Virtual Advent 2013: NYC Christmas Tree Stands

Kelly and Marg are once again hosting the Virtual Advent Tour for bloggers where each day a blogger (or 2 or 3) share a special holiday memory, tradition, story, etc. This is my third year participating - I love the run up to Christmas and this seems like a great way to lean into it! In the past I have written about my ornament collection and my favorite holiday movie, Love Actually. Today, I am writing about a NYC institution, the street Christmas tree vendors.

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Each year, just after Thanksgiving, Christmas tree stands pop up and trees line the sidewalks creating these lovely alleys of Christmas spirit. I love the smell of freshly cut trees and it brightens my walk home from work. You see families and couples weighing up the trees and can imagine the scenes as they set them up in their city apartments. The arrival of the trees are quintessentially NY to me and signal the start of the season.

My neighborhood tree stand - Pin

This year I was introduced to the book Christmas on Jane Street; this short book chronicles the story of the Romp Family who come each year from Vermont and live in a trailer selling Christmas trees on Jane Street and 8th Avenue. The story is really not about the business of selling trees  - it is about giving joy at the holidays, about the special relationship between a father and daughter, and self-discovery through the observations of others. It is touching and the perfect accompaniment to the holiday season - I heartily recommend it and can see re-reading it each year.

Prior to reading the book, I had never given much thought to the stories behind those selling these trees or the little bits of people's traditions they become part of each year.  This book certainly brought that to light for me - I will think of it each time now as I stroll through the little wonderlands created on the street annually by these vendors.

The video below (produced by BBC) tells a little about the Romp Family and you can see their operation in action.




Please check out the other Virtual Advent stop today - Trish from Love, Laughter and a Touch of Insanity

Virtual Advent: Would You Like It Gift Wrapped?

Kaliana from The Written World and Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader host The Virtual Advent Tour every year where participants post about the holidays - a favorite tradition, memory, food, whatever on their assigned day. Last year, I participated for the first time and blogged about my Christmas ornament collection. 

This year I am sharing a scene from a favorite Christmas movie - Love Actually. I first saw the movie in 2003 in a theatre in England - I spent Christmas with family there that year. For a lot of reasons, that Christmas was very special and I think the movie benefits from the halo effect of those memories. I just loved the connected stories, the music and the star-studded cast. There are many great scenes in the movie but perhaps my favorite is played by Rowan Atkinson - better known as "Mr. Bean". As a customer anxiously awaits his present which he is stealthily purchasing while his wife is in another department of the store, the shop clerk (Rowan Atkinson) painstakingly wraps the present unfazed by the urgency of his customer. It is a perfectly executed scene.

 I watch Love, Actually every year and remember that wonderful Christmas in England. I hope you enjoy the "Would You Like It Gift Wrapped?" scene! Check out the other Virtual Advent posts today:

Teri @ Henningsen Happenings
Cam @ epiBloguer
Jane @ Life @ Number 8

Sunday Salon: November 18, 2012: Shredding, Sign-Ups and Reading

Hope you all have had a nice weekend! Mine has been a mix of getting together with family and friends and chores. Actually chore (singular) - I have been a shredding ninja all day today. My shredder gave out a few years ago and I got into the bad habit of stockpiling items to be shredded in bags that I would strategically stash throughout my apartment with grand plans of bringing them somewhere to be securely shredded. Now that I purchased a new shredder, I paid penance today for that habit. The shredder has overheated a number of times and the pic below just shows a small product of my work (there were tons more bags!)

It really makes me think about the waste created with junk mail - I have done a lot to take myself off lists and to go paperless with a lot of billing - I cannot imagine if I did not do that. Corporate America - quit it with the paper! Anyhow - I have opened up lots of storage in my apartment and am free of the paper! I vow to stay on top of it from now on . . . .
  
Sign-Ups
 There are some great events around the book blogging world this time of year. One of my favorites is Virtual Advent. As a kid, I loved those advent calendars and this event is a slightly grown-up version of that. Each day between Dec 1st and Dec 24th, a blogger posts about some part of their holiday tradition - recipes, crafts, stories, etc. Last year I posted about my ornament collection and still need to figure out what I will post about this year.

Trish from Love, Laughter and Insanity has been hosting a Pin It and Do It challenge for a few months now to prompt people to actually do some of the things they obsessively pin on Pinterest (says obsessive pinner). I am about as far from crafty as one can get and have a slew of half-finished or poorly executed craft projects in my past but I am hosting the family for Christmas this year and would love to include a few of the great ideas I see on Pinterest. So I am joining the Holiday Pin It and Do It at the "Timid Pinner" level which means I will pin and do 1-3 items (I am ambitious but not masochistic).

 I am excited to see that Jenn from Jenn's Bookshelves and Jennifer from Literate Housewife are hosting Thankfully Reading this year! It's a relaxed celebration of reading on Thanksgiving weekend where participants check-in throughout the weekend and read as they can amidst the cooking, celebrating and eating! I am coming close to the finish line on my 2012 challenges and will, as per usual, use this weekend to try to make a dent in what is left!  


Reading

This week I finished the audiobook of The Shoemaker's Wife by Adriana Trigiani. I am late to this one - it's been popular with the bloggers all year - but I loved, loved loved it! I was sorry to say goodbye to the characters when the book ended. I also hosted a book club meeting for Little Bee. On the whole, everyone praised the writing and liked the story although some had problems with violence that makes up the backdrop of the novel. The group is reading The Walnut Tree for their next meeting. Have any of you read it or others by the author?
 

Hope you all have a great (and thankfully short!) week!

Virtual Advent: Ornaments from Around The World

My fascination with Christmas ornaments started young - I remember walking around the tree and fingering my favorite ornaments each year. As I grew older and started to decorate my own trees, I had ornaments but few had any special meaning. At that point in my life, I was also traveling extensively for work - I was fortunate enough to visit the Netherlands, Russia, South Africa, Spain and many places across the US. I was often tempted to bring home a memento from these countries but was loathe to clutter my small apartment with trinkets. On one visit to Amsterdam just before Christmas, I saw beautiful delft ornaments and an idea was born. I bought those ornaments and then began to buy an ornament in each country or city I visited. The tradition has continued now for more than 10 years and I have amassed quite a collection which reminds me every year of the wonderful places I have been fortunate to visit. Each year I virtually travel as I decorate the tree and the ornaments are often conversation pieces as people inspect my tree and I get to share my travels with them. Unfortunately I will not be putting up a tree this year because I will be out of town over the holidays but I did pull out a small sample of my ornaments to share here.

I am not a fan of Lladro generally but while in Spain I found these porcelain Lladro ornaments that are issued each year and because I went back there over a couple of years, I collected one for each year - some are balls like this one and others are bells.

As I have said here before, Ireland holds a special place in my heart so I had to have an ornament from there - I actually have quite a few but this delicate bell is one of my favorite. It made on bone china from Galway and I think it just looks like traditional Christmas and not at all kitschy.

I found this delicate leaf on a ski trip to Vail. I certainly have ornaments which just have the place name plastered across it but I also like to get ornaments which represent the place and where you have to ask where it is from. This one really sparkles on the tree with lights behind it.

This one from my alma mater was picked up on a visit to campus for my reunion. Williamsburg marks the beginning of the holidays with Grand Illumination which includes fireworks and other colonial holiday traditions. It always coincided with finals so we often missed it but my friends and I went back at Christastime a couple of years ago and enjoyed it without the stress of studying!

These two ornaments are less traditional but represent where I found them. The silk elephant on the left is from Cambodia and I found it in a handicraft shop run by a NGO to benefit and offer jobs to the disabled of Cambodia. Th ornament on the right was picked up in St. Petersburg and is reminiscent of the handmade traditional ornaments of Russia.

I am a bit disappointed that I am not decorating a tree this year but writing this post has given me the chance to enjoy them nonetheless! Thank you to the Virtual Advent crew! Check out their website or all the Virtual Advent posts. Do you have themes for your trees or ornaments with special meaning?