On Christmas Carols and Decorating Craziness

On Christmas Carols and Decorating Craziness

I have to confess something.

I love Christmas.

I really do.

Or that’s how this post was supposed to start before Jayde-Ashe at The Paperbook Blog beat me to it.  Oh, well.

There are things about Christmas I don’t like, like the way it has become all about stuff and all the whack-jobs and Scrooges (“Christian” and non-Christian) who suddenly get on their soapboxes to proclaim why we shouldn’t be celebrating Christmas.  I could probably think of more, but I don’t want to right now.  This post is about loving Christmas.

What I love most about Christmas is the music.  I also like giving the people I love gifts.  I’ve never been that big on decorating for Christmas – that’s the wife’s department – but this year I got into that as well.  In fact, I got a bit too into it this year…

It started with the wife decorating the tree:

Christmas tree

Looks nice, doesn’t it?  Then I decided the clock needed decoration as well…

Clock decorated for Christmas

I fetched a Santa-hat belonging to one of my puppets and put it on…well, perhaps it’s better that I just show you…

Clock under bell jar with santa hat

And then Santa-hats started popping up all over the place…

Argonath bookends

Gollum figurine with Christmas hat
I wanted to give the Witch-King of Angmar one as well, but he scares me. The cave troll wouldn’t stand still for his.

I think I should remove myself from decorating duties once again.  I clearly have a problem.

But as I said, what I like most about Christmas is the music.  Our wealth of Christmas carols and hymns include, to me at least, some of the most triumphant and most hauntingly beautiful melodies ever composed.

One of my favourites is The Carol of the Bells and my new favourite version of that carol is the one by Pentatonix.  The discovery of this amazing group and this song in particular cost me an entire day’s worth of writing in the middle of NaNoWriMo – I just couldn’t stop listening to them.  They have since also done excellent versions of Little Drummer Boy and Angels We Have Heard On High, but this one is still my favourite.

Enjoy it with me.

And as a bonus, here’s the new PianoGuys video as well.  Enjoy!

4 thoughts on “On Christmas Carols and Decorating Craziness”

  1. I completely agree with you that Christmas is something to be celebrated! I grew up in a very religious household and even though I am no longer religious I still love Christmas. Regardless of ones religious views I think its important to have a time in the year when you focus on the people you love and expressing that love. Also there’s no such thing as to much Christmas decorating (but then I might have as much of a problem as you!)

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    1. Over here the decorating your house thing is also rapidly gaining popularity. It’s a bit incongruous, though, to see a lawn decorated with reindeer, sleigh and snowmen while it’s 35 Celsius in the shade. Luckily I live in a fourth floor apartment, so I’m safe from that particular madness thus far.

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