'twas the night before Christmas and a raccoon was crossing the road
Why was the raccoon crossing the road? to see the Charlie Brown Christmas light display of course!
Christmas in America is next level stuff. Buildings, houses and whole streets are lined with pretty lights, lush wreaths and miles of garlands. Air filled Santas, minions and grinches appear from gardens and rooftops, and beautiful nativity scenes are pride of place reminding us that Jesus 'tis the reason for the season.
Our second homesit is here in San Pedro,in southern California, where we will spend Christmas Day.
San Pedro has a diverse community whom hold dear the birth of Christ, and many celebrate the event on Christmas eve. As we walk our happy homesit dog along the streets of this neighbourhood we can hear lots of laughter from the lit up households and imagine our families back home doing the same, only there it is already Christmas Day.
There is joy and sadness about being away from home at Christmas. Joy comes from the fact that you don't have to shop, cook and divide your time between families. Sadness gets you when you hang up after they've facetimed to watch them unwrap gifts through bleary eyes of the early morning Santa duty.
Quiggy and I are not religious, we weren't raised that way, but we do appreciate the significance of christian beliefs at this time and it's particularly poignant here where we are surrounded by lighting displays meticulously created as gifts for our eyes that fill you with joy. President Trump has announced his pleasure in 'making America Merry again' but I don't think he's ever been to San Pedro in December. Or maybe this is where he got the idea from.
Tonight our wonderful friends cooked a Christmas eve feast of sweet maple baked ham, tender beef wellington, carrot souffle and creamy spinach followed by pecan pie, caramel fudge and chocolate cheesecake. I contributed my home made pavlova topped with fresh berries which was a great success as they had never heard of such a desert and mine was the first one they had eaten. Let's hope it's not the last! It was all delicious and so special to be sharing their precious family time together.
It's been a lovely night and back in our beautiful homesit house we turn down the fire, ready the pets and ourselves for bed and rest our swollen stomachs. Ever since I was little, on Christmas eve, I have listened out for Santa's sleigh bells, silly but true. I always found it calming to believe in something magical and to this day I refuse to believe that Santa isn't real. Tonight the sound was quite different. It was a trumpet sweetly playing Silent Night just before the stroke of midnight coming from the midnight mass service atop the hill. As I lay there listening to the tune filling the night air I believe that magic still happens - "all is calm, all is bright".
Merry Christmas to you all and to all a good night.
#Back to childhood memories
#Skip the facts
#Go with the magic
and yes there really was a big fat raccoon running across the road to see the Christmas lights. Or eat them.