved it…as did I. It was a home where you felt love and ‘loved’ from the minute you walked in.

I remember being so happy when Steve and Lassie bought the house and kept it in the family. It would have been heart-breaking to ride by and see “outsiders” living there. Instead…How lucky we have been to be able to ride by all the years and know it is still there…and more beautiful than ever! Thanks Steve and Lassie!

There is one big, tall Christmas decoration on the porch that takes my breath away each year and makes me “covet” (yes “covet”) it. Take a look! A grape-vine Christmas tree.

Steve filled me in on some of its history. He said the “tree” is almost twenty-five years old. Lassie saw a grape-vine tree somewhere and came home all excited about it. She asked Steve if he thought he could make a frame for it.

Steve did think about it for a few moments and then replied “Yes.” He told me he “hog-wired” the frame which wasn’t easy… but the hardest labor came with twisting the grape-vine branches around and around…making each size smaller and then connecting the branches together. As you can imagine it was a long and arduous task…but one made with love.

*Lassie emailed me just a few minutes ago (last evening) and filled in some more history of the grape-vine wreath Christmas Tree for me.

Steve and I made that tree the first year my shop was in Cauthen’s.  I needed a tree that didn’t take too much of my floor space. I’ve always enjoyed it’s unique look. Been using it on the front porch ever since I closed the shop.

(I thought Lassie had just started with the biggest grape-vine wreaths, then the smaller ones, and then the smallest piled on top of each other…but no…there are/were no individual wreaths…the “tree” is connected by intertwining each grape-vine branch with the next and the next and so on….impressive!)

Now, 25 years later, it still stands proudly on the front porch each Christmas reminding them and the family of the time when they first built it. A beautiful past memory that still lives on today.

The beautiful Christmas tree inside was filled with oodles of hand-crocheted lace snowflakes. Steve said his mother and grandmother made these ornaments for years. He remembered both women starch-ironing the final products.

Today….some people call them “snowflake dolies.” The homemade ones are time-consuming, but like the grape-vine tree…made to last a lifetime.

Here are some pictures of snowflakes I have on my tree…some old, some new…along with cotton ball angels, handkerchief angels, and pine cone angels.

I love ornaments made from nature and creativity.  And isn’t that what Christmas brings to us each year…a rendevouz between past and present?

So until tomorrow…May we bring the best of the past to the table of the present and give thanks for those who came before us.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh