Christmas links to bring good cheer

ll of a sudden, here we are: Christmas is upon us. It has seemed especially sneeky this year, creeping up and surprising most everyone I know. Is it that we've all been so busy, or that the local weather seems to deny December, or some other factor I haven't yet considered? Who knows. But on this Christmas Eve Eve, here are a few things I've been collecting around the interwebs that are particular to this time of year.

Just this weekend the "must watch Christmas movies" mood struck. This post about life lessons from "Elf" made me smile... (part of a separate post about life lessons from other Christmas movies, but truthfully my favorite of their list is "Elf." I'm a big "Elf" fan.). I think my favorite "Elf" lesson is Do What You Love:
"First we'll make snow angels for a two hours, then we'll go ice skating, then we'll eat a whole roll of Tollhouse cookie dough as fast as we can, and then we'll snuggle."

Also from Positively Present, a collection of links I thought I'd pass along, all Christmasy, of course. And a Christmas playlist, because you can't ever have too much Christmas music, in my humble opinion. Kind of sad to say goodbye to it for another eleven-ish months.

A number of my favorite bloggers have written posts around the holidays. They are not necessarily full of joy, or cheer. But they are real, and represent the dichotomy of this season, the light and the dark, the sadness and the joy, that I think most people relate to.
Holiday
Hugs for Holidays
Winter Solstice

And, because there's got to be a way to build "Downton Abbey" into just about everything (am I right or am I right?), here's a little gingerbread magic for your viewing pleasure. Fun to watch the construction. Gives me hope that one day I will conquer that Fallingwater gingerbread house that's on my bucket list...



If you read my post a couple of Friday nights ago, you know that Mary Did You Know? is my favorite Christmas song. I happened to read a devotional about how the song came to be (click link above) a week or so ago.

And if you're in need of a reminder of the real reason for the season (as I am, often enough), these little kids from New Zealand do a pretty sweet job.

  Merry, merry, all. Wishing you peace this week, more than anything else.