Day 12 - Jay Hogan
Happy holidays friends, authors, and fellow readers!
I’m so excited to be taking part in the advent calendar and hope you’re all discovering lots of amazing new books to stuff your Kindle with.
In New Zealand it is of course summer for Christmas and also the start of the school summer vacation break, so most of my childhood Christmas memories are of barbecues and picnics and camping and Christmas swims in the ocean. But I have also spent many white Christmases in Canada, Paris and Korea and I think what I miss the most about a summer Christmas is not seeing all the Christmas lights as much, since it’s daylight until late at night. And nothing beats looking for a Christmas tree in the snow.
Off Balance
I don’t have a Christmas novel this year, so I thought I’d remind you of OFF BALANCE, the first in my hugely popular Painted Bay series https://readerlinks.com/l/1899648 .
OFF BALANCE 2021 Romance Book of The Year Award — Romance Writers of New Zealand
When JUDAH MADDEN flees his tiny suffocating home town in New Zealand for the dream of international ballet stardom, he never intends coming back. Not to Painted Bay. Not to his family’s struggling mussel farm. Not to his jerk of a brother. Not with his entire life plan in shreds. And certainly not into the tempting arms of MORGAN WIPENE, the older, ruggedly handsome fisheries officer who seems determined to screw with Judah’s intention to wallow in peace.
But dreams are fickle things. Shatter them and it’s hard to pick up the pieces. Hard to believe. Hard to start again.
And the hardest thing of all? Finding the courage to trust in love and build a new dream where you least expected to find it.
It’s the perfect time to read, or re-read Off Balance because…
IN STEP, the third book in this series is due for release February 10 and you can pre-order it here.
https://readerlinks.com/l/2002333
CONNECT: come spend the holidays (and beyond) with me!
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Competition
One of my favourite times each holiday season is dusting off the box of ornaments and reliving the memories attached to them. Handmade treasures from my kids, gorgeous glass baubles, kitschy characters, and always the star for the top!
To win a $5 Amazon gift card, and an ebook of your choice from my catalogue, I want to know: what is the ornament or Christmas decoration you most look forward to rediscovering each year?
Closing 18 December (7am London)
Deer ornaments. I LOVE deer ornaments so much I so look forward to shopping for more. lmao.
I am seriously out of control with the amount of deer things I have for the Christmas Tree, haha, but I just can’t help but get more and seeing all the new ways they make them. 🙂
The beautiful Christmas angel tree-topper.
‘Our First Christmas Together’ ornament. It always gets a special place on our tree.
My husband and I are huge Mannheim Steamroller fans. One year we bought a Mannheim steamroller ornament (a wooden steamroller) from their website. It is the first ornament we put on the tree every year.
musical snowglobe
my kids “First Christmas” ornaments – they’ve lasted quite sometime!
When my grandparents died I gave my mother an ornament that year with a Christmas photo of them that I love to have on our tree so they’re still a part of our Christmas
My mom has a pair of felt mice, one red and one green, that we put out every year. Those decorations are older than me. They were handmade from a craft fair.
the advent calendar I stitched and sewed to relax while I was studying for the bar exam; it’s huge and colourful!
My kids fist Christmas ornament and anything my daughter has made in school.
A wooden rocking horse ornament given to me by my mother.
A wicker sleigh basket that has be in my family for awhile.
A group of friends have a yearly ornament exchange – I treasure all the previous ones- plus Catherine dairs bunny ones .
The sledding nut figurine that I got my mother
White and red tree-topper with reindeers. It’s really pretty 😌
A couple of wooden ice skaters I have from my grandparents. They must be nearly 70 years old now.
I honestly don’t have a favorite anymore. We went through a couple of house fires in my life. The first took mostly all the childhood mementos so after that everything was store bought anyway. Though I’m not much for decorating, an ornament I used to really like as a kid all revolved around the homemade ones especially when a pic was added in the frame.
My christmas Hoptimist (I think it’s a danish thing). It’s a bouncy head with a Santa hat and it’s just so cheerful to look at 😊🧑🎄
A set of ceramic Santa and Ms Claus that aren’t armaments, they are figurines that my mother painted. My wife puts them beside my bed every year around Christmas sonI can remember my mom.
Mine is two ornaments. One is a ballerina and the other is a toy Soldier. They have to be placed near each other on the tree.
A ridged multi-color glass bulb that was on my mom’s childhood Christmas tree. Some of the paint has come off, but it’s still beautiful
I always looking forward for the star and the light. 🌟🎄⛄❄️
The Christmas Angel which goes on top of the tree we’ve had it for years but it still looks fab.
A string of truly horrible but also adorable lights that are meant to look like little Santa faces (and do, a bit). No one knows where we got them or why but they’re so ridiculous and we love them.
Mine is bittersweet but in 2000 I had a full term stillbirth. At Christmas that year my friend gave me an ornament that was a little pair of booties with Samuel’s name on them. It reminds me of my angel, my friend, and the pleasure of attending the birth of her son.
I have a stocking with my name on it that my Grandma knit for me on her knitting machine when I was wee, I don’t ever remember not having it. She’s celebrating her 100th Birthday in February!! That is my most precious Christmas item and the one that holds the most memories!! I’m a crocheter and I just made a set of stockings for my family (me, my dad, my sister, and my two dogs) that all coordinate!! It’s something special that we can look back on through the years and have warm feelings about!
My grandma and I both used to cross stitch. I have a collection of ornaments from her of mice and other small animals doing embroidery and sewing that I love rediscovering each year.
My grandmothers last Christmas card to me. It says “from me to you” (she was suffering with dementia) and always makes me laugh so we’ve gotten it out every year since she passed away!
I bought these 4 ornaments of spindly cartoon like characters with hubby and my name on and my two children. I bought them when they were little and every year they come out and sit close to each other on the tree. Just a little family. It makes me smile
Colleagues held Christmas parties in their divisions (I was tech support to several) and I was often included. One year, the gift was a stunning glass ornament which had been hand painted inside with a scene of a Mexican Tres Res celebration. It became my most honored and treasured bauble for my tree.
I have a set of lighted Hallmark Snoopy ornaments that they only made from 1991 to 1994, and those are my favorites.
We have a little white polar bear who plays Christmas songs when you press his paw. Used to drive my parents crazy; now it scares the cats but I still love him!
the snowmen that my mother used, with lights, of different sizes and colors, give joy to my house ⛄⛄
The Christmas tree topper my mom found for me years ago
I still have the spun glass angel ornament Mom got for my first Christmas. The base is now yellow after having to glue it back together after one of our moves, but it has survived 46 years so far.
My Grandmother gave a light up snowglobe a few years back. It’s my favorite thing to put out in the winter.
In our Christmas tree we have little glass birds of all kinds and colors , and it’s always a joy to put them up.
So, we have 6 “themed” trees, so there are ornaments on each that I look forward to seeing…but if I have to pick one, probably the snowflake ornament with our son’s baby pic on it my late aunt sent us the Christmas right after he was born…it was on New Years Eve Day that we got the call we could go get him and bring him home!
The couple of custom ornaments I had made featuring photos of family members.
I’m partial to fandom ornaments. Flying my geek flag!
My singing Christmas snow globe
When I first got married, my mother-in-law started the tradition of giving me part of a set of Winnie the Pooh collectable ornaments each year. She completed it years ago and now that she’s gone, it touches me when I unpack them to decorate.
When my grandparents died I gave my mother an ornament that year with a Christmas photo of them that I love to have on our tree so they’re still a part of our Christmas
My snowglobe
Little wooden subjects, Christmas elves, my parents had since I was a little child…
And Christmas decorations my Mom made over the years as cross-stitching projects.
Thanks for the chance and happy holiday season
I have a holiday projector for the outside that I love, because it looks like a penguin skiing while wearing a hat & scarf & looks like snow is falling around it
I love putting up the Christmas village every year. My husband and I made it together a few years before our kids were born. It looks so pretty all lit up in a dark room.
A crystal nativity scene that I love.
When I was a very young child, my family had chickens. My mom made an ornament that’s a basket, with pompom chickens and a few real feathers (from those chickens we had) on the handle of the basket. That’s my favorite ornament.
My Dad’s mother did a lot of ceramics. I’m the only person left on my Dad’s side so I now have all these ceramic trees she made for family members, about 14 in different sizes and shapes. It’s always a joy to pull them out and arrange them. Some go in different rooms but a cluster a group of them are arranged as a mini forest on a table.
My favorite ornaments are those in which my children and grand children have their photos mounted. I love seeing how they changed each year. So many memories!
Congratulations Diane you are the WINNER!!
Please complete the form to claim your prizes!
https://app.startinfinity.com/form/9acb2f96-0fd5-49f7-880d-ac799c91f03b
I collect nativity sets, so I look forward to getting them out.
We always looking forward to the nutcrackers that we had collected at holiday time all through the years after our son was born. They are good memories that we hope he will forward them to his own family and to the next generation. Happy Holidays!
The angel tree-topper that is at least 50 years old now, barely has any hair left and has wonky wings.
I have a deep blue hand blown glass ornament with gold hand painted designs that a friend brought back from Jordan. It’s gorgeous and being handmade makes it more christmassy for me.
So for my personal ornaments, I love my Swarovski crystal annual ornaments. But every other year I get an ornament I purchased for my grandmother. She passed away the year I bought it & my mom put it on her tree for years. Now for the last 20+ years we share this ornament & it gets mailed to & from my mom to me (different states). This year is moms year to have it so I look forward to hanging it on my tree next year
I have a beautiful elf… I love it!
I love the things my kids have made over the years.
Bought ones are great and all, but I love the most the ones I made together with my family. They hold warm memories.
I collect whimsical moose ornaments. I love them to bits!
My nativity scene. It’s wonderful.
I look forward to the personalized ornaments that I’ve given to both of my kids and my furbabies each Christmas since they were born. Its fun to look back and reminisce about whatever the ornament represented for them in that particular year.
the ones that my daughter made for me as a gift when they were short of money. She took pictures of the grandkids, glued them to ornaments and each kid decorated them. They are my favorite ones. Now, they make me new ones each year as they are getting older because of how much they know I treasure them.
I don’t have any favourite ornamentals, but I love to bake Caribbean Fruit Rum Cake for the holiday season. This is the only time of year I make this.
A salt dough ornament I made with my son’s hand for his second Christmas, it’s red and white with gold glitter
My grandparents gave me the Angel tree topper that has been in our family for Generations. Every time I put it on the tree it reminds me of those awesome family Christmas memories of my childhood.
Thirty four years ago I went into labor on Christmas Day. My son, second child, was born in the early morning but had a congenital condition and didn’t survive. The following Christmas I bought a silver cradle ornament with his name and birthdate engraved on it, and each year it’s the first ornament on the tree.
My grandma’s Belen (it’s a Nativity scene inside an old teapot that she made when she was young)
Don’t celebrate so don’t have a tree or decorations.
When I was young my mother got sick so, at 18, I ended up in charge of 6 boys, one a new born. I was in charge for almost 8 years before I was able to hand things back off to my parents. Every year when I unpack my ornaments, I tear up as I unwrap the homemade ornaments the boys made me during that time, especially this little sailboat the youngest made when he was 4. As tough as that time was, they are someone my most precious memories.
my family’s glass ornaments there aren’t as many as there once were but the ones left are still in the original box from over 70 years ago
I actually have an entire box of my favorite ornaments I keep separate from the rest and I basically on use those. My little dancer from Biltmore Manor, my Superman and supergirl and Olaf heart. ornaments I bought either bc I loved the Thing or I loved the place I got it from (Biltmore)
Santa statue
It is the angel that we put on top of the tree
I have a small collection of Christmas storybooks that we’ve collected over the years, starting with a copy of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas I received as a child. It’s so much fun to read those stories and reminisce.
We have little photos of our past pets on animal ornaments.
I have so many favorite ornaments that are wonderful to bring out of the box each year, so it is hard to choose. But I have this darling Dr. Seuss stuffed Cat in the Hat that sits at the top of the tree each year next to the tree topper. And something about seeing him sitting there makes me smile.
A sparkly ornament I made as a kid; took a long time, lots of sequins!
I have little bells and angel bells that were my grandmothers. Since I was named after her, they remind me of her.
I like the little mini whisks, spatulas, and other kitchen equipment ornaments!
The manger under the tree. Was my mom & dad’s so it’s about 66 years old. Getting a little worse for wear but it has to go under the tree
A few ornaments my Grandmother made and gave me before she passed.
Anything that’s been handed down or made by family.
I have an ornament that is a short stack of books with different colored covers. I love it so much. I also have an owl ornament and it gives me great pleasure to hang the owl and books next to each other.
I don’t have one particular ornament since I have theme trees and I change themes every year. Whichever theme tree I have the urge to put up, I use that one.
I don’t really put up a tree anymore since the majority of my ornaments are in storage. Of the ones in storage, the snowmen of many sizes are my favorite.
We have some beautiful balls, hand-painted that are like 30 years old and I love putting them on our family tree each year!
It’s been so long since we’ve put up a tree that I look forward to rediscovering all the decorations in the boxes we’ve stored for way too long.
Always a Nightmare Before Christmas bauble set that my sister got me several years ago and now added to that is an individual Jack Skellington tree ornament that I received last year from my cousin <3
Hi Jay,
Hanks for all the hours spent reading your stories.
Honestly, all my ornaments have such history that its like visiting with old friends you only see once a year. But for decades I searched for my perfect tree topper. Finally she was found. A voluptuous mermaid in sparkling green bra and fins, sporting a martini and fabulous sparkly sunglasses. She sits a top the tree, under a palm tree with special lighting to show case her glory. A bit tricky getting her perched up there, but once she’s set, she looks down upon the festivities with her tell tale smirk.
Merry Christmas to you and yours. May the season sparkle! Feel free to email if you want a picture.
I dont really decorate… but I do have a foot tall metal christmas tree than when you put tealights in it, the heat from the flames makes it spin.
I don’t decorate myself but I love christmas lights. It makes everything feel so cozy.
The ornaments my mom got me growing up.
I have four small knitted ornaments from my childhood that I enjoy seeing each year.
Happy holidays!
The picture ornaments and paw prints of my 4 legged babies.
My Christmas stocking my mum made for me when I was very little. She made one for all of my family and they have these really old-fashioned decorations made of foil that look like flowers. And glittered name. My stocking has a certain not really musty but older smell that absolutely reminds me of Christmas. It goes up every year. Now nothing goes in it, it’s too fragile, but I love looking at it.
I don’t have one favorite ornament, but I love putting up lights at Christmas. So cheery!
The bird ornaments from my grandparents. They are beautiful. Made eith featgers and sequins. Tgey remind me of Christmas with them. My grandfather’s favorite part of Christmas was always the Christmas tree.
Definitely handmade ornaments from my son
Well there are two. One is the Lionel set I grew up with setting up to run around the tee. The other are the simple ornaments that you put above a light that have a fan inside that spins the heat going up and is contantly moving. I must be a cat. mesmerized by that.
I actually have 4. 1. a handpainted ornament gifted to me by someone in my old fandom of the guitarist Die from the band Dir en grey. It’s gorgeous and so thoughtful and to this day one of the best gifts I’ve ever received. 2. A lucky cat ornament, also gifted to me by someone in that fandom when they got wind of how much I though that was an amazing thing that happened and wanted to help me decorate my tiny white tree. 3. A mouse with cheese, which was year 3 of the annual fandom gift-to-me-an-ornament tradition. 4. My neighbor’s little boy took year 4 with a hand glittered wooden ornament which while some would (and have) commented is hideous, I would not trade it for the world. I have no children of my own, nor do I plan on having any, and that gift meant a lot. He chose the glitter color for me and made it FOR ME. To me, it’s gorgeous.
Those are my fav ornaments on the tree.
The reindeer and snowman ornaments from my grandparents. They were my sisters and my first Christmas ornaments.
Honestly, it’s been more than a decade since I did much decorating for Christmas. I enjoy the season but not all the work decorating entails.
When I first married my kid’s father we didn’t have any extra money. He and another soldier (Air Force) went to the woods and brought a small-ish tree. I took the foam that came with a crib we’d bought and cut it into little houses, used markers to color them, added thread from a small sewing kit and hug them and the xmas cards we’d received on the tree plus a string of lights (with the larger bulbs) my mom had sent me.
I’m in a annual ornament exchange and I love pulling out the ones I receive every year and hanging them all near each other on the tree.
A small painted wooden carousel with hobby horses and candy striped poles. It reminds me of when my two boys were little. Happy Christmas!
Both my boys (who are now in there 20’s) made Christmas ornaments in grade school with their pictures on them. I love putting those on the tree every year. It brings back very good, fun memories
A glass brussel sprout. Family joke about absolutely hating the things and refusing any offerings- no matter how they are prepared. Was told I had to have one and would like it, so a gift of a glass ornament that I happily gag over with my family and still put up.
We are an ornamgent evey year household, so I have lots of ornaments I look forward to every year. I went though a snowman phase so a bunch of mine are snowmen.
I am with you, I love looking at the ornaments we have collected and made over the years.
Individual name baubles for all of the new babies that were born that year.