Christmas at Bunny Cottage . . .

As a young girl growing up in southeastern New Mexico, the small town where I lived only had a few large department stores. One of those stores was Sears and Roebuck. At Christmas time, the store would always decorate their large front store windows with Christmas things. In one window was a life-size beautiful Santa all decked out in his velvet red suit and snow white beard. He was animated and as he moved, he would wave and greet us with "Merry Christmas". I guess this must have been when I first fell in love with this jolly plump elf!! Another memory I have of this store is that one Christmas my daddy and I went to the store to buy a special present for my mother. We decided on a set of beautiful china dishes. I will forever see those pretty white dishes with a yellow rose on them (We later said that rose was for the "Yellow Rose of Texas"!) Even though I grew up in NM, I was born in Texas, and my whole family is 5th generation Texans. I think I loved beautiful dishes way back then, too. Every Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter or special Sunday dinner, especially if the preacher was coming to eat, my mom would decorate her table with these dishes. My niece, Robin, now has them to enjoy, and they, of course, will always stay in our family. I love to reminisce this time of year, don't you? The older I get the more I think of Christmases past. I hope that each of you my sweet friends are having happy memories of Christmases past and are looking forward to Christmas present. Many blessings and much love to you in the week ahead!