Sunnyshore Studio is thrilled to have our friend and neighbor, artist Melanie Serroels in our Christmas Show again this year. You will love her affordable Northwest landscape watercolors.
We asked Melanie what she liked most about the holidays. Here is what she said.
Melanie’s Christmas & Holiday Traditions
What I like most about the Christmas and winter holidays are the traditions we have created with our family and friends. At home, we’er watching sappy Christmas movies from before Thanksgiving until after the New Years. Holiday baking and cooking has taken on a more healthy fare, but it’s still important to prepare the family favorites. We select and install a least a 10 foot tall fresh cut tree, and decorate it to the top with ornaments collected over our years together.
Our family now includes three precious grandchildren, so with Randy’s 96 year old mom, four generations gather and exchange gifts and celebrate our blessings. Sometimes our celebration is delayed a day or two, to accommodate the worker schedules. When this happens, Christmas Day is a quiet day, usually spent over a 1,000 piece jigsaw puzzle with time to consider passed family members and childhood memories.
The most important thing is we come together, under one roof and around our family tree. Retirement and having Randy home and not at work, affords the time for me to spread out the preparations. I miss my kids being here to add their input, but they’re busy making their own homes just right for their own children and building traditions for themselves.
Handwritten Christmas cards are still a part of my holidays. I do this to slow down and bring friends and the few family members closer. I enjoy creating some of the gifts we give, so I’m usually working on something creative a month or two leading up to Christmas. There are a few parties to attend, but there is a number of evenings spent waiting for the day to come. A December 9th birthday keeps Christmas decorating at bay until just after. Then the decorations stay around until after New Years Day. I have Santas and Snowmen collections that find places all over the house to watch over us and fill in the conversation when I’m here by my self.
On New Years Day we host The Annual Port Susan Terrace Plunge and Potluck Brunch with our neighbors. It has happened around high tide the first morning of each New Year for the past 13 years. This year we are missing the original Port Susan Terrace Plungers and good friends, but looking to celebrating with some new neighbors and friends who we hope to know better during the years to come. Together we will ring in the new year in our own special way.
Christmas on Camano Show
You can shop for Melanie’s artwork and 14 other artists at our upcoming Christmas on Camano art show. This video invitation was made at the beach just south of where Melanie lives at Port Susan Terrace. We hope you will join us.
https://www.facebook.com/jason.t.dorsey.1/videos/10214847130323948/