A Little Village by the Sea...

Back from the Tree Lighting, and Malia and Kassia passed out in the car on the way home. Guess the decorating of our own tree will wait until tomorrow evening. We have church in the morning and the Christmas Parade at noon. Jared is supposed to march in it, playing his saxophone. However, his throat has really been bothering him, so we'll see how he feels tomorrow. Then later tomorrow night is Sierra's Field Hockey Awards Banquet. Non-stop...as usual.

As mentioned earlier, we cut down our own tree this year. In the recent years, we've gotten one of those already-cut-1/2 dried-out ones sold in a parking lot. They come from Maine or Canada and the needles fall off not long after we put it up. Our house has forced hot-air heat...which doesn't do any favors to a tree. SO, we found a local tree farm...and searched for "THE" tree...


It was fun for the first 2 minutes...when all of a sudden the owners dog decided to torment us. I didn't want it to startle the kids, so I said, "Dog". I expected Kassia would be frightened, but it was SIERRA who ran like a bat out of hell ... full speed...through the tree farm. She was screaming and heading for Steve. Jared was in hot-pursuit, right behind her. The dog was only a Springer Spaniel...but no amount of me saying, "stop running...don't ever run from a dog" would make her stop. The dog was very annoying...kept jumping and harassing everyone. The kids kept 1/2 an eye on the dog at all times...so what was supposed to be a fun experience, was rather disappointing. They finally accepted the fact that the dog wasn't a ferocious beast...and ignored him. We eventually found a tree that Steve felt was an acceptable height for our house. I like FAT trees with lots of space to hang my ornament collection. I've bought each kid an ornament each Christmas, and it always has something to do with the past year. As you can imagine, the collection is rather large. I digress...back to THE tree (standing in front of it).

Daddy starts chopping it down...

and Shawny insisted on helping...

so Kassia needed to help too...

Jared wasn't feeling so well, so he was content to sit back and take in the atmosphere...

Mission accomplished, we tied it to the roof...

...then we set up a lot of the Christmas decorations at home. The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, the snow-globes and music boxes were put on display...and we headed off to the "Village Tree Lighting". There is something very special about our small town. Lots of special somethings really. It has all of the charm one could wish for, friendly people, wonderful atmosphere, a tremendous sense of community and has some of the most remarkable scenery on the East Coast. Speaking of charm...the annual tree lighting is reminiscent of a modern Normal Rockwell painting. There's the countdown to the moment when the lights illuminate the tree in the center of the Village Green --which we nearly missed as we were sprinting from our car listening to 10-9-8-7-6 ...

and residents gather around the tree to sing Christmas Carols together. "Seafaring Santa" is there (he arrives on a boat into the harbor earlier in the day). We had a bit of trouble connecting with Santa at first, but the kids patiently waited for him to make his rounds.

After the caroling was complete, we wandered around the Village Green to see the other items on display. We spent a few moments enjoying the nativity...and seeing baby Jesus. It's important to remember the REAL meaning of Christmas...

Then on our way out, we took the chance for the girls to sit on Santa's lap...Kasi insisted on it. She wasn't very shy around him. Santa gave the girls some squishy tree thing and told them to squeeze it 3 times on Christmas Eve and their wish will come true. THANKS Santa, got a crystal ball for Mom and Dad?!?!

Shawn got a baseball from Santa, which he thought was pretty cool.

Miss Kasi played peek-a-boo with the animated St. Nick in the chimney...

then we headed home. Earlier today, I pulled one of my prized possessions out of the attic. It's my very own Village. It used to be so special to me to set this up every year, but once Shawn was born, I quit doing it. He seemed quite obsessed with touching it when he was a baby, and it would have devastated me to have any of it break...so I put it away. Then I had Malia, then Kassia...just too many curious fingers. This year, I decided it was time to try setting it up again. Kasi, Malia and Shawn loved watching me put the people in their places, and enjoyed listening to me explain what the buildings were. We picked up some "fake snow" and Shawn helped me sprinkle it on the village when we got home tonight. We sang, "let it snow, let it snow, let it snow..." as we lit it up.

I'm looking forward to getting the tree decorated tomorrow and hopefully Jared will feel well enough to be in the parade. Today was a special day in our little village by the sea. :)