Thursday, January 12, 2012

{pretty, happy, funny, real} Twelfth Night Bonfire edition!

~ Capturing the context of contentment in everyday life ~
Brought to you by Like Mother, Like Daughter

This year, I decided I wanted to have a Twelfth Night Bonfire. Never having celebrated Twelfth Night before, and not knowing much about it, we kind of made it up as we went along. I got the idea from another blog, where a suggested activity for this night was having a bonfire to burn the Christmas tree and any other greens that had been brought in the house over the Christmas season. I thought that sounded like fun!

The only trouble was . . . I couldn't make it work for December 5th! The people I wanted to invite over were all involved in another activity that Thursday, and they were working on Friday night, so the first night we could do it was this past Monday night.

So it was actually a Sixteenth Night Bonfire.

But Monday worked out perfectly! It was a calm, clear winter's night with a full moon and no wind. We had friends to dinner for sweet and sour pork ribs and tourtiere pie, then bundled all the kids up and went out to burn the tree. . .

{funny}

But wait, where is the tree? Wasn't it standing up on the back porch?


Something bushy is moving over there, and off the kids go to investigate!



How did the tree get over there? And why is it making funny noises?



We have a runaway tree on our hands!





I think the tree is trying to blend in with the others to prevent its fiery fate.



There's the crazy man behind the shenanigans!

{happy}

And then amidst much laughter and excitement, we lit the tree on fire! 



The kids thought it was pretty cool. (And I think the adults did too!) 


{real}

Arden wasn't quite sure what to make of her first bonfire. It was past her bedtime and she refused to keep her hands in her mitts!



At this point she was asking for her blankie!


{pretty}

It was a beautiful night. The full moon in the starry sky, the fresh snow, the dancing flames.



It was a little sad to see our beautiful tree go up in smoke. But perhaps a better - and certainly more memorable - end than wasting away slowly in a corner of the yard?



I wish I had taken a picture of the moon, but I was too busy cuddling with a sleepy Arden!



The magic of fire...

After the kids had their fill of marshmallows and the cold started to creep into our bones, we went back in for hot spiced apple cider and the last of the Christmas cookies!

I think it was a great success, and maybe the start of a new tradition in our family!



round button chicken



~lg

5 comments:

  1. What a cool idea and I bet it smelled so good.

    ReplyDelete
  2. What a great idea. It sounds like it was a lot of fun.

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  3. That's a great idea. Bonfires are always fun, and burning the tree is genius!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Excellent idea! We did a Guy Fawkes bonfire (in a birdbath, since our yard was so brown I was afraid my grass would go up in flames) but it was much smaller. Hopefully Arden will enjoy it more next year.

    ReplyDelete

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