The old English tall clock at Corgyncombe Cottage.
Lovely Music to accompany this post:
Return Here to Read the Corgyncombe Courant.
In "The Night Before Christmas" by Clement Clarke Moore, illustrated by Tasha Tudor, 1999, the page showing the bedroom is illuminated by a beeswax candle in a tin candle stick. The tin candlestick was a gift to Sarah from a tinsmith who admired her old fashioned tin lunch pail. When she gave him a homemade cookie out of her tin lunch pail he gave her the tin candle stick. Every year, in exchange for a cookie, a gift made out of tin was received.
In the "The Night Before Christmas" illustration, on the bed pushed aside when Father "sprang from his bed to see what was the matter", a blue and white plaid woven blanket can be seen. On the previous page it shows Father and Mother in their big canopy bed and the little children in the trundle bed both with a blue plaid top cover. The canopy bed was the same bed in the same room that I had the joy of waking up mornings at Tasha Tudor's Corgi Cottage. Of course, how could one wake up in the morn without an admiring glance out the window!
Above are some antique handspun, handwoven wool blankets. These blankets were woven in two sections and then sewn together down the middle to make a good sized blanket to cover a bed.
Ahh, wool, so warm against the winter's chill!
Christmas morn, after coming in from feeding the birds the Izannah Walker girls gathered round the old fashioned table top tree.
The little English Robin took the little sifter handle in its beak and is sifting flour around the table to look like snow.
Emma wanted to try on Bridget's delightfully stylish coat and hood.
In her hand she has cradled the little English Robin.
The Advent wreath from the outside looking in through the old wavy glass.
The Robin has decided to take a taste of the doll sized apple pie. Its tracks can be seen in the dusted white flour snow.
A clip on bird ornament in candlelight on the old fashioned Corgyncombe table top tree.
Little Twinkle Toes arrived in the post, a handmade gift from a sweet friend, who shared a special memory of making little Elfin girls such as this in Christmases past. Little Twinkle Toes is absolutely exquisite as is her little turquoise pouch dotted with gold!
Wool blankets that Diane wove are warming on the rack by the stove.
In Tasha Tudor's 1999 version of "The Night Before Christmas", plaid blankets can be found on the parents bed and covering the children in the trundle bed and hanging on the settle bench by the fire with St. Nicholas.
The deer, stars, and trees on the cookie sheet tell a true story of one twilight when I stepped outside. Seven deer came winding through my snow covered lawn by the creek looking amazingly like reindeer, all in a line, flying over the creek, curving as they ran following each other in the cornfield. Really it was much like the reindeer pulling Saint Nicholas' sleigh in Tasha Tudor's "The Night Before Christmas".
Trilly Tweet Sweet seems to have a natural sparkle about her!
An Angel made of plaited straw.
The candle is blown out.
We hope all of our Dear Readers had a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
copyright © 2013 Diane Shepard Johnson and Sarah E. Johnson
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