Saturday, December 20, 2008

Christmas Ride

I'm so excited, it's finally my day for the Christmas Ride post! It's been so fun keeping up with everyone else, and today I get to add my two cents!

I love Christmas. I love everything about Christmas.

The decorations. (Our house was all decked out the weekend after Thanksgiving.)
The baking. (My husband and I make "kiss" cookies each year to share with family and friends...and spend extra minutes on the treadmill working off ourselves!)
The shopping. (Okay, I still have some of that left to do. But I'm not worried. There are still plenty of shopping days left until Christmas.)
The wrapping. (One of my favorite parts of getting ready. I do it up big! Paper. Trimmings. Ribbons. Bows.)
The parties. (It's so wonderful to hang out with family and friends and share some holiday cheer...sometimes spiked...sometimes not.)
The music. (Ah, the music. I have it on constantly, but I'm a purist and won't start listening until the day after Thanksgiving!)
The movies. (So far we've done "Christmas Vacation", "A Christmas Carol", "A Charlie Brown Christmas", and we have the best one of all saved for Christmas Eve, "It's a Wonderful Life".
I even like the snow! (The kids had a snow day yesterday, and I think we'll have that White Christmas we always hope for but never seem to get around here!)

I could go on, but I think you get the picture. The very best part of Christmas is that we get to share all of this with family and friends. It's a time to come together and think about the good things in our lives. The people and things we've been blessed with. God's gift to our world.

So I encourage you, no I invite you, to curl up with a copy of my free read Mistletoe and Holly, stir up a batch of holiday punch, bake up some cookies (fellow Christmas Ride bloggers have shared some extra-yummy recipes) and enjoy the peace and comfort this season brings.

Leave a comment sometime today and tell me what your favorite part of the season is, and you could win a PDF copy of "This Time for Always", my debut novel from The Wild Rose Press.

And here's the clue for my Christmas song.
Down in a lowly manger
The humble Christ was born
And God sent out salvation
That blessed Christmas morn


(My favorite version of this is on Toby Keith's Classic Cristmas CDs.)

Don't forget to continue on the Ride tomorrow by visiting Tarah Scott.

To spread more Christmas cheer, we're giving one lucky person a $75 Wild Rose Press gift certificate! All you need to do to enter is attend each day's blog post, identify the carol, and make a complete carol list to submit after the final blog post of Christmas Eve. Don't forget to check the list twice! Send it to Christmasrideblog@live.com by midnight, CST Dec. 31st 2008!

If you haven't been keeping up, feel free to head back to the beginning at PL Parker's blog. There's still plenty of time left!

Merry Christmas and many blessings in the New Year!

Until next time,

Happy Reading!

Debra St. John

www.debrastjohnromance.com

16 comments:

Hywela Lyn said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Skhye said...

Hi, Debra! I hope you have a great day on the Christmas Ride. Things look like they're slowing down online. :( But that means we just need to eat cookies! I'm making the butter cookies flavored with Jello. Yep. They're yummy. So, have a fabulous day and holidays. I'm off to town.

Hywela Lyn said...

Blogger Hywela Lyn said...

Hi Debra, I really enjoyed reading your post. I love Christmas for all the reasons you do. I don't decorate or really start feeling Christmassy until about a week before though, and then the decorations stay up until Twelfth Night. Oh and I so envy you snow, I don't think we'll be having a White Christmas in this part of the UK, unfortunately.

I think my favourite part of Christmas is listening to Carols late on Christmas Eve, when all the preparations are done and hubby and I can relax with our dog by the fireside. There's still the anticipation of Christmas Day to come and there's something very special about the stillness of the night before Christmas.

Morgan Mandel said...

Hi Debra,
Last night I watched the Bishop's Wife and Christmas in Connecticut. The old time movies really put me in the Christmas mood!

I still have some gifts to buy. I'm afraid I'm not as much into the Christmas wrapping spirit as you are. After all these years of doing Christmas presents, I enjoy putting them in pretty Christmas bags instead.

Merry Christmas!

Morgan Mandel
http://morganmandel.blogspot.com
http://www.morganmandel.com

Stephanie said...

Christmas cookies. Yup Christmas cookies does it for me every year. When I start baking that brings Christmas spirit out around our home.

Thanks for sharing!

The Christmas Carol for today is Go Tell It On The Mountain.

Mindy said...

I Love the decorations and the music of Christmas.

Merry Christmas Debra,
Mindy :)

Anonymous said...

Go Tell It On The Mountain

Anonymous said...

I love all the Christmas Carols and I happen to be a big Country Music Fan so I like all the classics sung by the big burly Country men like Toby.

Go Tell it on The Mountain.

Merry Christmas

Judy said...

I love it all, but the main thing is being with family and watching the grandchildren and children opening their presents (the little ones get so wide-eyed).

June said...

Hi Debra,
Thanks for sharing all those wonderful Christmas things to do. It sounds like the Christmas Ride is doing really well!

Have a great one
June

Debra St. John said...

Thanks to everyone who stopped by today. I'll check in later on to see who qualified for a PDF copy of "This Time for Always!. I hope everyone is enjoying the Ride!

Tami Winbush said...

My favorite part of Christmas is the fact that I get to see and hear from family and friends that I don't get to hear from often. It's great to be around them all!

Tami

tami.winbush@gmail.com

Kim S. said...

Great post! Thanks for the free read! And I agree, the recipe's have been scrumptious!

My favorite part of this season is visiting with people I haven't seen in a long time. This year it's my siblings. We will all be meeting at Dad's house this year. The first time in ten years, since Mom passed. Some haven't spoken in ten or more years until now.

Oh....and the food!! Love the 'legal' reason to overinduldge!! LOL

This carol is Go Tell It On The Mountain.

Happy Holidays!!

Helen Hardt said...

Hi Debra, I've read your free read, and it's wonderful! Your carol is Go Tell it on the Mountain.

Helen

Debby said...

Hi, I love Christmas as well but am having a hard tiemthis year. I really like when we all get together and spend time. Christmas is for families.

Margot Justes said...

Hi Deb,
Well, my favorite part is not wrapping presents, I leave that part to my younder daughter.What I do love is getting together with friends and family and sharing the Christmas spirit.
Margot Justes
A Hotel in Paris
www.mjustes.com