We're going to have a rare white Christmas here this year. We had a storm come through early in the week that dumped lots of sleet topped with about two inches of snow. It all congealed to white ice, the lovely counterpart of our more usual treacherous black ice. The weathermen have been in their glory with lots of extra weather coverage and closing announcements. Unfortunately for the kids, it came after schools let out for the Christmas holidays. It is so solid that it won't even make good snowmen or snowballs.

The daytime highs have not gotten much above freezing with the nighttime lows in the 'teens and even a single digit night predicted tonight for a possible record low. The ice is quite solidly frozen to the streets and probably won't loosen its grip until the thaw predicted for after Christmas. If the weathermen hadn't been right on the mark about this winter storm, I would hardly believe their insistence that the weather will soon be balmy in the afternoons.

In just a few days, the daytime highs should be in the mid to high 50's again, a wicked flirting with springtime conditions. It is much better to have the cold temperatures more steady so that the shrubs and trees aren't tricked into awakening and trying to bloom well before the heavy frosts have passed. Several azaleas have already bloomed and won't be at all happy with the plunging temperatures.

The vegetable garden was hit hard as one would expect. The cabbages are still green but somewhat limp, and now the ice melted enough today that they've lost their insulation against the cold tonight. The broccoli looks limp and blackened by the frost, dashing my hopes of late winter broccoli. It is more of the unusual weather that we've been observing the past few years. At least the sleet didn't glaze the trees and power lines and bring them down.

I've sent in my seed order to my favorite company already, and I'm resisting temptation to get more this early. I've also resisted the temptation to start early cabbage seedlings so far, given how severe the current conditions are. I can't wait too much longer if they are to go in before the cabbage butterflies multiply in the spring, but this severe frost and predictions of more polar blasts is a definite warning that spring planting might be better delayed a few weeks this year.

Work on the new Memphis Cotton Belles Chapter of ABWA website and moving my personal website to its new address have kept me quite busy for the past few weeks. I need to do more work on the pages for the personal website, since I was trying to finish the rewrite to take them out of frames and haven't quite gotten that done. The ABWA website is in pretty good shape, though, and we're going to discuss possible new features at the next chapter meeting in January.

The crafting is still getting done in spurts. I finished the green child's sweater and have nearly finished a red and green sweater. I could have sent the box earlier this week without the red and green sweater, but the storm has me trapped at home. I may have it done by the time the streets thaw to send it along as well.

I did sneak in a fabric.com box for a Christmas present. I got some more yarn for some cotton dishcloths, two skeins of a shaded acrylic to try a sock pattern, a yard of fish fabric for a quilt I've got about enough fabric to make, and four yards of a beautiful teal fabric with stripes with gilded scrolls that looks like a definite shirt fabric and enough leftover for some quilt blocks. I had to get extra to fiddle with matching the stripes properly. Now if I could only find the time to set up the sewing machine again.

We passed out the presents late on Christmas Eve, so I'm still up in the wee hours of Christmas morning typing this while beautiful Christmas programming is on the TV. For all the fits the ACLU throws about using public facilities for Christmas displays, they don't seem to have put a dent in the Christmas programs. They've been very good this year with lots of the old favorites and many new ones.

I'm encouraged to see how many Christians are standing up for proclaiming the reason for the Christmas holiday instead of letting it be overshadowed by the secular festivities and shopping trips. Our Lord Jesus Christ was born in a tiny human body to enter this world as our Savior, a sinless Redeemer Who would pay for our redemption through His death on the Cross. This crucial event in human history needs to be announced to people unaware of the spiritual war that has the human race caught behind enemy lines in a world seized by Satan through deceit.

Our rights to speak out about Jesus Christ and to openly celebrate our religious holidays commemorating His birth and death and resurrection must be exercised throughout the year. This is actual human history, not religious myths as so many unbelievers assert. It should be taught as it was in the past before we allowed ourselves to be partially silenced by liberals insisting that other religious beliefs were equally valid. In the name of tolerance, we stepped aside and allowed false religions to be taught on an equal footing even though their historical founders and roots are known.

This same tolerance has led to the rewriting of American history to deny the truth that our founders were largely practicing Christians and that our laws were founded on Biblical principles. This basis in God's law and the moral character He desires in His children is what gave this country its freedom and justice for so long. It is not tolerance to allow alternate explanations to supplant the true history of this country, it is folly.

A people that doesn't teach its history and culture to its children is soon replaced by the people who teach their alternate history and culture instead. That is the whole purpose in the drive to erase Christianity from our history and culture, especially the current culture. The foolishness of this should be obvious from an examination of countries where Christianity is not practiced.

The mass murders and denials of human rights in the atheistic Communist countries in the last century are clear evidence that mankind is not the naturally good and rational race that so many atheists believe. The abuses of human rights in predominantly Islamic countries, the discrimination against women in particular, ought to be clear evidence that this major religion is not the equal of Christianity. The same could be said of other major religions.

In fact, a rational examination of real history shows that Christianity has done a great deal to uphold human rights and stop abuses. Many Christians have followed their Lord's teachings in working to alleviate human suffering while spreading the Good News. We should boldly proclaim the truth throughout the year, not just during the major Christian holidays.