Presents

Christmas Day came and go. No that Christmas is past yet as it goes to the Epiphany, but the Day itself, I mean.

I spent the days before preparing for the big day shopping for the last presents, for the last ingredients and finishing wrapping the presents. I had not a spare moment to come here and say something.

Now all is calm and rest and here I am.

I will leave you with the animation of  the wrapping season, the happiness.

So it went from this

to this 

and this

then to this

and at last to this !! 😄

So many hours of wrapping and all the presents are out and the pretty papers done in rubble with the bows apart. It was all worthwhile. The happiness in those faces for each opened present !

Thanks be to God !

Only 12 days till Christmas

Days Until Christmas

Did you realize that we are only 12 days away from Christmas ?

Do you have most of your presents bought ? What about wrapping ?

I must say that I bought already a lot of them but I will make some more trips to the shops to buy the ones I didn't do yet. But things are under control, thanks God.

Even the wrapping is half done. I'm quite pleased with myself.

And the book keeping related with Christmas shopping is not bad either - even if I need to give it a refressh soon.

I even bough the meat to Christmas day lunch. The cod for the Eve is on its way.

May Our Lord grants us peace everyday that we have from now to that blessed Day, and Eve, and let's give thanks  for what we have already now.

Remember that there is no Christmas without Christ.

Viva la Virgen de Guadalupe !

 

Today is the Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

If you want to know more about what happened in those times, the amazing science findings on the tilma of Juan Diego, the Indian saint, go here.

Those lovely times at Christmas

Christmas time in those delightful days of the past through ads and other images by Roger Wilkerson, Norman Rockwell, Stevan Dohanos and others.

Shopping

Wrapping

Decorating

The Eve and The Day

It happens every year and we expect it everytime.

-

Shared at Grace at Home nº448 in Imparting Grace

The Immaculate - Solemnity

Who is she that cometh forth as the morning rising, fair as the moon, bright as the sun, terrible as an army set in array?

Song of Solomon 6:10 DRB

In a day like today, so many years ago, when I was a little baby just some months old, it was my Christening Day. And in what day was it? On the day of the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception.

The ones who are interested in learn about it can read it here: Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

Thanks be to God.

Image 1 - The Immaculate Conception / Tiepolo

Image 2 - The Immaculate Conception of El Escorial / Murillo

St. Nicholas Day

Do you know who was St. Nicholas, the one who inspired the Father Christmas image ? The one who some call Santa Claus or just Santa ? He was St. Nicholas of Myra, also known as St. Nicholas of Bari. He was born on 15 of March  270 and died on the 6 of December 343. He was a Bishop from Myra, in Asia Minor. Through him God made so many miracles that he is also known as Nicholas the Wonderworker.

See this: 

• Upon hearing that a local man had fallen on such hard times that he was planning to sell his daughters into prostitution, Nicholas went by night to the house and threw three bags of gold in through the window, saving the girls from an evil life. These three bags, gold generously given in time of trouble, became the three golden balls that indicate a pawn broker’s shop.
• He raised to life three young boys who had been murdered and pickled in a barrel of brine to hide the crime. These stories led to his patronage of children in general, and of barrel-makers besides.
• Induced some thieves to return their plunder. This explains his protection against theft and robbery, and his patronage of them – he’s not helping them steal, but to repent and change. In the past, thieves have been known as Saint Nicholas’ clerks or Knights of Saint Nicholas.
• During a voyage to the Holy Lands, a fierce storm blew up, threatening the ship. He prayed about it, and the storm calmed – hence the patronage of sailors and those like dockworkers who work on the sea.

https://catholicsaints.info/saint-nicholas-of-myra/

So, next time you think about Father Christmas, or Santa Claus or Santa, remember St. Nicholas, who helped so many people on his time on Earth.

Happy ThanksGiving

It's Thanksgiving Day.

It's not from my culture to celebrate it because I am not american but it means a lot to me because when I and my husband were not married yet, and he wanted to get closer to me and know me better, it came to his mind to arrange a Thankgiving lunch so he could invite me. So he did and I accepted unaware of what was in his mind. It was a long time ago.

But did you know that the first Thanksgiving was not made by the Puritans ? Let's then remember the real First Thankgiving. 

"Blaring trumpets and thundering serenaded Don Pedro Menéndez de Avilés as he waded ashore on September 8, 1565. The Spanish admiral kissed a cross held aloft by the fleet's captain, Father Francisco Lopez, then claimed Florida for both his God and his country. As curious members of the indigenous Timucua tribe looked on, the 800 newly arrived colonists gathered around a makeshift altar as Father Lopez performed a Catholic Mass of thanksgiving for their safe arrival in the newly christened settlement of St. Augustine. At the invitation of Menéndez, the Timucuans then joined the newcomers in a comunal meal.

Some Florida historians have argued that this feast - and not the one held 56 years later by the Pilgrims and the Wampanoags in Plymouth, Massachusetts - was actually North America's First Thanksgiving. It was the first community act of religion and thanksgiving in the first permanent settlement in the land", wrote University of Florida Professor Emmeritus of History Michael Gannon in his book The Cross in the Sand."

(https://myfloridahistory.org/frontiers/article/140 )

Anyway, as most in America celebrate it today, let's give thanks for everything Our Lord gives us.

Have your turkey with your family and friends and have a very happy Thanksgiving Day.

Happy ThanksGiving