Fa La Lalala

'Tis the season and I'm searching for the spirit.  It took all afternoon to put the Christmas tree together.  Whatever possessed me to buy a tree that has to have every single branch fluffed out and inserted separately?  Oh, right, it was the five-dollar price tag.  I am my mother's daughter.  Mother would buy a grocery bag full of canned foods that had no label because they were only a dime each.  Dinner was an adventure:  three cans of peas and perhaps a can of dog food (fortunately, we had a dog).

While I was busy with the project of the day, Ralph and Celeste took turn playing in the cardboard fort, hunkering down and then leaping out to ambush one another.  I did, in fact, get the tree put together and in place and it has two ornaments already!  One was a gift last year from Deb and Craig, the other is the reindeer from Mary.  I am sworn to put up lights and finish the decorating today.  Or maybe tomorrow.  Or not.

Camille had been out scouting for fireplaces just in case the repairman who won't be there until Saturday can't fix her present pellet stove.  In an attempt to put a dent in the leftovers, I made a turkey potpie and invited Cam for dinner and a chance to get warm.  The potpie turned out well and there's only enough left over (that word again) for dinner tonight.

I know what I'll be watching today.  "Our Grapes Have Tender Vines" (1945, Edward G. Robinson, Agnes Moorehead, and Margaret O'Brien).  It's a wonderful, feel-good movie, and bad guy Robinson plays an uncharacteristic, gentle farmer (and Norwegian, to boot) and he does a masterful job.  There are scenes in which he takes his daughter in the early morning to watch a circus train unload.  It brings me memories of doing that with our Kids.  We couldn't afford to take them to the circus proper, but we did go to see the animals and clowns come down from the train and parade through the streets to the grounds.

It's a winter-white world out there this morning, frost as heavy as snow.  That's enough to say that it's the season.  Ho ho ho, and a hey-nonny-nonny!