Advent, Advent
On the first week of Advent...
Paper stars in every window, nativity rehearsals in full swing, and December underway.
And so too is Advent.
When I think about Advent, I see candles lit in windows, in those ladder steps that crescendo to a point, to the highest, most prominent candle; red ribbons and fabulously green foliage all around.
I see berries and holly, and long boughs of Norwegian spruce on the mantel above a blazing hearth.
Snow falls outside, soft and silent, and bells trill in the distance: Christmas is coming.
Faces are bright.
There’s festive food aplenty.
Stockings are hung, ready to be filled.
The scent of simmering fruit carries from the kitchen, from the mulled wine and spices and charming citrus pomanders.
It’s a highly romanticised vision; my mind’s eye conjuring every nostalgic, and traditional image from books and films and hopes and dreams.
It’s slow and cosy, totally devoid of hurry, and denying all that’s bad or sad or wrong in the world.
It’s a Christian cocoon, a sanctuary, rather like an Advent calendar window. I want to step right into it. Right now.
When I think of childhood memories of Advent, I’m struggling to come up with anything, except one time we lit a candle one Sunday at church.
It’s the countdown calendars that have really stayed with me (in memory, and some physically too), with their secret little windows, hidden, at random, across a snowy, Christmassy scene. Oh there've been some stunners - and not a chocolate in sight.
I LOVE chocolate, but there’s something totally sacred about a thick card calendar, with maybe some glitter and sparkle over the illustration, and a nice ribbon to hang it up. My mum continued to buy them for me when I was well into my thirties, and it always felt like a special little ritual, just for us.
We would go to great lengths to find the most unusual or special or precious design or shape to gift each other, and then compare notes on what we had ‘found’ that day behind each sacred door or window, marvelling at the (often vintage or Victorian) charm of the illustrations, and feeling an extra hit of magic if we had got the same motif on the same day.
It seems the clues were there for a long time before I embarked on this career.
I’ve kept a lot of the more recent Advent calendars, because technically they could be reused in other years, but really, because they were just too beautiful and precious to throw away. On one particularly memorable woodland scene calendar, there’s a hand-written note on the back, making it even more precious than ever, now she’s gone.
One year, she got me a wooden Christmas tree calendar that came with little wooden stars and gifts, each with the allotted number on the front counting down the days to the precious 24 (although I really appreciate an Advent calendar that has a window or image for the full 25 days). I still have my wooden Christmas tree, and that's what my children are using this year. A little family tradition, now an heirloom, passed on down the years. I think my mum would be pleased (and so eco too!)
Another year, the first after we moved into the house we live in now - which also happened to me my mum’s last Christmas, though we didn’t realise at the time - she’d bought me a glittering wreath Advent calendar and the door for Christmas Day was of a beautiful child’s face, a girl. My Mum commented that meant I’d be having a girl soon, and in fact, I was pregnant in the spring - with my daughter.
It’s strange how things work out, and what life brings to us, the signs and synchronicities we notice and take in, almost subconsciously. Memories of special times such as Christmas, and the build up or countdown to it, become richer with each recollection, and more layered with meaning when reflecting back. I think this is true of both good and bad memories, too.
And then suddenly something will spark that memory to pop back into your mind.
A certain image, a song, a scent, a conversation.
More recently, we embraced the advent-calendar-as-gift, aka as the hyper-commercialisation of Advent as a full-on gifting opportunity in itself, before the month of December has even arrived. In fact, it’s more like August these Advent calendars are teased and trailered. It really is the season that keeps on giving.
I think most people can get on board with luxury chocolates, or various fancy foodstuffs of multiple varieties, but suddenly, Advent is all about beauty products - how did that happen?
My husband is so thoughtful at Christmas, and two years running got me the Rituals Advent calendar, which came in a massive box with a whole festive village to build and decorate with fairy lights. Very labour intensive!
Each Sunday of Advent there was a small candle to light, and although I didn’t burn them on those days, it was a nice touch.
One year when I must have been feeling particularly crafty and time-rich, I embarked on a Christmas stocking advent bunting, from a panel I bought. Diligently I cut out 24 stockings, front and back, plus lining, and made it for my mum, all the seems inside. i remember sitting on the couch turning them all the right side out while watching TV.
I’m still really proud of that achievement, and of course, now it is in my Christmas box (actually a big red vintage suitcase). The memories of making it still feel so fresh, though it’s over a decade ago now.
The year I had my son, Jack (his birthday was this week so he’s my Christmas robin), my mum brought me my Advent calendar to the hospital ward. It was a bit of a ‘fail’ that year as it was fancy pork scratchings and I wasn’t in the mood for that after the ordeal of labour. I think my husband benefitted instead!
Last year he really went for the Big Time, and got my the Liberty of London Advent building, edifice, extravaganza - is really the title it deserves. I was so amazed I couldn’t speak, and was also quite panicky about the cost.
It’s a replica of the real Tudor-style building in London, with gorgeous illustrations evoking a festive, snowy scene with tiny hidden details of birds and . I could barely bring myself to open the little Liberty-print trays of delight.
Day 3 proved potentially explosive with a defective candle (back to the candles again), but each item felt very special and I’ve still got some of the fancy make-up. The perfumes were the star of the show. But none of it reflects the real story of Advent, apart from maybe the candles.
This year, to make best use of the stunning festive box, my husband said he was going to find other things to fill the hallowed numbered drawers. I didn’t really think or expect that he would.
Just get me a card one with nice illustrations, I said.
We didn’t mention it.
And then.
On Monday night he came in with a ‘secret stash’, and enlisted the help of our 4-year-old daughter to fill up the Liberty drawers.
It’s such an incredibly special thing to do, even more so than last year, because it’s taken extra time and effort.
The first drawer held a little cream and gold angel decoration, the kind that stores flat but puffs out into a kind of honeycomb effect. I almost cried. Actually I did cry. It was so sweet and simple and nothing like the extravagance of the actual first door last year. But Christmas shouldn’t - and really isn’t - about the most expensive gift or the fanciest choice. It’s about spending time with loved ones, being kind, a small token of thoughtfulness.
That angel represented so much to me, and angels are and have been a bit of a theme for me at Christmas, since childhood. That's a story for another post.
Happy first week of Advent.
- Rebecca