I Will Honour Christmas In My Heart

I will honour Christmas in my heart,
and try to keep it all the year.
I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future.
The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me.
I will not shut out the lessons that they teach!

~ Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Reflections of Christmas 2017, One of the Best Ever!!

  Welcome!!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

 I have been posting my annual Christmas Home Tour, sharing each room in our townhouse decorated for Christmas...

All of these posts are on my side bar if you missed them!!

Well, Christmas Day has passed but for me and my family, the Holiday Season is far from over!!!

In the coming week, we will be celebrating my older son, Joe's Birthday on the 29th, we will be hosting a Neighborhood Open House here on the 30th, more family will be visiting on the weekend, Joe will be cooking his famous lobster tails for New Year's Eve Dinner for our family and I will be serving a vat of Lasagna for New Year's Day Dinner!!

So you see, there is a lot more of the Holiday Season left for me and my family!!

I do want to reflect in this post on this year's, 2017, Holiday Season and share with you some of the things that I have shared on my Face Book site where I post a bit more personal things than I do here on my Blogs.

On Christmas Day, I shared some photos of Local Churches decorated for Christmas that I thought were beautiful and showed the true Reason for the Season so I will post them here as I "talk' a bit.......

St. Maria Goretti Parish, Our Church, in Laflin, Pa.
Truth be told, I was "behind' this Season with my decorating.......

I actually was quite under the weather......

St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish, where most of my family attend church, Swoyersville, Pa.
My Cholesterol was up a bit and my Dr. decided to try a different medication from the one I had been on for several years...

After a few days on the new medication, I literally could hardly move.....

St. Therese's Parish, Shavertown, Pa. where Father Jim Paisley, who is a former priest of our parish, is now Pastor.....
 I had incredible joint and muscle pain, my hands and feet were swollen, my back was killing me and my right knee, which is the one that I need a Total Knee Replacement on, was hurting beyond belief!

I still went to work and tried to decorate the house but at a much slower pace, needless to say!!

I originally thought all the pain was because I was hauling tubs up and down from the attic and that work was particularly busy and we were working short staffed......


St. Ignatius Loyola Parish in Kingston, Pa.
Then it finally dawned on me that the side effects of Statins are muscle and joint pain so I immediately stopped the new medication, put myself back on the old one and called my Dr.!

Nativity of Our Lord Parish, Duryea, Pa.
It took several days for me to feel like a truck did not roll over me twice but my knee pain did not go away until after I had it injected on the 14th.

 My Orthopedic surgeon felt it was from the medication and said that he knew people who actually were not able to get out of bed after taking certain statins.

 St. Peter and Paul's, Plains , Pa.
So if you are put on a new medication and start to not feel like yourself, call your Dr.

And to top it all off, I also tripped over a wheel chair with it's leg left on, sticking out in a patient's room and landed on my "good" knee!!!!!!

I did not have a "good" leg to stand on for awhile......

I was then back on tract with Christmas 2017!!!

I hope you enjoyed the photos of some of the beautiful Christmas displays in some of our local NEPA churches!!

The Season started off with Joe, who retired last year, realizing that he needed to get out of the house and that I needed him to get out of the house!!!!

LOL!!

He is now working as a part time cashier at Wegman's.......

They allow their employees to wear holiday shirts for Christmas and Joe really went a bit crazy with that!!!!

He bought them at WalMart for $5.00 each!!

The Abominable Snowman.......
 A Christmas Elf!!
His customers loved them and his co workers now think he is "The Coolest Senior Citizen" they know!!!!!!

He loves his job and he only works 15-18 hours a week!!

We were definitely in the Christmas Spirit after going to see Trans Siberian Orchestra in concert with our son Jim and his girl friend, Danielle, who had never seen them before!
 If you have never seen TSO in concert before, it is the most amazing thing!!!

They have toured for 19 years now and I have only missed 3 years!!!

It is part of our Christmas traditions!!!

On December 7th, we celebrated our younger son, Jimmy's, Birthday!!

I had finished decorating right before his birthday which was a week late according to my usual  finishing date of December 1st!

Because I decorate our home like a crazy person, we have a lot of friends and family over to see the house......

This year, I was thrilled to re-connect with my dear friend Anne Marie, who has had a very trying 2 years ending with the passing of her beloved Dad.......

She saw that I posted that I loved these Vintage Carolers in a Tour of Lark Mountain Marketplace.......
 So when she and her husband Tony came to visit, she gifted them to me!!!

I displayed 2 of the Carolers here on top of the hutch in the Living Room......
And the 3rd one, here, on top of the TV entertainment Center in the Living Room.......
We think they are from the 40's or 50's!!

My new friend and co worker, Lisa, also came for lunch and she gifted me this sweet Monet Angel.......
I hung it here on our front door so that everyone who walks through our door will be Blessed by an Angel.....
She will hang there year round..........

I also hosted a luncheon for some of our friends from church........
Carol, Patti and Barb.......
Of course, Joe was there too!!

Our friend Barb took this photo of us!!
 And as I mentioned, I still have family visiting on the weekend and I am hosting an Open House for our neighbors on the 30th!!

My Christmas Blog, A Debbie-Dabble Christmas was featured again as the Blog of the Week on  PA Live on the local NBC affiliate!!

PA Live! Blog of the Week: A Debbie-Dabble Christmas

NEPA Blogs will be presenting the "Blog of the Week" on WBRE's PA Live! every Tuesday. PA Live! airs weekday afternoons on WBRE from 4:00 to 5:00.


Our PA Live! Blog of the Week this week is A Debbie-Dabble Christmas (http://adebbie-dabblechristmas.blogspot.com/)

Fun, creative, and affordable home decorating for Christmas!

Above is the post on NEPA Blogs......

My 3 seconds of fame....LOL!!

I did a lot of baking for the Holidays and I do have to admit that it is the only time of year that I do bake!!!!
 I got to use my copper baking sheets that I bought last year and they worked wonderfully!!!!
 I sent Joe to Bed, Bath and beyond to buy one more.........They are $9.99 there.....

 And then an amazing thing happened........

Working night shift in a Hospital has meant that I have had to work either the Eve or Day night of every Holiday, not ever getting an entire Holiday off.

A Co Worker has her family coming in after Christmas so I agreed to work a day for her and she was so kind to give me Christmas Day night off!!

I was now off both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day night for the 1st time since I was on Maternity Leave with my youngest son, Jim, 34 years ago!!! WHOA!!!!

I did have to work on the night of the 23rd so I set my simple tablescape for Christmas Eve Dinner in the afternoon of the 23rd.......
Just something simple......
For Christmas Eve, being of Polish descent, we celebrated a traditional Polish Holy Supper.......

With Pierogies........
Whole potatoes and butter and mushrooms....

And seafood......

We have scallops and shrimp.......
Our own twist on it is that our oldest son, Joe, does not like seafood so we added chicken fingers.......
We had a wonderful Christmas Eve with our family of 5.....

That is when we exchange gifts which is money and gift cards, taking a lot of the stress out of Christmas!!!

 We were Blessed with a White Christmas here as it snowed a bit over night into Christmas Day......
 Our family of 5 also gets together at our house on Christmas Day for dinner........

I make a Sausage Stuffing that my Dad used to make........

Potato bread crumbs, celery, a jar of Heinz Pork Gravy, pepper, onion and garlic salt and Italian Seasoning......
Fry up the sausage.....
Add to the mixture and bake, covered at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.......
 You can see that I make it in a copper baking dish.......

Traditional Polish Kielbasi that I make like my Mom did....first boiling.....
 Then frying a bit.......
A half of a boneless ham....
And a turkey breast.....
Along with veggies..........

We had a great Christmas Day dinner......
 I was thrilled that I did not have to go to work on Christmas Day night like I have for the past few years.......

I was able to stay up and watch the Dr. Who Christmas Special!!!!!

I am a huge fan of Dr. Who!!

I was great to see David Bradley play the original Dr. Who....
 And it was so sad to say Good Bye to Peter Capaldi as Dr. Who.......

But I am looking forward to the new season of Dr. Who with the first ever female Dr. Who......
 Played by Jody Whitaker........

 I am going to close this post by showing you this present that Joe gifted ,me!!!
Now Joe and I have had an agreement for about the past 15 years that we do not buy presents for each other for any occasion......

Well, he broke that agreement!!

 He actually bought this lovely pendant for my Birthday which is the end of Jan. because I will be turning 60 years old......
 But Joe is not one to be able to keep a secret so he gave it to me at Christmas!!!
 This is the inscription.......
I could not be mad at him for breaking our agreement!!

I have been able to enjoy this Holiday Season with good friends and family......

So this has really been one of the BEST Christmas Seasons that I can remember and it is still not over......

I will keep you posted.........

So I hope you will come by and visit  again!!

And thanks to those who took the time out of their busy day to spend a little bit of time with me!!

If you do not have a blog, PLEASE  give me some way to reply to your comment, maybe by including your email in your comment.  If I can not find a way to reach you, I will reply on the post where you commented so please check back......

Hugs,
Debbie
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10 comments:

  1. I'm so glad to hear about your wonderful Christmas....and more holiday fun to come! Our new great grandson was also born on the 29th just like your Joe. We're having a big first birthday bash for Michael! Your Christmas dinner looked yummy....we had 16 for our dinner. I served prime rib and all the fixin's
    I'm going to try to catch up on all your posts when things calm down.....hugs... .

    ReplyDelete
  2. O my such lovely photos and 34 years is along time glad you were able to get that time off and be with you family and friends.. I will be turning 60 as well Jan. 15.. So if I dont get back here before then Happy happy 60th Birthday with love Janice Your pendant is awesome love in inscription

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  3. Oh Debbie - I could write a whole blog post commenting on your post!!! Haha!!
    First let me say 60 isn't any different than 59 was - I turned 60 last January! What a lovely gift Joe bought you. I love the inscription! That was a good break the rules case!
    I am just sick now that we didn't get to Trans Siberian Orchestra this year. They were here Tuesday before Thanksgiving and I was going to go with my daughter and her husband but hubby wanted to leave for Thanksgiving that night so we didn't get the tickets. I definitely will try next year. They look so fun!
    All of the food looks so great but those scallops and shrimp have me!!
    I love that you continue to celebrate. We do too and it is fun because the hustle and bustle is over.
    Everything looks so beautiful dusted in snow! We got our first snow Christmas Eve and the grandkids made an 18 inch snowman - not much snow but enough to get excited about.
    Have a wonderful week - sounds like a lot of fun!

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  4. That Joe! He's a sweetie, Debbie. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and family!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Your dinner looks delicious! Beautiful church decor. Terrible to go through all of that pain because of a medication. I do know how your knee feels. I still have not gotten all of the feeling back right on the right side of my knee. It just feels a little numb when I touch it. I guess because of the nerves being cut. But it is much better with the surgery. The outside of your home is decorated so nice. Happy Christmas Season.
    betsy

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  6. I'm so glad you were feeling back to your old self by Christmas! Those pictures from the Trans- Siberian orchestra show look amazing! I have been trying to get my family to go with me for years... I hope by showing them these photos they'll be more willing to try it out next year.

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  7. Debbie, I'm glad you enjoyed a beautiful Christmas this year. We did too! Hope you are feeling better. My husband suffered some terrible long term pain many years ago as a side effect from statins.
    Happy New Year!

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  8. Debbie, the carolers were such a sweet gift from your friend! Love Joes shirts!! Thanks for sharing with SYC.
    hugs,
    Jann

    ReplyDelete
  9. Oh wow, what a great post Debbie. So glad to hear you had a great Christmas. That necklace is precious :) Hope your feeling better. Happy New Year :) Thanks for sharing at Creative Mondays.

    ReplyDelete

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