The colors of Christmas: green

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“O Christmas tree, O Christmas tree, how lovely are your branches!” If you’ve missed the other posts in this series, you can go back and read all about white Christmases and red poinsettias. But today’s color is one of my favorites: green.

This little green tree decorates the table where we put all our Christmas cards.

This little green tree decorates the table where we put all our Christmas cards.

That green is one of my favorite colors shouldn’t surprise you, given the title of my blog and the fact that I write so frequently about trees. And unless you walk around with blinders on these days, you can’t go far without seeing some green of Christmas: trees, elf costumes, candy wrappers.

There are many conjectures about why green is one of the traditional colors of Christmas. Perhaps it’s because Italy’s flag had green in it. Or maybe the church set Christmas to coincide with pagan winter solstice celebrations, complete with their evergreen trees. Some sources suggest we celebrate with green trees because the German church in the 1300s used pines decorated with red apples to suggest a “paradise tree” in plays about Adam and Eve and the tree in the garden of Eden. Or maybe green is so popularly associated with Christmas because of holly plants, with their green, waxy leaves and bright red berries: Continue reading →

The colors of Christmas: red

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Last week, I began a series for Advent on the colors of Christmas. This week’s focus is on the color red, one of the most traditional colors associated with the season. I remember a few years ago seeing a friend at church in November wearing a beautiful orange sweater, and she said she was trying to wear it one more time before December fashionistas dictated red as the “must-wear” color.

In Western culture, the color red has widely varying associations: blood, passion or love, danger, stop (like the color of most of the traffic signals I seem to see these days) and many things Christmas (candy canes, Santa’s suit, Rudolph’s nose, bows, holly berries).

Even our expressions use the color in varying ways. You don’t want to be “in the red” (in debt) at the end of the year. The parking deck at the mall may have you “seeing red” (feeling angry) as you struggle to find an open space.

“Red-letter days” are ones we anticipate for their celebrations and importance. We “roll out the red carpet” to celebrities and dignitaries. And we can even “paint the town red” on a fun night out. But we don’t want to get caught “red-handed” (in the act) when we’re snooping to discover the contents of our wrapped Christmas presents.

For Christmas reds, there seems to be no end in what we can find in red. Let’s start with what blooms during this season: Continue reading →

The colors of Christmas: white

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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

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.

Continue reading →

After the party, cleaning up the confetti

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After every party comes the cleaning up, the clearing away. A few weeks ago, I described the falling leaves in our yard as confetti, as though Autumn were throwing a grand party.

There’s still some confetti left on the trees, but for the most part, the party’s over. We’re fortunate where we live to have street crews that come through the neighborhoods to vacuum leaves we’ve raked to the curb. Here’s what our leaf pile typically looks like right before the crew is scheduled to visit our street:

A typical pile of leaves from our yard, with our dog posing to give you an idea of scale

The crews came through today, and in advance of their visit, the whole neighborhood has hummed a constant melody of leaf blowers with accents of rakes, preparing piles of leaves to be cleared.

It was a week that I would have preferred a quieter neighborhood, but I’m still grateful that our city collects the leaves this way, as it’s the easiest and quickest way to get the yard cleaned up.

Between now and the crew’s next visit, we’ll resort to filling up cans to the brim, as we prepare for the next party coming, the grandest of the year: Christmas, with its own variety of confetti that comes in sparkling lights and snow flakes. It’s another type of confetti and another party I’m excited and grateful to celebrate. How about you?

May I offer another gratitude challenge even now that Thanksgiving is over? As we prepare our hearts for the Christmas celebration, I challenge you to continue keeping track of all the blessings in your life. I’m hoping for a calmer, more sane holiday season, where I can keep my priorities in the right place and my focus of gratitude on the beautiful gift of our Savior’s birth. I’d love to hear some things you’re grateful for in this holiday season.

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I hope you’ll forgive today’s shorter than usual post. I’ve been quite sick all week with a stomach bug, but even fighting that, I’ve found plenty to be grateful for: getting home from out of town before getting sick, doctors on call in the wee hours of the morning, 24-hour pharmacies, the best husband in the whole world who was able to work from home for two days to look after me, oyster crackers, ginger ale and a calmer-than-usual dog. And, yes, even the hum of leaf blowers and street crews with vacuum trucks reminding me that life goes on.

Time for pie and gratitude

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Did you take me up on the recent challenge to keep a list of everything you’re grateful for? If so, have you found it changing your perspective about the blessings and disappointments in your life? I hope you’ll continue to document your personal gratitude list long after tomorrow comes and goes.

I’ve been trying to list just one thing on Facebook that I’m grateful for each day, but I find myself trying to weave together multiple things into one, because I have trouble picking just one thing each day.

Here’s just one thing I wanted to share with you that I’m most thankful for at Thanksgiving every year:

Vegan pumpkin pie from Whole Foods

Yes, that’s right: vegan pumpkin pie from Whole Foods, a Thanksgiving treat I order from their bakery almost every year.

I’m not a vegan, but I do have a food allergy that keeps me from eating regular bakery items. I didn’t learn of this allergy until one November about ten years ago. I don’t remember the exact year, but I do remember the exact month, because my thoughts had already turned to the anticipation of pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving. (For the record, my mother makes the best pumpkin pie in the whole world, and if I could only pick one food to have for Thanksgiving dinner, it would be her pumpkin pie.)

One of the initial horrifying realizations of learning about my allergy was that pumpkin pie was off my plate forever. Or so I thought. Continue reading →