“Christmas, children, is not a date. It is a state of mind.” ~Mary Ellen Chase

“Love came down at Christmas; love all lovely, love divine; love was born at Christmas, stars and angels gave the sign.” ~ Christina G. Rossetti

“I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round, as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.” ~Charles Dickens

“Never worry about the size of your Christmas tree. In the eyes of children, they are all 30 feet tall.” ~Larry Wilde, The Merry Book of Christmas

“Gifts of time and love are surely the basic ingredients of a truly merry Christmas.” ~Peg Bracken

“The earth has grown old with its burden of care But at Christmas it always is young, The heart of the jewel burns lustrous and fair And its soul full of music breaks the air, When the song of angels is sung.” ~ Phillips Brooks (1835-93), American Episcopal bishop, wrote ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem‘.

“Brew me a cup for a winter’s night.For the wind howls loud and the furies fight; Spice it with love and stir it with care, And I’ll toast our bright eyes, my sweetheart fair.” ~Minna Thomas Antrim

“I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.”
~Charles Dickens

“Let’s dance and sing and make good cheer, For Christmas comes but once a year.”
~Sir George Alexander Macfarren

“I heard the bells on Christmas Day; their old familiar carols play, and wild and sweet the word repeat of peace on earth, good-will to men!” ~ Henry Longfellow

“Christmas is a necessity. There has to be at least one day of the year to remind us that we’re here for something else besides ourselves.” ~Eric Sevareid

“Christmas is the day that holds all time together.”
~ Alexander Smith

“Christmas is the keeping-place for memories of our innocence.” ~Joan Mills

‘“Christmas is a time when you get homesick – even when you’re home.” ~ Carol Nelson

“Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful.” ~Norman Vincent Peale

“He who has not Christmas in his heart will never find it under a tree.”~Roy L. Smith

“Christmas, children, is not a date. It is a state of mind.” ~Mary Ellen Chase

“Christmas is the gentlest, loveliest festival of the revolving year – and yet, for all that, when it speaks, its voice has strong authority.” ~W.J. Cameron

“The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other.” ~Burton Hillis

“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.” ~Laura Ingalls Wilder

“There has been only one Christmas – the rest are anniversaries.” ~W.J. Cameron

My Cats Are Super Helpful with Christmas Preparations

The holidays can be hectic. Thanks heavens, I’ve got the cats to help me: Peaches, Cream, Pavel, and Percy. Kitty Pavel likes to assist with decorations and gift wrapping. Little escapes his notice. He gets excited when the tree goes up and the wrapping paper, boxes, tissue paper, and bags come out. He likes the crinkly sound paper makes and exploring inside bags and boxes. Also hiding. He’s all about Christmas, unless you have catnip and then he’s easily distracted.

Peaches and Cream are Christmas lovers supreme. They are, however, disappointed that we switched to an artificial Christmas tree (because of my allergies). They will still crunch on the fake branches, though. I hear them ‘crunch, crunch, crunch.’ And ascending the artificial tree is not impossible. Heck no. I’ve greatly reduced the number of ornaments I put on it, and anywhere else in the house within their reach, or I would have camels and wise men carried all over the place. And have. I was constantly retrieving Creche figures and ornaments. Peaches and Cream are what some might consider ‘naughty’. Because of them, far less goes up so they’ve saved me work. Less decorating.

Our older curmudgeonly tabby Percy ignores most of the festivities and keeps my spot warm on the couch. The only problem is that he complains when I want to sit in it, however, he will compromise by sitting on me. Preferably my chest, when I’m trying to write on my laptop. All very helpful. Peaches adores Percy and hangs out with him as much as Percy will tolerate. Even more.

(Percy and Peaches curled together in a sunbeam)

“Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.” ~Robertson Davies

“People who love cats have some of the biggest hearts around.” ~Susan Easterly

“Cats can be cooperative when something feels good, which, to a cat, is the way everything is supposed to feel as much of the time as possible.” ~Roger Caras

“There has never been a cat
Who couldn’t calm me down
By walking slowly
Past my chair.”
~Rod McKuen

(Pavel exploring Christmas packages)

“I had been told that the training procedure with cats was difficult. It’s not. Mine had me trained in two days.” ~Bill Dana

“If there is one spot of sun spilling onto the floor, a cat will find it and soak it up.” ~J.A. McIntosh

(Note this tree only has lights on it….)

(Peaches and Cream into everything)

“Kittens believe that all nature is occupied with their diversion.” ~F.A. Paradis de Moncrif

“What greater gift than the love of a cat?” ~Charles Dickens

(The look on Cream’s face when I caught him in the act.)

“It is in the nature of cats to do a certain amount of unescorted roaming”. ~Adlai Stevenson

Did someone say Christmas Romances?

I've written two quite different Christmas romances, hauntingly beautiful Somewhere the Bells Ring and sweetly scintillating colonial American historical, A Warrior for Christmas.

The ghost in Somewhere the Bells Ring appears whenever the heroine is drawn into the past in the beautiful old Virginia house inspired by my father's homeplace in the Shenandoah Valley.

"An intriguing, gripping ghost story with a focus on romance rather than terror." ~Reviewed by Stephanie E with Fallen Angels Reviews

From Romancing the Book: "Ms. Trissel captivates her reader from the moment you start reading the first page. She has written a compelling love story that spans some fifty plus years and keeps you entertained every step of the way with the story within a story...I fell in love with her characters and look forward to the next delightful story ready with Kleenex box in hand. A must read for every romance fan." ~Reviewed by Robin

A Warrior for Christmas features a deaf heroine and a Shawnee captive turned warrior, recently returned to upper class colonial American society. A vastly different life from the one he knew in the frontier. The romance between this unlikely couple is one of the best I've written.  This novella is also available in audio.


"A Warrior for Christmas took me by complete surprise. I expected the usual tale of a former Indian captive transcending his past to live the life of a gentleman, but Beth Trissel's exquisite writing skill made me love this story...No reader of historical romance will want to miss A Warrior for Christmas, even if it isn't Christmas." ~Two Lips Reviews (Five Lips and A Recommended Read Rating)

These two novella length romances published by The Wild Rose Press are available from all online booksellers.

Visit my Amazon Author Page, My books at Barnes & Noble

If you enjoy these, or any of my other stories, please leave them a review at Amazon, Goodreads, and/or any of the other online book sites.

Curse of the Moon Won Book of the Month at LASR!

YA contemporary fantasy romance Curse of the Moon (Book 2, The Secret Warrior Series) won book of the month at Long and Short Reviews.

Story Blurb: The bad news? Morgan Daniel’s wolf is out of control. The good news? There’s a treatment. She just has to get a potion from a lizard shifter witch–without looking into the witch’s eyes. Easy, right? But when the witch puts a spell on her younger brother, Morgan has to do the witch’s bidding to save him.

Fortunately Morgan isn’t alone. She has Jackson to lean on, a few witches coming into their powers, a secret warlock, and the always mysterious Chief Okema. What could possibly go wrong?

Review snippet: “The story weaves between modern day and myths and legends, providing an exciting and compelling read.” ~by Orchid for LASR

To read the complete super review visit:
http://www.longandshortreviewsya.com/book-reviews/curse-of-the-moon-by-beth-trissel/

Curse of the Moon and the other stories in The Secret Warrior Series are available in kindle and print at Amazon and in eBook from all other online booksellers.

YA Fantasy Romance Curse of the Moon Up For Book of the Month at LASR!

YA contemporary fantasy/paranormal romance Curse of the Moon (Book 2, The Secret Warrior Series) got a super review from Long and Short Reviews and is up for book of the month! Voting is easy and runs through Dec. 2nd at: http://www.longandshortreviewsya.com/book-reviews/november-book-of-the-month-poll/

Snippet from the review: “The story weaves between modern day and myths and legends, providing an exciting and compelling read.” ~by Orchid for LASR

To read the full review visit: http://www.longandshortreviewsya.com/book-reviews/curse-of-the-moon-by-beth-trissel/

YA Fantasy Romance-Book 2

Curse of the Moon and the other stories in The Secret Warrior Series are available in kindle and print at Amazon and in eBook from all other online booksellers.

Vintage Christmas Cards Found In An Old Family Trunk

Several years ago, my mother came across an antiquated box of family Christmas cards reaching back into the early 20th century. For those of you who enjoyed the British television series, Downton Abbey, this would encompass the Edwardian era before WWI (Season One). Other cards were sent during the Great War and soon after its conclusion. Some cards may extend even further back in time. This window into the past makes me very nostalgic. Reading the messages included in these holiday greetings transport me back to an age forgotten by many, but shouldn’t be.

I’ve often heard about these ancestors, fine people, and even remember some of them from my childhood. Others lived far later into my life, but began theirs when America was quite a different place. Some cards from family friends are people not known to me, but glimpsed through their greetings. These gentle folk wouldn’t be trampling each other at Walmart on Black Friday. There is a graciousness in this era, despite the World Wars, that we are losing. Hearken back with me to earlier days.

These cards Mom scanned are among the most colorful. Because the cost of ink was high in that era, many only had small colored images or were in black and white. To receive a truly colorful greeting would have been a real treat. I’m grateful my family saved these images and messages from a simpler, more refined time. Many of these folks lived in Virginia. Our roots in the Old Dominion go back several hundred years.

Because of my fascination with these bygone days, I’ve written two Christmas romance novellas: A Warrior for Christmas (set in Colonial America) and Somewhere the Bells Ring (set in the old Virginia family homeplace in the 1960’s with flashbacks to 1918). Both eBooks are on sale at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. A Warrior for Christmas is also out in audio.

“Christmas is the gentlest, loveliest festival of the revolving year – and yet, for all that, when it speaks, its voice has strong authority.”  ~W.J. Cameron

“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.”  ~Laura Ingalls Wilder

“This is the message of Christmas:  We are never alone.”  ~Taylor Caldwell

“I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.”  ~Charles Dickens

“Christmas is the season for kindling the fire of hospitality in the hall, the genial flame of charity in the heart.”  ~Washington Irving

“Christmas is the day that holds all time together.”  ~Alexander Smith

“A Christmas candle is a lovely thing;
It makes no noise at all,
But softly gives itself away.” ~Eva Logue

***For those of you interested in old trunks. The one containing these cards and other family memorabilia is pictured below. We think it dates from about 1870, but are not certain. If you have a better guess let me know.

Vintage Christmas Cards & A Colonial American Christmas Romance

Ever wonder about the history of Christmas Cards in America? Here’s what I found.

From Something Olde: Christmas Card History

“In the late 1700’s merchants sent their customers best wishes for the new year. The cards were created on lithographs and hand-colored. A lithograph is an etching on a stone that can be reproduced on paper. Sending Christmas cards first became popular in England over 150 years ago.  In the 1840’s John Calcott Horsely was a curator at the royal museum.  He was late sending his usual holiday letters to his friends and relatives for Christmas.  He asked the artist, Sir Henry Cole, to design and hand-color 1,000 cards.  He wanted the card to show people being fed and clothed to remind his friends of the needs of the poor during this season.”

From The Old Farmer’s Almanac: 

Holiday Cards

The first American to print and sell Christmas cards was Louis Prang of Roxbury, Massachusetts, who began publishing cards in 1875.

(In 1953) President Dwight D. Eisenhower is given credit for sending the first “official” Christmas card from the White House. An art print also became the standard Christmas gift for the president’s staff, a practice continued to this day.

From Idea Finder: “A relatively recent phenomenon, the sending of commercially printed Christmas cards originated in London in 1843. Previously, people had exchanged handwritten holiday greetings. First in person. Then via post. By 1822, homemade Christmas cards had become the bane of the U.S. postal system. That year, the Superintendent of Mails in Washington, D.C., complained of the need to hire sixteen extra mailmen. Fearful of future bottlenecks, he petitioned Congress to limit the exchange of cards by post, concluding, “I don’t know what we’ll do if it keeps on.”

Not only did it keep on, but with the marketing of attractive commercial cards the postal burden worsened. The first Christmas card designed for sale was by London artist John Calcott Horsley. A respected illustrator of the day, Horsley was commissioned by Sir Henry Cole, a wealthy British businessman, who wanted a card he could proudly send to friends and professional acquaintances to wish them a “merry Christmas.”

From The History of Christmas Cards: At Christmastime, many people would send letters to friends and family far away, and children at boarding school would decorate paper and write letters to show off the writing skills they’d improved upon that term at school. However, the first official Christmas card was created in 1843 in Britain.

Sir Henry Cole, director of London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, would write letters to family and acquaintances at Christmastime. He and others could buy decorative paper on which to pen greetings and good wishes, but he found it to be a cumbersome task. So Cole commissioned an artist friend, John Calcott Horsley to create a card with a simple message that could be duplicated and sent to all his acquaintances. Horsley lithographed and hand-colored 1,000 copies of this first commercial card. It was a three-panel card – the center panel showed a family celebrating and the two wing panels depicted people feeding the hungry and clothing the naked. The card bore the simple greeting, “A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to You,” which would become the standard sentiment of the mass-produced Christmas cards.

CHRISTMAS CARDS RISE IN POPULARITY

“Christmas cards were quite elaborate and though the lithograph printing process helped in producing cards, they first became popular among the upper-class in England. However, the development and improvement of the postal system, making sending cards more affordable, was a big part of the rise in the popularity of Christmas cards. Early cards were not necessarily religious Christmas cards but favored images such as beautiful flowers, birds, scenery and other pretty things.

In 1875 Louis Prang brought the commercial Christmas card to the United States. Prang, a German lithographer, had developed a new innovative way of printing that made the process of creating Christmas and other cards much simpler and more affordable. Like British Christmas cards, Prang’s cards included various images that were simply pretty and tasteful, not truly having much to do with Christmas or even necessarily winter. However, some cards did include holly, snow and some other wintry or Christmas images. His cards became extremely popular in the U.S.; his company printed almost five million cards a year by 1881.”

Well, you get the idea. In my holiday release, A Warrior For Christmas, (also in audio) I journeyed farther back in early America to the colonial time period and the holiday celebration in a wealthy household. However, the hero, a former Shawnee captive, would rather return to his adopted people in the colonial frontier.

Blurb: Reclaimed by his wealthy uncle, former Shawnee captive Corwin Whitfield finds life with his adopted people at an end and reluctantly enters the social world of 1764. He plans to return to the colonial frontier at his first opportunity–until he meets Uncle Randolph’s ward, Dimity Scott.

Deaf since a childhood bout of Scarlet fever, Dimity Scott intends to be cherished for herself, not her guardian’s purse, even if it means risking spinsterhood. Then the rugged newcomer arrives, unlike any man she’s ever known. Dimity has learned to manage her silent world, but unaccustomed to the dangers of the frontier, can she expect love and marriage from Corwin, who longs to return to his Shawnee life?~

***A Warrior for Christmas is available from all major online booksellers including Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

“I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.”  ~Charles Dickens