Happy Birthday Beautiful...Innocence Mission

Heavens Gates Stand Open For Us

from First Things:
Let us, then, rejoice and be happy today. Let our mouths be full of laughter and our tongues full of praise. For the holy message of Christmas is that heaven’s gates stand open for us.

Art from "Nativity" by He Qi, a professor at Nanjing Union Theological Seminary in China

Streamline your holiday shopping by purchasing the same present for everyone on your list.

from Slate:
My grandmother had a no-fuss method of tackling Christmas gifts for her extensive brood of descendents. She sorted us into broad categories (female, male, adult, child) and then bought multiple copies of the same gift for each grouping.

We Just Had National Pickle Day

from Al Dente:

holiday blurb...happy fathers day all you awsome dads

holiday blurb...the great pumpkin

Holiday blurb...happy new year

from Wikipedia, re the song Auld Lang Syne: "Singing the song on Hogmanay or New Year's Day very quickly became a Scots custom, which soon spread to other parts of the British Isles. As Scots (not to mention other Britons) emigrated around the world, they took the song with them. Beginning in 1929 Band leader Guy Lombardo is often credited with popularizing the use of the song at New Year’s celebrations in America, through his annual broadcasts on radio and TV. The song became his trademark, and besides his live broadcasts, he recorded the song more than once, the first in 1939, and at least once later, on September 29, 1947, in a record issued as a single by Decca Records as catalog #24260.[5] However, he neither invented nor introduced the custom, even there. The ProQuest newspaper archive has articles dated 1896 that describe revellers on both sides of the Atlantic singing the song to usher in the New Year.
various artists:

banjo version:

dan fogelberg soft rock much changed version:

holiday blurb...brings tears to my eyes

holiday blurb...gift ideas

via superpunch, best squirt gun.

holiday blurb...eco friendly...thrifty Christmas cards

This holiday, send them an e-card
Maria Puente
"Paper Christmas cards with family photos may be traditional, but they're "old media." The new media alternative: electronic Christmas cards with video. At photo-sharing site Webshots.com, users who have already created an online photo album can send a free e-Christmas card featuring a slide show that combines digital photos and digital video clips. At OneTrueMedia.com, users can do the same thing, and even add holiday music, graphics and stock art to fill out their video montage. "This is the holiday season where people will be (video sharing) for the first time," says Martin Green, Webshots general manager." Or you can send an e card...

holiday blurb...thank the troops this season

Thank the troops this season. Check out the gratitude campaign.

holiday blurb...Christmas card arrives 93 years late...

from PNJ.com: Kansas, Dec 15: A postcard featuring a color drawing of Santa Claus and a young girl was mailed in 1914, but its journey was slower than Christmas. It just arrived in northwest Kansas.

The Christmas card was dated Dec. 23, 1914, and mailed to Ethel Martin of Oberlin, apparently from her cousins in Alma, Neb.

It`s a mystery where it spent most of the last century, Oberlin Postmaster Steve Schultz said. "It`s surprising that it never got thrown away," he said. "How someone found it, I don`t know."

holiday blurb...please get rid of your pumpkins if you haven't...NOW!!!

holiday blurb...best Christmas Albums of all time

Jesusfreakhideout picks the best Christmas Albums of all time.

holiday blurb...is this the grinch's dog?

holiday blurb....Christmas Trees

We just got a Christmas tree this weekend. Our tradition is to go to a farm and walk through rows of trees to find the just right Nobel fir. Then we cut it down and drag it back trough the mud and put it on top of our car. Strap it down...half the time we forget the ropes. We paid $60 ouch dollars this year. I think a better solution might have been to get one of the trees below and give the difference to the needy. The Charlie Brown tree costs $24 dollars...this one looks like I could make it. The Whoville tree costs $34...both available at UrbanOutfitters.

Holiday blurb...Happy Thanksgiving.

From Joel Mark, comments World Magazine Blog:
Their 65-day trip across the Atlantic in 1620 was cold and damp. Aiming for Virginia, the Mayflower was blown north to the unknown land of Massachusetts. Scurvy, typhus and tensions followed them all the way. They landed at Plymouth on December 11, 1620, with winter upon them.

Nathaniel Morton, record keeper for the Plymouth Colony, wrote that they had “no friends to welcome them, no inns to entertain or refresh them, no houses, or much less towns, to repair unto to seek for succour; and for the season it was winter… What could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wilde beasts and wilde men?”

Of the 103 who boarded the Mayflower, thirty were children. After a severe winter, only 55 souls met the spring alive. 12 of the 18 married women perished. Those who remained barely had the strength to put in the next year’s crop. It was all they could do to care for the sick and dying.

Supplies soon ran out. The seeds they brought from Europe for growing wheat wouldn’t grow in the stony soil. Squanto, a friendly English-speaking showed them how to plant corn, but their first crops were poor.

The Pilgrims coped with their dire circumstances by lifting their eyes to heaven. Nathaniel Morton called heaven, “their dearest country.” Looking upward was all they could do, according to Morton, to “quiet their spirits.” If you had survived all their disappointments, tragedies and losses, which way would you have looked?

In 1621, Gov. Bradford chose a day for expressing gratitude to God. They invited Indians to share the feast. Massasoit came with 90 others. The Indian contingent “went out and killed five deer which they brought to the plantation.” Their feast included fish, berries, watercress, lobster, dried fruit, clams, venison, and plums. King David’s words in the 92d Psalm led them on: “It is good to give thanks to the Lord.”

holiday blurb...Thanksgiving

THE ASY GIVING THANKS CAMPAIGN:
"This holiday season, America Supports You is giving you a new way to send your thanks to the troops - by text message! When you send your message of thanks to 89279 (TXASY) between November 17th and 22nd, you'll receive a special thanks in return. Also, we'll be displaying those messages on our ASY Giving Thanks widget far and wide across the internet. Just another way that you can support our brave military men and women serving in 177 countries across the world."

holiday blurb....Veteran's Day

Freedom isn't free...thank you Veterans.

this may seem weird blurb

Profile America — Sunday, November 11th. "This is the time to celebrate one of life’s simple pleasures — it’s Peanut Butter Lovers Month. The stuff of America’s favorite sandwich, peanut butter, was first offered to the public at the St. Louis Exposition in 1904. But as we currently know it — with the peanuts roasted and the product churned like butter to be smooth and so the oil won’t separate — peanut butter didn’t appear on grocery shelves until 1922. While we each eat about 7 pounds of peanuts in all forms each year, peanut oil is used to make paints, cosmetics and lubricants, while the shells are used to make wallboard, abrasives and fuel. .

I have a friend who eats a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch almost every single day...I am amazed at how ofter she actually does: Monday through Friday.