Long before I started this blog (about music), I had a page on a Christmas site listing “musings,” which are short articles about our personal reactions to Christmas and related topics. If you’re in the mode for some Christmas readings, check out our FamilyChristmasOnline Musings page.
Some musings that I recommend this season are:
Remembering Our Shoestring Christmases – Shelia Race looks back to times when less really was more. New for 2015
Don’t Try This At Home (Anymore) – Dangerous Christmas Decorations People Used To Use
Why I Need Christmas – Paul addresses complaints that Christmas is culturally insensitive, is foolish, or brings back bad memories, then explains why people need Christmas in their lives anyway. New for 2015
How Much Do We Really Need Anyway? – At some point you have to determine that more stuff isn’t going to make your life better, and it just might be making it more complicated than you need. New for 2015
The Line for the Family Stable Starts Here – A funny and touching look at the way children perceive Nativity sets in their homes.
Christmas Gifts Gone Awry – Shelia’s take on how gift-giving that doesn’t work out the way we planned sometimes works out for the best after all.
In Search of Baby Jesus – Author Paul Race’s musings about the dime-store nativity figures he grew up with and why they represent his family’s priorities as much as they represent Christmas.
Say “Enough” to “Life Inflation” – Why does our culture keep “setting the bar higher” in every area of our lives? And how can we put on the brakes, especially at Christmas?
What do Trains Have to do with Christmas? (borrowed from the Big Christmas Trains™ site)
Could Christmas Possibly Come at a Worse Time? – A different way of looking at holiday stresses
Who Speaks for Christmas? – The message of “Good tidings of Great Joy to All People” seems to have got derailed somewhere. Is looking for ways to get offended really the best way to honor all of the best meanings of Christmas?
The Magic Window – “Papa” Ted Althof’s essay on how our earliest Christmas memories become our most precious. Updated, December 2014
Make Your Giving Count – A seasonal flood of requests from scammers reminded me that folks still tend to fall for this stuff, and every year millions of dollars in donation that should have gone to help real people with real needs go instead to any con artist who can tell a good story or scan a heart-wrenching photo into their materials. It would be enough to make me cynical about giving to anybody, if I didn’t know so many real people out there on the front lines helping other real people. How do you know the difference? Follow the money. New for 2014
