When I was in girl scouts oh so many years ago, we had a song we sang in rounds: “Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver, and the other gold.”

For the next few weeks, I’ll be insanely busy with a cross-country move, and while I want to be here in this space with you each week, you wouldn’t get the best I have to offer. So I’ll remind you each week that my book (the new friend) is available—in paperback and as an ebook through Lulu—and would make a great gift under the tree. Each week, I’ll also offer a popular repost from Christmas 2012 (an old friend).

And I promise to reply to your comments as soon as possible. Thanks for your grace and patience. Happy Advent!

Tis the season of Advent, a joyful time in the calendar as we prepare for Christmas. My husband and I got an unusually early start on our Christmas decorations this year, and our weekend of stringing up lights and hanging stockings on the mantel has me pondering the colors of Christmas.

In the coming weeks, I’ll focus on a different color of Christmas, starting today with the color white.

One of my favorite Christmas decorations: a white ceramic angel holding a book and lit from within

In our western culture, white represents many good qualities: innocence, purity, light, goodness. We sing songs dreaming of a white Christmas and get a little excited (at least in some parts of the country) if the weather forecast calls for snow to blanket everything in its stillness and quiet on that magical day.

White is the color you get when all other colors get absorbed. I think the Christmas season is a bit like that, absorbing all of our prayers and dreams and hopes and expectations, even our fears and sorrows.

A little white book
I have Enuma Okoro to thank for opening my eyes to this color of the season. I’m reading her latest book Silence and Other Surprising Invitations of Advent. The simple white cover drew me to the book, probably because I’ve found myself craving simplicity more than ever this year.

Read the rest of this original post.

What I didn’t point out to you two years ago was the crack in the angel’s right wing. When I was packing her away the year I bought her, I was being careful to support the wings in bubble wrap. So careful that the whole thing slipped out of my hands as I was putting it in a box. Her wing snapped off, and I superglued it back on. I found myself thinking of her recently, wondering how she will fare in the move from North Carolina to California. Here’s hoping she arrives with her wings still intact!