Weekend Shopping

 Well, yesterday I went to the Craft 2000 store with my husband and my sister-in-law. What a nice store! It was my first visit there.  Even though it's October, they still had some Christmas things in the store! How I love Christmas. I always try to refrain from buying to much at these kinds of stores because I really do have plenty of Christmas decorations. But when you see all the cute things that are out there....it's very hard to do. I bought some candles and things for fall, and then when I came home, I ordered snowflake garland for my 5ft. Alpine tree! I must have been in the spirit. About that Alpine tree...it's a prelit tree that I use all year long and decorate it according to the seasons. I had to take off all 200 lights on the tree because they kept burning out on me. What a job that turned into! They really do a good job concealing the lights on prelit trees. The wires were twisted around each branch...ugh...I had to cut out all the wires from 200 lights or I would have been there much longer than I already was! Very time consuming! I replaced them with 150 lights and it doesn't look to bad after I put all the fall decorations back on it. I just ran the strings of lights from top to bottom back up to the top, pushed them in among the branches, and it's not to shabby. I would never be able to wrap strings of lights around each branch to conceal     the wires like the prelits. What a job that would be. I think there must have been a short in the wires somewhere. On the bottom half of the tree, the insides of the bulbs were black. I'm wondering if all that twisting of the wires and wrapping them so tight onto the branches could have caused it to short out. So, now it's done and for the winter season, I decorate it with snowflakes and I thought snowflake garland would look nice. We will definitely be going back to visit the Craft 2000 store next month. I'm sure they'll have a lot more Christmas things by then. I'll just need a bigger house to put out all of my decorations..just kidding..!  

My woodland tree for fall.

Children Go Where I Send Thee

I was looking for some old Christmas clips and came across this one. I think it's so darn cute and it turns out that the little boy to his right is his son Brian. He is so into the song his father is singing!  Makes me smile every time I watch it! 

A Christmas Star

Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, saying, Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the East and have come to worship Him. When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.

Then Herod, when he had secretly called the wise men, determined from them what time the star appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem and said, Go and search carefully for the young Child, and when you have found Him, bring back word to me, that I may come and worship Him also. When they heard the king, they departed; and behold, the star which they had seen in the East went before them, till it came and stood over where the young Child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy.

A Christmas Story

Oh No! The triple dog dare! This is a holiday classic for me. Some people love it....like me....and some hate it. I love the whole nostalgic feel of the movie. I'll be waiting for the marathon of this movie on Christmas Eve through Christmas night. :)

A Christmas Story House

The film takes place in fictional Hohman, Indiana, the setting of writer Jean Shepherd's stories, based on his actual hometown, Hammond, Indiana. Cleveland was chosen because of Higbee's Department Store. Appropriately, the fictional boyhood home of Ralphie Parker is on Cleveland Street, the name of the actual street where Shepherd grew up. In addition to the house exteriors, Cleveland was the location used for the scenes involving Higbee's department store, despite the fact that there were no Higbee's stores in Shepherd's hometown.



Cleveland was only one of several locations used. The school scenes were shot at the Victoria School in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. The Christmas tree purchasing scene was filmed in Toronto, Ontario, as was the sound stage filming of interior shots of the Parker home.


The exterior shots of the house and neighborhood where Ralphie lived were filmed in the Tremont section of Cleveland's West Side. The "...only I didn't say fudge" scene was filmed at the foot of Cherry Street in Toronto; several lake freighters are visible in the background spending the winter at Toronto's port, which lends authenticity to the time of year when the film was produced.


A Christmas Story House Museum:


Brian Jones, a fan of the film since childhood, purchased the house across the street and converted it into A Christmas Story House Museum, which contains some of the props from the movie, including Randy's snow suit, the Higbee's window toys, and hundreds of behind the scenes photos. The house to the left of the museum features a gift shop with movie memorabilia.


The house and museum opened to the public on November 25, 2006, with original cast members attending the grand opening, and the site drew 4,300 visitors during its first weekend.


This is one of my favorite Christmas movies. A very warm telling of a family during the Christmas season.

Christmas Trivia Fun

Here's a little fun trivia game. I found out that I didn't do so well. How did you do?

Listening to Accu Holidays Radio

Image via Wikipedia

Well, I don't know about you, but when I'm on someone else's Christmas blog or even my own, I like to listen to Christmas music. After all, what's visiting a Christmas blog like without music to help you get excited about the holidays??


I also like to listen to Accu Holidays Radio. I can go there, pick out any kind of Holiday music I want to listen to out of their many different genres, just click on any music icon of your preference, and the player opens up in another window. I can then minimize my window and listen as long as I like. Love it! The player has three tabs, a Now Playing tab, an Artist List-banned artists-ones you can select to never hear again while listening, and a Other Channels tab to pick from if you want to change the kind of music you are listening to. You can do it all from the player. It streams great and sounds wonderful! What more can you ask for?!


http://www.accuradio.com/more/accuholidays/