I love Christmas.  I am a sucker for Christmas decorations.  Slowly over the years, attending after-holiday sales, I added to the Christmas decorations for me and my children.  Every year for many years I would let my son and daughter pick out a Hallmark Christmas ornament of their own.  Our tree is decorated with the Three Stooges, a Klingon Battlecruiser, an Enterprise Shuttlecraft, and a Mole Christmas.  In fact, when the tree is plugged in three voices chime in: one is saying, “Shuttle craft to Enterprise, shuttle craft to Enterprise.  Spock here.  Happy Holidays.  Live long and prosper.” Another is Worf from Next Generation saying, “I wish you a most honorable holiday.  Ka-plah.” Thirdly, and no less spectacularly, is, “Roger.  Zero G and I feel fine.  Capsule is turning around.  Oh!  That view is tremendous!”  That was astronaut John Glenn in 1962 in the Friendship-7 shuttle, having the first view of the earth by a man in space. 

The most labor-intensive part of the Christmas set-up,  yet the most satisfying, is Christmas town.  Years of going to Michael’s crafts store after Christmas to pick up the Dickensville Christmas town piece by piece, along with small houses collected along the way (I always have had a weakness for miniature houses), has coalesced into a city that, if not always size appropriate, certainly is well planned.  My son used to set up the town, then after he moved out my daughter took over the planning.  There is a business district, a central park area, the docks, a residential neighborhood, both upscale and poor, alleyways, and off in the mountains stands Scrooge in front of his dark home watching with hopefully spirit-changing surprise as Santa and his reindeer fly past.  The town changes every year.  It is always good to see the familiar faces: a mother and daughter feeding the birds, boys on a teeter-totter, and a little man just standing there having a cup of tea.  Then in January, I pack it all away again, and enjoy having my house a little less cluttered for the New Year.