More about our birds. . . How we came to have the parakeet is a story in itself. Mother was out in the garden hanging up the laundry one sunny day and out of nowhere a blue & white parakeet flew right down and landed on Mother's shoulder. She nibbled lovingly on Mother's ear and mother said, "Well hello there" and the bird said, "Ooooh. Hello!" And Mother said, "So, who are you?" The bird replied, "Pretty Bird!" So, she kept her name. She never flew away after finding a nice home, having no desire to try living out in the big free world ever again. We never did find out from whence she came. I would like to add about the Mexican Love Bird. . . . . .that after cursing out the preacher and telling him to "Go to Hell!", and saying things like "Well, -uck a duck!", our love bird never said any of the really foul swear words ever again. Mother said it must have just been a cleansing thing for her, but I have always wondered just what Mother did to make her "repent" and come clean.??? And as for our parakeet, Pretty Bird? After her jello bath, she began saying, "Oooooh, Pretty Bird. Pretty Bird is a dirty bird!" We kids got so much fun out of her. She loved Orange Jell-O, not just for bathing but for eating it as well. She especially loved it when mother made it into a salad by adding grated carrots and chopped walnuts. Yum yum! She would walk across the table and sample everything. If she found something she particularly didn't like, she would make a mess of it and have a fit! So afterward she had to kept up during meals. She would fuss and squawk at us from her cage, demanding to be loosed at once! As you said, covering her cage was helpful in quieting her down. She would then say, "Good night Pretty Bird!" which would then of course, set us all into a round of giggles. ~Annie

SK, I haven't seen that pattern(I did an eBay search), but there are stuffed alphabet patterns still available. Maybe you can use one for your letters and find another for the holly? Have you done a 'vintage sewing pattern' search? There are many sites. I hope this helps a little. Here is a link that might be useful: eBay patterns

It may be new, but I haven't seen it before. Thanks, real cute

Thanks for the egg nog info; it doesn't look like any ones favourite 'beverage of choice'. (and beverage is one of those words we almost never use over here; don't know why) Paula, glad you found out about the 'Feast of Stephen'. 26th Dec more commonly called Boxing Day in the UK and a public holiday, except for the mad rush to the 'Sales'. I think it is still known as St Stephen's Day in Ireland and over there they used to have a tradition of killing wrens (the tiny bird) on that day . . . again no idea why. Tim thanks for the link to the Huron carol, simple and quite different. Certainly beats White Christmas or Rudloph the Red Nosed Reindeer. To me 'Deck the Halls' doesn't sound Welsh, so many of their old tunes are in the minor key and have a plaintive lyrical quality. But I am no musical expert! Over here there are some lovely arrangements of really 'old' carols. Do you know the 'Coventry Carol'? Here is a link that might be useful: The Coventry Carol