Parents' Review Magazine - My Story

A Homespun Magazine for Home Training and Culture

My Parents’ Review Story

Click here to buy the Parents' Review Magazine.

     I’ve been happy to answer questions that enter my email. The questions are varied. But if I had to pick a frequently asked question, it would this: Where do I find your Parents’ Review magazine - published 1991-96? Remarkable. Therefore, it is about time the editor shared her story.

   
  “What’s this?” I exclaimed with hands-on-hips. I was thinking out loud. My little girls were playing nearby. Overseas Federal Express dropped a pile of old whiskey boxes at the backdoor. One ragged box had a hole. Through the torn cardboard I could see that the boxes were heavily laden with hardcover books. I read the bill. It was 600 dollars. Perturbed, I telephoned my husband Dean at the office.

     “Is everything alright?” he asked.

     “No,” I said.

     “What’s wrong?”

     I told him what sat at the backdoor. I hoped the Tennessee clouds wouldn’t send their usual downpour of spring rain. Expecting a baby any week I couldn’t carry the boxes indoors.   

     After a brief pause to collect his thoughts Dean said, “I distinctly remember asking the librarian at the archive for a few of the earliest years of Parents’ Review. That’s all. Just a couple sample years, when Charlotte Mason was the editor. And to send them surface. I never thought the librarian would send them all. And at such an expensive rate as Fed-EX air.”

     “The bill is almost one month’s rent,” I said, with a flair for stating the obvious, and with more than a hint of stress in my voice.

     He took a breath. “There must’ve been a misunderstanding.” 

     “Yes. Well. If you ask me, your English and the librarian’s English are two different languages.”

     He laughed.

     It was 1989. We were tightly getting by on one income. We had one car that Dean drove into the city of Nashville daily. I was sort-of marooned in the ranch house we rented. It was in the woods. No one apparently wanted to buy it. We were told it was for sale for a long time - possibly because the house was half garage. The garage was huge. The kitchen was tiny and dark with dingy brown wallpaper. Most of the rooms had solid paned windows that didn’t open. The long driveway, as steep as a roller coaster rail, dipped down at the creek, then up just as steeply to the street.

     But there were things we liked about the place. The trees gave us shade. The weedy areas had stick-bugs and wildflowers. The sandy creek had crayfish and turtle hatchlings to observe. Our sparsely furnished family room offered the children room enough to play and one sunny window - a sliding glass door.  Although furniture was sparse we were surrounded by an abundance of books, art supplies, dolls, blocks, wooden puzzles, and audio cassettes. And there was always the odd cardboard box awaiting discarding.   

     Dean cringed at the state of the wobbly whiskey boxes when he saw them. The hardcover bound volumes looked to be loosely thrown in. They could easily have been lost in shipping. Dean paid the bill. He set up a bookshelf. And I carefully checked each volume to make sure all the years were accounted for. It took the space of four or five sets of encyclopedias. “How on earth will I ever find time to read all these?” I thought.

    Heavy-with-unborn-baby I put my feet up on the sofa each afternoon. While the girls were occupied – I would reach for a copy of Parents’ Review and hold its small print before my eyes for ten minutes. I already had a stack of books by the bedside such as Miss Charlotte Mason’s 6-volume-set that we had brought back to America. It was forming a rather long queue.

     I scanned the pages of Parents’ Review, stopping at what caught my eye. Never had I read articles so unusual, so meaty, so British. I sipped the paragraphs like tea. It gave me something to think about while standing in front of the kitchen sink full of soapy dishes or baskets of clean laundry overturned on the bed. Sometimes ideas rolled over in my mind while the girls were in the bathtub. “Education is an awesome undertaking” was my overall impression. But there was something so invigorating and curiously inviting about the high ideals. 

    


     When tackling anything high or big it is best to just get on with it, bit by bit. So I started plodding. As the saying goes: Inch by inch it’s a cinch, mile by mile, it’s a trial. Here and there I would experience a sense of fulfillment. It told me, that’s enough. Stop reading. It’s time to put these appealing ideas into practice – somehow - even by trial and error. It didn’t matter that I felt an awkward lack of confidence. (This was to be expected. After all, I hadn’t received an education like it myself.) The attractiveness of the ideals drew me forward. And I knew that anything really worth doing is worth doing not-so-very-well, at least at the start. 

     I mulled over that irksome Fed-Ex bill. Women tend to brood and plan. And I’m one of them. After praying about the situation I came up with a suggestion. Perhaps I could re-coop our outlay by photocopying choice articles and offering them for sale to anyone interested.

Baby crawled into Daddy's brief case.

     With this aim in mind, and with the girls and the baby tucked into bed for the night, and Dean out-of-state on business (two weeks out of the month) I sifted. I book-marked. I scribbled notes. The articles stimulated my mind in many directions. This is precisely what its editor, Miss Charlotte Mason, originally meant them to do. It was a sort of blessed enlightenment. By 1991 I had selected a variety of topics for the first issue of my own magazine. Would my fellow home teacher find them to be of mutual encouragement?  She did. She was hungry for inspiring ideas.  

     On the cover of PR I placed this phrase:

“May its pages supply your educational endeavors with fresh ideas, a touch of culture, old-fashioned wisdom, and introductions to enduring works and lives of great people.”

     I embellished my magazine with antique black & white book illustrations and related research. As insights unfolded from what I was learning from Miss Mason’s books, unknown to me, I was laying the groundwork for the chapters of A Charlotte Mason Companion and for spreading ideas far and wide. Today it is amazing to see the fruition of seeds sown in the 1990s.

I invited my readers to send, on postcard, a drawing of a bird observed. 

     Cut & paste was the way to do a homespun magazine on the kitchen table then. It was the early days of the home-learning-boom. Reading material for home teachers was scarce. Consequently, friends told friends about Parents’ Review. In couple of years I had hundreds of subscribers who were looking to give their family a Charlotte Mason Education.

Nature Notebooks at Longwood Gardens - Karen in a Laura Ashley jumpsuit.

    


     We recouped the Fed-Ex charges after several years of work. Eventually, we mailed the volumes back to the British library surface rate, wrapped snug and secure for travel. I remember standing in our dinning room, in Maryland, finding myself giving every volume, one by one, a tender pat-of-the-hand in farewell, as I fitted it into its box. I had grown rather attached to them.  

      As editor of Parents’s Review (1991-1996) I answered hundreds of paper letters from America and some from overseas. (Some I still save in an ornate hatbox.) During those years my husband, Dean, changed jobs three times. Our family made seven household moves. But never was there any feeling of hurry to contend with. The quarterly schedule was a nice pace. 

Nigel - Junior Salesman (Moving from Maryland to Maine).

     When we lived in Oregon, Sue, a fellow home educating mother, told me that her husband knew computer layout and could “make” the magazine for us. Wonderful news. No more cut & paste (1994-96). These issues that were on disk were lost. We have wondered what to do with the paper masters of our six years of back issues. PDF is hard to read and with most of the issues at 40 pages, the file would be enormous. So we’ve kept them in their original state. And although the cost of printing since the 90's has increased more than tenfold, we’ve kept the cost of each issue the same for our new readers.

     Apart from the odd book review the pages of Parents’ Review are advertisement-free. Friends still tell friends. Curious moms find us. Therefore, those six years of Parents’ Review have never gone out-of-print. Here is a photograph of the oak bookcase built into our office/family room in Maine. We’ve since downsized our library but appreciated, then, having such an expansive accommodating arrangement. You can see Parents’ Review stacked horizontally at the left. Apparently, there are some people who still like to recline peacefully with paper in hand. I do. 

     If you are curious to know the titles of the articles in PR and prices, click below. Or go to "Products" on this blog. It is also on the new website that my son designed for me CharlotteMason.com.  

Thanks for allowing me to share my story in words and pictures.

Karen Andreola     

Click here to buy the Parents' Review Magazine.

Charlotte Maria Shaw Mason

Charlotte Maria Shaw Mason

January 1^st, 1842

January 16^th, 1923

     Charlotte Mason is my heroine. I stitched her name into an historic sampler a while ago and had it framed.

      As much as I’ve put pen to paper about her work, words faintly describe my admiration for her accomplishments - and her modesty. Have you noticed how little she talks about herself in her writings? Rather, the founder boasts of her findings for the children's sake. She was a Christian not merely by church association (the Anglican Church) but by her commitment to live for Christ. 

     Here is a photograph of my desk in the attic where I write to you. I made it tidy for the picture. On another wall (not shown) is an old bookshelf (painted pink for a young daughter) and the sewing machine - where I enjoyed making a pink cushion for a chair. The oil painting portrait of Charlotte Mason, commissioned for the cover of my purple book,  keeps me company.    

Idealism at Work

     At Charlotte Mason's memorial service a gentleman who gave the prayers and addresses said, “She was . . . the living example . . . that it is character that matters. She had a shrewd, saving north-country common sense which kept her idealism from ever becoming an unpractical fact.”*1 Reaching for ideals we labor to put into practice those things that inspire us. Instead of being frozen in our tracks - fretting about feeling inferior to the huge task before us, we get busy making mistakes. Consequently, by and by, we learn to do things better. A superior education is the result as we meet with success in odd hours. Out of love and duty we quietly seek to advance His kingdom “on earth as it is in heaven.” How grateful this imperfect Christian is to know that when we yield to the Holy Spirit, the Divine Educator, He works in us and through us.

We Grow When Fed

     I fervently hope that my reader will take time for Mother Culture this year. One way is to feed her mind. This equips her for guiding her children. In the earliest years of my motherhood I was an eager, but slow, learner. The “slow” was leftover from my less-than-empowering youth. Nevertheless, I poured through articles and books. I read in fifteen-minute-snatches while my energetic children played in the afternoon. I read beside the sandbox or beside the puddle pool (where my pages and I survived splashes). I read on the edge of the hot drive while tricycles wheeled happily around in circles. I read on rainy days while children played inside the living-room tent (a blanket supported by kitchen chairs.) Does this give you any ideas?

     Fifteen minutes of reading now and again will do a mother a power of good. It takes two-to-three minutes to read a blog post. Perhaps in today’s on-line world fifteen minutes with a well-written book would be considered luxurious lingering, and not the quick “snatch” it once was.  

Harmony of Lifestyle

     Eventually I began to call the collection of Miss Mason's principles “The Gentle Art of Learning™.” They harmonize so well with the background of sane living that it becomes difficult to tell the two apart. The living books, narration, early hours, short lessons, the way of habit and reason, the picture study, music appreciation, nature study, love of God and service to others, etc., are pearls of great value. Parents reading about Miss Mason for the first time are struck with the sensibleness of it all. Their letters to me confirmed this. “This is what I’ve always thought education should be but haven’t been able to put into words.”

Not a Fad

     In these modern times we can glean from the same principles Miss Mason advocated in the 19th century because they are not a fad. They are fundamental, simple and straightforward. “Lifestyle” wasn’t a word in Miss Mason’s day. But the concept of a lifestyle of learning was what she strove to bring to our notice. And although we may say, “of course, this is the way to do it, this is what we want for our children,” little pearls of great value can be left undefined. On this blog and in my books I point out the pearls.

The Lake District of England

     Every once in awhile I am privy to someone, who with light-hearted anticipation, plans a trip to England’s Lake District - where Miss Mason lived and taught for a good part of her life. I am asked what to see. To the surprise of my questioner I respond curtly but politely. “I’ve never been. It’s Dean who’s been. In the 1980s he visited the (then) Charlotte Mason College,” I say. 

     I had the opportunity once. In the 1990s I was sent a formal invitation to take part in a reunion of PNEU teachers, the few remaining teachers who were trained decades prior at Miss Mason’s House of Education in Ambleside. It was a big deal to me. I felt honored. But I was exhausted from our recent household move, and not having the courage to hop on a jet plane by myself, to travel so far from my family, I gracefully declined. It is doubtful that I’ll ever get to the Lake District in my lifetime.

     That’s why some months ago, when asked by email, “What shall I see?” my closing remark surprised me. “Miss Mason is buried at St. Mary’s. If you visit her grave would you place a flower on it for me?” My eyes were wet with tears the instant I clicked “send” and caught up with what my fingers had so boldly requested. But I didn’t amend it. And, Lynnda (a friend from Maine who taught her four children K-12 treasuring a wide variety of living books) wrote back to say she would.

Mission Accomplished

     A few months passed. I heard from Lynnda again. With her email she attached these photographs her daughter had taken. I felt my heart move and thanked her most sincerely. And when I asked if I could share parts of her letters she said, “Certainly.”

"Dear Karen,
     . . . Our first view of St. Mary’s Parish Church in Ambleside was from a narrow, twisting lane that dropped steeply from the high fells overlooking Ambleside. I spotted the church steeple from this bird’s-eye view. It reminded me of looking down on Camden [Maine] from Mt. Battie.
     After a stop at a florist to select a flower, we proceeded to the churchyard. I was afraid it might take us quite a while to find Charlotte Mason’s grave since there are a considerable number of stones. Evidently there have been many people seeking out Miss Mason’s grave because there was a discreet sign pointing us to the right direction. I was curious to learn when the sign had been placed there, but no one I asked knew the answer.

     I was very pleased to be able to fulfill your request of laying a flower on Charlotte Mason’s grave. You’ll notice that the flower was red. I thought it a fitting choice since red seems to be a favorite of yours.

     The tag I attached to the stem was a last-minute thought, otherwise I would not have torn a page from my journal and written the first thing that came to mind. I wanted anyone who saw the flower to know it was from you, as you’ve done so much to bring Miss Mason’s teachings to light and make them accessible for so many grateful homeschoolers. I still remember how I devoured A Charlotte Mason Companion. It was such an encouragement for me to know that what I had been doing by gut feeling with my children was practiced by others, and that I wasn’t alone in what I felt education should be. Even if I had never met you, I’d feel like you were a cherished book friend. . .

      The Lake District is as picturesque as I could have imagined. I particularly enjoyed visiting Beatrix Potter’s Hill Top and seeing the places she painted in her little books. I do hope you’ll be able to make a visit there someday. . .”  Love Lynnda

End Notes

*1 Parents’ National Educational Union, In Memoriam – Charlotte M. Mason, page 223.

Photographs at St Mary’s are used with permission.

Thank you Lynnda for helping me honor Charlotte Mason today.

Happy New Year to all, 

Karen Andreola 

Raspberry Ruffles

Raspberry Ruffles

     The Man-of-the-House returned from running errands. He walked into the kitchen and carefully placed his bags on the farm table. “I just saw someone out front - picking our wild berries,” he spoke to the Lady-of-the-House. Familiar gestures were in gear. One arm waved in the direction of the mailbox.

    “She can pick what she likes. She’s welcome to it. I prefer the cultured varieties. No chance of poison ivy, thorn pricks - snake, spider, tick, or bee bites.”

     He corrected her. “The picker is a him.”

     “Really? Interesting. Perhaps he’s picking for a wife or mother. A real gentleman.  Or . . . he likes berries as much as you do.” Connected to her smile was an eyebrow slightly raised. It was the eye on him. The other was on unpacking the bags. 

     Leaving that last remark alone the Man-of-the-House announced, “These are from the farm stand by-the-way. The zucchini looks good.”

     “It does. So does the butternut squash. Nice and fresh. Thank you.” Then, reaching into the last bag, she exclaimed, “Ooo, raspberries,” in slow melodious tones.  

     “Yeah” was the solitary note. But a knowing glance was exchanged. A hankering for raspberries is something they share in common, although, one doesn’t often put a hankering into words – at least not out-loud.  

Raspberry Jam

     Childhood memories are embedded in the taste buds of the Lady-of-the-House. Mom fixed peanut butter and jelly sandwiches routinely with grape. Raspberry was a once-a-year experience. On vacation at the seashore Dad drove out to an ordinary-looking-enough-house, a location mysteriously revealed to him by word-of-mouth, and brought home freshly made doughnuts – for one of the family’s breakfasts. The young girl can still see the grease spot on the brown bag Dad held in his grasp. Other than that gala event they never ate doughnuts.

     Overhearing grown-up gossip in the kitchen, she learned that the white powdered doughnuts were made by a beach-tanned baker who let his reputation go to his head but never his surfer’s waistline. He was generous with his filling of either rich custard (that Mom could testify he was boast-worthy of) or raspberry jam. The Lady-of-the-House has vivid memories of choosing the jam. She wandered out the screen-door and ate the summer holiday confection in private, in little bites, making it last as long as she could – a feat of accomplishment for any growing girl.  

Raspberry Cake

     For the hankering of the Man-of-the-House his Lady made a cake. A warm summer memory of raspberry doughnuts hovered over her as she buttered and floured, mixed and measured. She spread fresh raspberries over two thirds of the batter in the pan, then spooned the remaining batter over the top to almost cover the raspberries. The cake came out but went back in the oven to bake several minutes longer because of its added moistness. It didn’t rise as well as she would have liked but the flavor of that mysterious baker’s jam-filled doughnut was captured.

     The Man-of-the-House and his lady could not go away this year but they have learned to stop and take brief vacation-interludes at home. Enjoying the pleasant breezes of a remarkably mild summer they vacationed in a chair, each with a slice of raspberry cake served on pretty china. 

Raspberry Ruffles

Knitting Lingo

     While the Man-of-the-House puttered around in his own way, the Lady-of-the-House picked up her knitting needles - also a kind of brief vacation. A small project in the Fall 2011 issue of Love of Knitting magazine aroused the cuteness-factor in her and launched an attempt at something new – ruffles - in this case Raspberry Ruffles.

     The size 2 bloomers-with-back-interest is knit flat, top-down, front-to-back.

     Gold yarn is shown on the magazine page but she used up remnants in her stash – which is what a small project is good for.

    

     The crowded stitches inside the ruffle can be picked-up easily with a crochet hook, sliding the accumulated stitches off the straight end of the hook and onto a knitting needle. Here you can see the loops of the purl rows ready to be picked up for the ruffle.

     The ribbing at the leg has some yarn-overs for a lacy look. Elastic is in the waistband. 

     Into Grandmother’s Someday Box it goes . . . or until an invitation to the next baby shower.

     It is okay to look back at the good memories. The faithful also look forward. The American poet John Greenleaf Whittier puts this well:

“I dimly guess, from blessings known, of greater out of sight.”

Hope you are enjoying the last weeks of warm summer breezes.

Karen Andreola

At the Seashore, Real and Fictitious

At the Seashore, Real and Fictitious

     I was brought up loving the seashore.  Its intensity of sunshine, foamy waves of cool saltwater, the dunes, the salt sea air in my hair, and the crying gulls of the New Jersey shore, are marked in my memory. This is where I would visit my grandparents for a weekend every summer of my childhood. And this is where one old Kodak slide gives evidence of my very first taste of ice cream - in my father’s arms, in 1960.

     My grandparent’s had a little yellow house on stilts. Their front yard was sand dunes. Beyond the dunes was the Atlantic Ocean. After supper, after a day mostly spent waist high is seawater, my mother took out a large aerosol can and sprayed my sun-toasted arms and legs wet with mosquito repellent (not advised today). Then, I’d wander the dunes in the cool of the evening. (These dunes are off limits today to protect against erosion). I’d listen to the lighthearted birds hidden and at home in the dune grass. Their clear songs would repeat their sounding joy – a joy that matched my own.

Brother and Sister 1963, Bayside

     From my grandparent’s high deck I could see the shinning sea. My grandpa would hand me his heavy binoculars to give me a closer look at the fishing boats that dotted the horizon. Indoors, out of the incessant wind, my grandmother embroidered in the easy chair closest to the picture window so her threads wouldn’t blow away. She would keep the window glass sparkling clean for the sake of the view.

Paul Michel Dupuy (1869-1949)

     All the sensory impressions I have tucked away securely in my imagination of the seashore (for the remainder of my life) came back to me when I read Island of the Blue Dolphins. It is a sensitive tale of realistic fiction. If you haven’t yet read Island of the Blue Dolphins, summer would be a good time to saunter through its pages. It isn’t a long story. I read it in four hours – although not all in one sitting. Yet, it is a square meal that gives you a satisfying feeling when you are done. 

     Off the coast of Los Angeles, California is a small rocky island, San Nicolas. Indians had lived on the island for centuries. When writer, Scott O’Dell learned a bit of history about the island, that a schooner carried an isolated tribe of Indians off the island in 1835, he set out to write a story. He wrote about this real island and the real girl who, the captain reported, jumped off the schooner and into the sea.

     In Island of the Blue Dolphins, the schooner’s white sails had filled. The ship was already moving away. Although the rest of her tribe urged her not to jump, twelve-year-old Karana would not be persuaded. She screamed and broke free from the arms that held her when she discovered her brother was not onboard. She spotted him running along the cliff with a spear in his hands. He was only six-years-old and would be left alone on the island for who knows how long. She must swim to shore. What did she see when she reached him? How did she live on the Island?

     Karana tells the story. She brings the nature, on this lonely little island, to the forefront: wild dogs, “devilfish” (octopi) elephant seals, sea otters, shellfish of various sorts (to eat), seabirds, and more. The setting is exotic but it is Karana that we care about most. She survives isolation with ingenuity, courage, and perseverance. Although a girl is the main character and she retains her feminine nature, boys will like to read how Karana “roughs it” with the loyal company of a dog. And yet in roughing it she lives life to-the-fullest. 

     Island of the Blue Dolphins is literary enough for a high school student. Anyone, junior high up to adult, will find it a sad and beautiful story. 

     Dean photographed our hardcover on the Jersey shore – a couple years back - and I, on the sofa I’m sitting on now with my laptop.  

     For young readers – or for reading aloud – children will find the settings of Time of Wonder and One Morning in Maine, to be light and summery with a bit of adventure. This time we explore the coast of Maine. The visit will be brief but you may find yourself wanting to vacation there each summer. 

    


        I photographed Mr. McCloskey’s stories outside my parent’s seaside bungalow. They are driving inland to see us next week. Perhaps they’ll bring me another copy of their local newspaper, The Beachcomber.

 The books I chose to feature are linked to Amazon.com.

Comments are welcome,

Karen Andreola 

A Dickens of a Christmas

A Dickens of a Christmas

     At a gathering my mother met the great-grandson of Charles Dickens. Cedric Dickens is his name. He was selling his book, Christmas with Dickens. My mother bought a copy for me and Cedric Dickens autographed it. Isn’t this neat? That was ten years ago or so. 

Faux mistletoe is in the middle jar.

     The book is a framework of ideas on how to create A Christmas Carol evening. Cedric Dickens and his cousin edited the Carol to 28 minutes of reading aloud. The host or hostess acts as the master of ceremonies. Recipes are provided in the book for a banquet.

     Filling the house with greenery is suggested. Period clothing and period music are optional. Between the courses selections of the Carol are read (with feeling, it is emphasized). Later come parlor games and punch. Although never as elaborate, I have adapted some of the ideas within our family and over the years we have extended the hand of hospitality to friends and neighbors.   

     Traditions were formed by degrees. Several Christmases stand out. Looking at our little tree this year, I recall the simplest Christmas of all. It was in 1986.

     In 1986 we spent Christmas in London, England. Joining the volunteer efforts of a Christian literature mission Dean and I had come for the year with two suitcases each – and our two daughters - then age 2 and 4. We were prepared to live simply. But how appreciative we were when we were able to move from a tiny third-floor flat into a semi-detached house. We thoroughly enjoyed its back garden.
  

The glass and plastic ornaments, most from the 1960s, remind me of my childhood.

     Along the edges of the narrow, fenced-in lawn, were plants that took turns blooming through the months. The largest was an overgrown holly. I trimmed a branch, brought it indoors, propped it up on a table, and decorated it with popcorn and paper chains. I cut a star out of cardboard, covered it with (you guessed it) silver foil. The star balanced on the top of our crooked little “tree.” Secretly, I thought it drab. But in the eyes of my children it was fine and dandy – and so – for their sake - I thought it fine and dandy, too.

     A month prior a fellow American had handed me a bag of puzzles, plastic toys and picture books that her children had long outgrown. She was, “just now getting around to cleaning out their closets and would your girls like them?” I thanked her and hid the things away to be wrapped for Christmas.

     I remember my girls sitting cross-legged in the middle of the carpet listening to a cassette. They played it again and again. Sometimes I sat with them. Other times I took advantage of the moment to start supper. At the sound of the beep the eldest knew to turn the pages of the accompanying book. With heads together they gazed at the pictures of Joseph and Mary and the lowly stable. They were quite taken up with the Christmas story – even if the incarnation – one of the most marvelous and important doctrines of the Christian faith – was something they would grow to understand better, later – and yet it is too wonderful to comprehend this side of heaven, really. I can still hum the melody of the sweet song that came at the beginning and end of story. I wonder what ever happened to that cassette – narrated beautifully in the King’s English.  

I like sewing pinwheels. Sophia's homemade teddy wears his holiday bowtie.

     One Saturday in December Dad took us to the missionary closet. We could choose what we wished from what had been donated. After an hour of rummaging, trying on things in a curtained corner - elbowroom only and no mirror - we each settled upon a piece of clothing. I’ll never forget the beautiful wool skirt that fit me perfectly – except that I was in denial of it being rather snug at the waist. It was moth eaten in an inconspicuous spot and easily mended. This soft, black skirt, with its ruffle along the hem, had a nice drape. Add a white blouse with a red ornament on its collar, and it looked smart for Christmas Eve service. Wool provided necessary warmth for sitting in the chilly pews of the ancient stone church – Christ Church Bromely.

Relaxing with a needle at Christmastime

     With our new used things and a couple tiny treats for the girl’s stockings, (literary their socks) Christmas Day arrived with smiles all around. After dinner (a meal that Dad relished) we put on our coats and took a walk around the block. The brick houses sat close to the sidewalk and I couldn’t help notice, through the windows of the front parlors, people sitting in chairs arranged in a circle. I found it odd that they were wearing brightly colored paper hats. I learned later that they were waiting for parlor games to start.



A homemade ornament resting on my new plaid skirt. I need to get better at sewing corners.

     Parlor games on Christmas Day became a tradition much later in our lives. With all the years we spent reading A Christmas Carol, listening to it on audio, and watching it on films, it eventually caught on. Perhaps you play them, too.

"There was first a game of blindman’s buff." A Christmas Carol

     It was our Yolanda who initiated Charades, which I explained in a post last year, “Name That Hymn” is one that I started and it stuck. It is a way to give closer attention to lyrics – some of the most precious in all of Christendom. It is fun to include lines from  contemporary songs, too.

     After the main course is cleared the game is played. One by one, each person seated around the table, unfolds his slip of paper and reads it aloud. He then guesses the hymn title. Although my family is pretty good at answers, lines from a third verse can be a challenge. The guesser is permitted to choose one person to assist. A sudden remark blurted out from across the table of  “Ohh, I know,” identifies a willing assistant.

    But Mom urges, “Give him a minute first, please.”

"There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor." A Christmas Carol.

     I typed out some examples. A hostess will enjoy choosing her own lines.

Christmas morning muffins - orange cranberry

1) A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices, For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn. 

2) Bless all the dear children in Thy tender care, And fit us for heaven, to live with Thee there.

3) Word of the Father, now in flesh appearing.

4) Where meek souls will receive Him still, The dear Christ enters in.

5) On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me (what is it?).

6) Where the treetops glisten and children listen to hear sleigh bells in the snow.

     The hostess keeps the corresponding answers handy.

1) O Holy Night

2) Away in the Manger

3) O Come all Ye Faithful

4) O Little Town of Bethlehem

5) six geese a laying

6) White Christmas

I've been meaning to decorate with pineapple on the fireplace mantel for some years. The apples are editble, too.

    

     My children aren’t little any longer. “Time has stolen them from me” – as one Victorian poem sentimentally refers. While children are with us we work to give them a foundation of pleasant memories – especially because the details of this world are not all fine and dandy. 

     Mom and Dad share the memories. The children grew up and grew into making a memorable Christmas for others. They’ve learned that the advent season is less about material gifts. It is the giving of oneself in various ways and celebrating the joy and true meaning of Christmas.

“. . . apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a shovel-full of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Crachit family drew round the hearth . . . “ A Christmas Carol

In Fellowship assembled here

We thank thee Lord for food and cheer

And through our Saviour, thy dear Son,

We pray “God bless us everyone.”

Prayer [for the table] discovered by Alan S. Watts, President of the Dickens Fellowship, during research for his book, Dickens at Gad’s Hill. 

    


  Peace and Good Will,

     Karen Andreola