No spread-armed, hovering angel blessed the Christmas tree of our Colorado vacation home.
"Christmas is gonna be a little bit different this year," husband Willard had informed the Boggan grandchildren as I heated mulled apple cider and hot chocolate on the stove and we all began decorating our home at Rebel Holler. "In more ways than one."
The children's parents were flying in on Christmas Day. Willard and our grandchildren had come earlier to prepare the way.
"Two thousand two is gonna be a make do with what you have. We didn't bring any toys from Jackson and we certainly don't have any ornaments stored up here in Steamboat Springs."
"Our tree is pretty," Bryan said, but he couldn't hide the disappointment in his voice as the grandchildren began trimming the tree. "There's no angel for the top and it doesn't have many lights though."
Although the blue spruce at our vacation was tall and as beautifully shaped as an enhanced Playboy Bunny, it had only one string of twinkly, multicolored lights. No red, silver, green and gold balls, themed ceramic or wooden ornaments, crystal baubles or icicles graced its branches. Nothing glitzy. Our two largest tree trims were reindeer faces made by neighbors back home—pantyhose stretched over coat-hangers, with black button eyes and pink felt noses. Other decorations were fashioned from looped twine and set off with bows. Earlier Willard and I had found a few small stuffed animals on sale at the local Walmart, and we gave them to the grandchildren to hang from the branches. Instead of hand-stretched decorator ribbons circling the trees, they lassoed the limbs with hemp ropes.
No gold star crowned our spruce; a tilted cowboy hat graced the top. Strands of red tinsel streaming from under the hat gave the appearance of a scalped cowgirl, her glorious mane of sparkly, jewel-toned hair left behind as a trophy.
Our homegrown décor was not exactly that of poor country people, who might have cut strips of colored construction paper and glued them together with flour-and-water paste to make chains, threaded pickled berries onto fishing wire, or strung together kernels of popcorn, but our finished tree was somewhat in the same neighborhood. Back home, we wouldn't have been especially anxious to have our Northeast Jackson neighbors to come in and view our handiwork.
We certainly wouldn't have been asked to be on a Christmas tour of homes.
For a table centerpiece Willard found an old red ski boot. He plucked dead branches from frozen, snow-covered aspens in our yard, stuck them in the heel and hooked the same twined loops accented with red velvet ribbons on the dead limbs that he had made for the tree.
And now we were ready for family and Santa to come.
***
Early Christmas morning the children bubbled with the holiday spirit. The faint strains of "Oh Come All Ye Faithful" played from the radio as deer sausage sizzled in a George Foreman grill. We all sank onto sofas and chairs in front of a popping, aspen-wood fire to open the few presents we had brought from home. For Willard and me, robes and socks, with a few extras for me, some ceramic accordion players.
Each child received a sweatshirt. Small items-gum, candy, and video games-filled stockings hung on the limbs of our blue spruce. Only one package of something to play with lay under the tree--a cylinder of wooden Tinker Toys. But we quickly found out that if Santa Claus had left a sleigh full of high-tech goodies, those gadgets couldn't have entertained the young folks at Rebel Holler any better. Probably for the first time since they had learned to walk, the children created their own toys.
A little bit later in the morning, Willard and I picked up the grandchildren's parents at the Yampa Valley airport. Back at the house, the cars were quickly unloaded and clothes changed.
While cornbread dressing baked, a turkey roasted, and butterbeans simmered back at the house, we skied under a fading blue sky, in 10-degree temperature, and face-burning winds.
The setting sun peeped through high, fluffy clouds as we curved and glided down almost abandoned slopes.
The heavy smell of burning firewood, of which us Mississippi folks never seem to tire filled the house that night. Everyone drowsy and full, we sipped our drinks of choice: wine, champagne, Sprite, hot chocolate, spiced coffee and tea, as we watched, How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
When the movie ended, the oldest grandson sprang from his chair.
"Let's do it," he called out.
As if on a prearranged cue, all the children fled the warm, comfortable living room and trooped down the stairs. We adults sitting upstairs by the fire could hear excited chatter as the grandchildren stripped down to their underwear. In the silver glow of a full moon, slanting snow covered the limbs of the aspen, spruces and firs, as the kids ran outside to the steaming spa and jumped in.
Following a long tradition, each person stayed in the hot water until they were nice and warm.
"It's time," the oldest grandson commanded the others. They took a deep breath and dove all the way under the water, then one by one the young people stood. Their bodies smoked like a fireplace with a closed flue as they balanced on the edge of the tub.
The children spread their arms like eagles ready to take flight.
"Aieee!"
With loud anguished screams, they leaped from the hot tub. Fresh snow drifts that lay like a thick velour skirt around the trees rimming Rebel Holler were now embossed and imprinted with Mississippi snow angels.
