The Virtual Advent Tour heads back out on the road today to Rudi at Random Duck. He’s got a tremendous holiday show for your pleasure today, bound only by the best Christmas musical presentations of all time.
Give yourself some time to check this one out!
Today on the Virtual Advent Tour, I’ve got a holiday book review for you:
It is December 1985 in an Irish village in Claire Keegan’s novella, Small Things Like These, and Bill Furlong and his wife and five daughters are preparing for Christmas.
Bill runs a small coal delivery company, and it’s been an okay year for them. Not everyone can pay their bill, but enough people can that he can afford not to chase after the families he knows can’t. As a small business owner, he’s able to keep some people employed, even as factories are laying people off. He and his wife can send their children to the local Catholic schools and pay for the dentist and put gifts under the tree and, as long as they are careful, can mostly live a comfortable working-class life with the respect of their townsfolk.
A quiet, thoughtful man, Bill is proud of being able to provide in this way. He grew up the child of an unmarried, but loving, mother in service to a kind-hearted local woman, and he knows that without those women (and the male gardener who also worked for the estate), he’d likely have gone down a much different path.
So, when, the Saturday before Christmas he makes a delivery to the local convent and discovers something he’s not supposed to see, it sends him into a spiral. How did he get to this point and how would his story have changed if things had played out differently in his and his mother’s past? What if the careful choices he’s been making have inadvertently hurt people and have protected people causing harm? And what choices do you make when you know the ripples from your actions will affect someone else, no matter what you do?
Keegan combines the same distinct sense of time and place with that timelessness that I associate with Dylan Thomas’ A Child’s Christmas in Wales. And despite it taking place during my childhood, it read to me like something out of the 1950s, which I think both helps to give you the distance to process the story and underscores that this took place so recently.
This is a novella, so you could buy it or borrow it from the library this week and still read it before Christmas Eve, when the story ends. I highly recommend it to everyone.
A key part of our holidays every year is watching specials and movies, but while sometimes the tropes are old and the themes cheesy, it’s still fun to view them.
Last year, I made us bingo cards for the seasonal viewing we were doing and my mom and I had a lot of fun filling them in. So I made us new new boards for this year for this year.
Click through and you’ll be given a playing board. You can either play online or print it out. (If you hate the board you get, instructions for getting a different one are under “Help.” There are 30 different versions and over 50 categories, so don’t take one that you know you’ve got no shot at filling.)
I’d think back to what you’ve already seen so far this season, rather than moving forward from today, but YMMV. And if you’re a reader, rather than a viewer, most of these will work with your holiday-themed books, as well.
Let us know in the comments when you hit bingo! And have fun!
Today brings us to the halfway point in our Virtual Advent Tour, and to celebrate, I’m sending you right back on the road!
My very best friend in the whole world, who writes at Blue-Footed Musings, has taken on the task of composing today’s post. She’s written a bit about time and then given us a fun tie-in, so make sure you head over there now!
I’ll see you back here tomorrow!
First off, Happy Gaudete, the third Sunday of Advent:
When Rudi and I went to Iceland a number of years ago now, one of the fun things we pre-scheduled was to attend a “bedtime story,” in which we were read a Christmas picture book (and sated with cocoa and Christmas cookies).
We came home with copies of that book, which focused on the Yule Lads and which we’ve shared with friends over the years. But the real magic is in being read to, so I thought I’d share a few options with you.
First, while this isn’t the exact book we were read, it’s based on the same folklore: Christmas Is Coming by Jóhannes úr Kötlum with illustrations by Tryggvi Magnusson:
Next up, we have Sutton Foster reading us Memoirs of an Elf by Devin Scillian with illustrations by Tim Bowers:
Finally, a classic, The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg, read by the classic Liam Neeson:
Do you have a favorite holiday picture book you revisit every year?
While I enjoy a good holiday commercial, mostly I see commercials because I’m watching holiday specials.
Today I thought I’d share three of my favorite songs from Christmas cartoons:
From ‘Twas the Night before Christmas, “Even a Miracle Needs a Hand”:
“We’re a Couple of Misfits” from Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer:
And, finally, “When Christmas Comes Around” from The Polar Express:
Do you have a favorite song from a holiday special?