Show & Tell Friday: The Preparing for Christmas Edition

Happy Friday to you all!

Some good stuff to share this second-to-last Friday before Christmas! (Crazy, right?!)

1.) Michael McIntyre - "People with no kids don't know"

Lately, trying to successfully parent two children under the age of five (one of them a baby) during this most hectic of seasons, do some work, keep the house Christmas-shiny, get to every single preschool performance-choral concert-friend's party that we need to, and do all the holiday shopping, has been exhausting. I know you're all exhausted, too. In ways good and bad. Because there is hectic-exhausted and happy-exhausted.

But I digress. Last night at a concert a friend shared this link with me to British comedian Michael McIntyre doing a stand-up routuine called "People with no kids don't know." It's absolutely hysterical. And I especially like his take on trying to get out the door.

2.) Christmas Concerts in your town

Speaking of concerts: Last night my husband and I attended the annual Brevard College Christmas Concert at the Porter Center for the Fine Arts in our little mountain hamlet in Western North Carolina. If you don't know much about Brevard College--which is a small liberal arts college with a great big heart, known largely for its Music and Wilderness Leadership programs--trust me when I tell you that whenever these students put on a concert, it's a hum-dinger.

Here's a taste of the Brevard College music students and faculty, and members of TCS, directed by David Gresham and singing an African Noel (please forgive the quality--I'm no videographer):

BC Christmas Concert

We make it a point to get a babysitter and go each year with friends. It's a great evening, full of incredible music generously performed for free by the College's music students and faculty, and members of the Transylvania Choral Society. Afterwards, everyone gathers in gorgeous lobby of the Porter Center for punch, cake, and time to meet up with friends old and new. This is the time of year in any town, big or small, that arts events--often free--abound. If there's a choral concert in your town around this time of year, I say get thee to it, and take friends! There's nothing like live Christmas music to put you in the spirit.


3.) Recipe - Aunt Gloria's (Adapted) Killer Dip

Everybody needs a good party recipe this time of year--one that's blessedly free of all the "frees": fat-free, sugar-free, etc. This recipe is full-fat and tasty as all get-out. My Aunt Gloria always made it when I was growing up for our annual Crawford Christmas, which basically involved a whole lot of yummy pogey bait.

Don't know what "pogey bait" means? Look it up. (Hint: it comes from WWII.)

Anyway, I altered the recipe just a bit from the original, and tend to serve it at Christmas parties, football games, and New Year's weekends at the lake. Yes, it makes a lot. Yes, it's full o'fat. Don't try to halve it. Trust me: it WILL get eaten.

Here you go:

Killer Dip

Ingredients:
1 lb Original Velveeta
8 oz. cream cheese
1 lb sausage
1 can Rotel
Tabasco or Texas Pete to taste

Directions:
Brown the sausage and drain; melt the cheeses together and stir in the Rotel; add the sausage and stir together. (I do all this on a big pot on the stove. Set on low and stir frequently to prevent burning.) Serve with tortilla chips.
I dare you to take just one bite!


4.) Christmas quotations

I'm a nut for a good quote.

"Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before!  What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas...perhaps...means a little bit more!”
~ Dr. Seuss, from How the Grinch Stole Christmas!

“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.”
~ Laura Ingalls Wilder

“I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet
The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”
~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

"Christmas is a time when you get homesick - even when you're home."
~ Carol Nelson

"Christmas is the season for kindling the fire of hospitality in the hall, the genial flame of charity in the heart."
~ Washington Irving

"I'm dreaming of a white Christmas,
Just like the ones I used to know,
Where the tree tops glisten
And children listen
To hear sleigh bells in the snow..."
~ Irving Berlin

Post-Santa Edge

Hi, all.

Hope you had a lovely and happy Christmas holiday! (Or a happy celebration of whatever you celebrate!)

I just posted over on my author website about an article a writer-friend just had published in Salon.com, called "I was bad Santa." Check it out when you get a chance.

Parental Guidance suggested.

Living the Creative Life

A while back, my new friend, the author Ann Hite (Ghost on Black Mountain) asked me to write a guest post for her blog, “Living the Creative Life.”

Ann is fabulous, and her blog is all about creativity–so, of course, I was thrilled to take part. My post is up now and will run through New Year’s. Check it out here.

http://livingcreativelife.wordpress.com/2012/12/23/katherine-scott-crawford-on-creativity/

I may or may not have a chance to write again here before Christmas. If not, I hope that you all have a holiday filled with happiness, peace, and Light.



Merry, Merry and Happy, Happy all around!

A Christmas Wish

Recently my publisher asked me to write a guest post for their blog. It’s up today, and it’s called “A Christmas Wish.” I’m reposting here for those interested.

This was a tough blog post to write. I’ve known for a while that the deadline was coming up, but honestly, had the worst time writing it. After the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School, I have felt like nothing I say holds significance. How, I asked myself, can I write about Christmas, when my heart feels like a leaden balloon in my chest? The pain that those parents and loved ones are suffering–and will continue to suffer–is unimaginable. I’ve thought of not much else these past days but fervent hope for their peace and ease.

My friend, the writer Kimberly Brock, and I talked about this. She, too, was asked to do a guest post earlier this week. Both of us had an admittably hard time writing. Hers is here; I think she does a great job addressing the mystery that surrounds this time of year.

But if there’s a time of year meant for hope, a time meant for magic and for the promise of Light, it’s this season.

So here’s my post. It’s nothing special, just childhood memories and a wish. I hope you enjoy it.

 

A Christmas Wish


Christmas magic.

It’s something—a feeling, a spirit, a hope—that I’ve searched for, and inevitably found, every December since I was a child.

When I was very young, my parents made the magic. They filled our house with Christmas cheer: Johnny Mathis, John Denver and Bing Crosby on the record player and then the stereo; a house festooned with garland, candles and poinsettias; the everyday china exchanged for plates and mugs and bowls of Cuthbertson Christmas china; the lighting of the Advent calendar; the mistletoe hanging from the light fixture in the foyer; and the enormous Virginia pine Christmas tree. Today, that tree is a Fraser Fir, but it’s still brilliantly lit with bubble lights and adorned with mine and my sister’s hand-made ornaments, along with a precious few that have been in my father’s family since the turn of the century. It stands next to an enormous real-wood fireplace, red, crocheted stockings hung at the fat wooden mantel, just waiting for Santa Claus. To this day, my sister’s and my stockings are stretched inches longer than any of the others from years of being stuffed to the brim with goodies.

On Christmas Eve we’d head to church for the United Methodist celebration of the Moravian Love Feast. We’d sing Christmas carols, convene with friends, and hold our candles aloft as the entire sanctuary sang “Silent Night.” I loved standing on the pew bench with my family, holding my candle high and watching the glow on the faces around me. After, we’d head home for Christmas Eve supper with my aunt’s family and our best family friends: a tradition we still keep to this day. That very night, Santa would call the house, and all the kids would line up to hear just where his sleigh was at that very moment (usually over the Atlantic Ocean, Rudolph lighting the way through the fog).

Sheer magic.

Now, as an adult with a writing and teaching career, a family (including a husband, a dog, a three year-old daughter and a baby on the way), it takes a concerted effort to create that Christmas magic. I have to look for it—to make it happen, because I want my daughter to grow up as I was so lucky to: feeling that every day of December holds promise and magic.

I want her to be able—as I did as a child, a teenager, and still do—to stand outside in the dark of a cold Christmas Eve, and to look up at that mysterious sky with wonder and hope. I want her to feel in her bones a peace like no other. That is my most fervent Christmas wish, this year of all years. I wish it for all of us—for the community of Newtown, Connecticut, for all the world, for my family and for yours.

Tonight and every night, may we sleep in heavenly peace.

Repeat the Sounding Joy

Usually, I become a deep thinker at Christmas time. A ponderer. A sponge for the lovely, bittersweet, joyous and sometimes maudlin emotions winging out from most December souls. I can't help it: I'm a born empathizer. But at times, I even annoy myself.

This December, the season has been especially busy. I realize that I alone am not suffering under the hectic pace of the holidays, but for some reason I'm feeling it this year a bit more than usual. I've been trying to kick the feeling, and it's beginning to budge.

Last night, after my husband had returned from work and taken over toddler duty, I made a trip out for last-minute teacher gifts and groceries. My town was fairly empty, and the white lights lacing the trees on Main Street, the huge Christmas tree at the courthouse, the snowflakes on the power poles, they all glowed, dripping with rain. The grocery store was fairly calm, and I moved beneath the florescent lights from aisle to aisle in a bit of an exhausted trance. I didn't see anyone I knew, and this was a bit of a gift. It was nice to be alone.

On my way home, I couldn't help but drive slowly down my street, looking at the lights. Candles lit the windows of so many houses, and it seemed like even the most humble of apartment-dwellers had given in to the season, stringing a lone strand of fat colored bulbs up one railing. It made me smile. The glowing Santa statuette on my neighbor's lawn, these lights, my own, seemed suddenly a small reach for joy.

Yesterday before the evening store run, I'd put my toddler down for a nap like I always do, and had collapsed on the couch, quite literally unable to keep my eyes open. My limbs felt heavy, and welcoming blackness engulfed me. I may not have emerged for hours later, save for the incessent ringing of my cell phone and my daughter's wails over the monitor. I woke groggy, still caught by sleep, and stumbled to her room. It had been as if my body and my brain shook on it, and decided to take me by force.

My husband insists that this was my stress--work, home, motherhood, impending trip, Christmas business--having its way with me. He may be right, but it still feels strange. Stress? I have a great family, a home, an avocation, my health, and a Christmas tree. What do I truly have to be stressed about?

I think I just needed a nap. This is odd for me, as I'm a pretty peppy person. But I believe if I lie down, even now, I might sleep until Spring.

So, no nap. A shift, refocus. On Christmas--that most mysterious time, that awakening. Here's my recipe, if you will, for a return to Christmas cheer. (I cannot guaruntee this will work for you, should you be filled with Christmas ennui... but it does for me):

1. Throw off plans. If you need to order out for supper, do it. Ask for the Christmas burrito.

2. Sit in front of the fireplace until your back burns.

3. Read Christmas stories, to your kid(s), your significant other, your friends, heck--even the dog. I suggest Van Allsburg's The Polar Express. It doesn't get more magical than train of children chugging through a snow-filled forest, wolves pacing beneath the Christmas moon.

4. Eavesdrop at a small-town post office. Standing in line earlier this week I heard lovely Christmas greetings between friends old and new. There's nothing like a big, fat smile on a wrinkled face. Pure magic.

5. Watch Christmas movies, lots of them, whenever you can. Even if it's after midnight. I suggest: White Christmas, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, The Family Stone, Love Actually, and, of course, It's a Wonderful Life. Forgo any sarcastic thought, any lingering of cheese. It's Christmas.

6. Step outside. Breathe deeply. Consider the sky: starry or dark, it's the same sky looked upon by the ancients, the holy, the sinner and the saint. It is full of Mystery. And that's okay.

Wishing all of you joy in this season of Light,

K

Happy Holidays! Or, As We Say in Russia, Весёлого Рождества!

This was a major toddler morning.

For those of you who have kids, you'll know what I mean. For those of you who don't, simply picture a ten-car pile-up on the freeway, stir in a little background whining, some nuclear bombs exploding in the near distance, ten car alarms going off at once--and no one turning them off, and getting smacked in the face by an indignant little person. There, can you see it?

This was my morning. We were thirty-five minutes late to preschool, and I missed my twice-weekly hike in the national forest with my dog: a time I treasure, one I look forward to for days for the rich smell of the winter earth and the life-affirming cold of the air near the river, for the silence and the sight of my dog bounding up the trail ahead of me, for the thinking time. Instead, I barely managed to brush my teeth, throw on my bra and a fleece coat (I still wore the fleece pants I slept in), slap a toboggan on my head and tuck my daughter under my arm like Heisman, and make it to the school.

This was after the Mexican stand-off over the yogurt. It wasn't blueberry, and so really, it had it coming. The banana, bless its heart, became a giant crayon which my dear child used to smoosh into the coffee table, to "draw" with.  It was World War III over the coat, the right cup, the treatment of the dog. I said "gentle hands" and other inanities so many times I think I'll change my name to Rainman.

I have a pint-sized problem.

She's my little Czarina. My precious little despot. A two year-old schizophrenic with dimples and a killer left-hook. Here's her photo. (See how tall she is? She did NOT get this from me. That, and the tyranny she gets from her father. The big mouth may be my fault.)

Do not be fooled by the blonde hair and the dimples. She's a tyrant, I tell you. A gorgeous little centuries-old Russian despot. The other day, the despot came with me to the post office, and the postmistress gave her a few Priority Mail stickers to keep her happy. I stuck them on her chest and told her I was shipping her to Siberia. Or maybe her grandparents'.

Learning how to be a mother, a wife, a college teacher, and a writer--not to mention a functioning friend, family member and a generally good person at Christmastime--has been tricky. I'm about to add graduate student to this mix, and I've really avoided thinking much about it. I'm not sure if this is wise, but it's the way I'm going about it. That is, until Dec. 28th, when I fly to Vermont for my first ten-day residency in the MFA in Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. A stack of manuscript pages for my first VCFA workshop (which I'm seriously excited about reading) I've had to put at the bottom of the pile of to-be-graded English final exams and essays on my desk, simply to keep them out of sight. Because, I lack self-control when it comes to reading. Last night, I almost lost my just arrived copy of Diana Gabaldon's The Scottish Prisoner to the lukewarm depths of my bath. Because I fell asleep there. (Not because of the novel--it's fantastic. Because I. am. officially. an. old. person.)

I'm not sure how some writers do it. There's this famous anecdote about best-selling romance novelist Nora Roberts, and how she wrote her first novels at the breakfast table while her boys were eating cereal. I am not Nora Roberts. (Sigh.) In my life, I think the cereal could become airborn. A spoon makes a good catapult... I'm sure my little pumpkin pie would figure that out pretty quickly. She's sly. Maybe she's not Russian. Hidden beneath that exterior of sweetness is the soul of a secret agent. Maybe she's Mossad.

I swear I'm doing almost everything I can to spread Christmas joy. To be enveloped by the magic of the season, a magic I have so genuinely believed in since childhood. Our house is lit with white lights, candles in the windows; our tree is small but hardy, full of glowing bubble lights and beloved ornaments, our stockings hung by the chimney with care, our manger scene placed just out of the sweet little puddin' pie tyrant's reach. Heck, there's even a Santa hat on the rocking horse. We dig Christmas in this family, let me tell you.

See, here we are, enjoying Christmas. Look how calm the despot is. Can you see that blue hundred-yard stare? I think she's just biding her time.

Perhaps I can make a deal with that sweet little schizophrenic Czarina: give me back my precious toddler of yore, and you may return at 16. We'll even let you obscond with the peasants. But despots don't make deals, do they? I think I remember this from World History. They lop off heads. Or utilize efficient firing squads. So maybe I'll lay low, hide behind the dog, play "Frosty the Snowman" on the DVD player as many times as I possibly can, at least until my husband gets home. Until then, writing anything except for this blog post may have to be put on the back-burner, sad as it makes me.

Because a girl's got to make it through the day, нет?

Ghosts of Christmas Past

It's only just topped 20 degrees this snowy, frozen mountain morning. I am a-sit at my fireside desk, considering the end of 2010. The passage of time like this has always seemed to me a cosmic joke, a bittersweet reminder of the nature of being wonderfully human--a treatise on the rare and precious nature of life.

For me, one of the loveliest, and at the same regrettable, aspects of time passing so lightning-fast is not the new wrinkles around my eyes or my daughter morphing into a literal little girl, or even my dog growing more gray about the muzzle: it is, instead, my inability to connect with old friends in a real way.

Certainly, there are the things that separate us: age, different lives and responsibilities, new ideas and cares, state lines, even continents. But though we are no longer children, teenagers--or even tanned, carefree twenty-somethings--what we share are memories of experiences that glitter momentarily in the mind, a Christmas ornament catching the light. And memories of time spent with friends, however ephemeral, cannot be lost no matter how old we grow or how much we change.

So....

For My Friends at Christmastime

I miss you.

I miss the days spent lakeside, fireside, schoolside--

the quick flash of laughter, the raucous freedom of being wild,

the stories and the trust and the secrets.

Know that if you wonder on me, I wonder on you--

that ours is a snow globe shaken.