"There's always room for one more Santa."

--And that's exactly what V said today as I unwrapped the holiday gift she gave me, which was a beautifully dressed vintage-looking Santa. He stands about twenty inches high, and his porcelain face has such a happy expression (as all Santas should). When I unwrapped this latest addition to my Santa parade, V and I both said There's always room for one more Santa!

Both V and I have been collecting Santas for years. We don't buy dozens at a time, usually just one spectacular one each Christmas. There was a holiday program on the HGTV channel last year, and one woman had her entire house filled with Santas big and small, old and new, made out of everything from paper to cement... so many that it was a year-round display in her home. Maybe that's how it started for her-- someone told her "There's always room....."

I gave V a Santa last year for Christmas, and I would have looked for another one this year, but I found a framed African American artwork in one of the antique shops a few weeks back that I knew V would just love..... so that was her Christmas gift from me. The painting was a New Orleans-style funeral procession, complete with a jazz band leading the mourners to the burial site. Regardless of the funeral-occasion, it is a serenely joyful painting, and I knew that V didn't have that in her artwork collection.

The four of us had a nice lunch and a great afternoon today. It was nice to see V and S again, and we got caught up on what we all did during the summer (they traveled; we moved and unpacked). They were surprised that our guest cottage was so big, and now they're determined to come up again after the holidays so they can stay for a weekend. V is anxious to get to the antique and resale shops up here, so maybe we'll get to do that the next time they visit.

By the time they left this afternoon, V was wishing that Thanksgiving would "just come and just go" so she could start decorating her house for Christmas. Her two sons come home every Thanksgiving and when they leave, out come the Christmas decorations and all of her Radko ornaments. V is like us-- Christmas-crazy. But that's a good kind of crazy.

Speaking of crazy.... one of our Guinea hens is spending tonight on the roof of our house. When I went out to lock up the coop tonight, the four chickens and just one Guinea hen were all cuddled up on the roosting bar inside the coop. As I started looking underneath the nesting boxes and in the baskets on the floor of the coop, I heard the click-clicking of bird feet up on the roof of the coop. Sure enough, there was Dottie...... up on the roof, looking down at me.

When that silly hen saw me, she flew to the roof of the guest cottage. I left the gate of the coop open a bit and went back inside, hoping she would fly down and join the others. I gave her half an hour to make up her mind, and when I went back outside it was already dark. I checked the coop first.... the chickens were resting on the bar, Jeanie (the other Guinea hen) was sleeping next to Jaye-Bird, but Dottie wasn't in there.

I had a big flashlight with me and I pointed it at the roof-line of the garage, the cottage, even the barn. No Dottie in sight. Then I went towards the house and I heard her soft cooing. I looked up and there she was, on the highest point of the roof on the house. She was all settled down and looked like she was sleeping, so I just went back and locked the coop gate and let her be. No way to get her down anyway. The Guinea hens are not like the chickens, who will come to me when I call them. These silly birds have minds of their own. Most often, they follow the chickens, but there are times when the two Guinea hens are off on their own, as close together as if they're attached with a string.

But not tonight. Dottie is up on the roof. Jeanie is in the coop. Our neighbor D had told us that the Guinea hens prefer to be outside in the trees or up on the roof, but this is the first time that one of them hasn't been safe inside the coop after dark. "You're on your own, you silly bird." That's what I said to Dottie before I came back into the house tonight.

When I told my husband that she didn't get back into the coop with the others, he went outside with the flashlight and a piece of bread. He was holding the bread up so she could see it, hoping her appetite would persuade her to fly down. Not a chance. I didn't think it would work. Birds don't fly around after dark..... they find their sleeping spot and that's that till the sun comes up.

Guinea hens...... silly birds. Or, as the neighbor down the road says about them-- "They're about as smart as a pile of rocks." I have to agree. But I hope we don't find a pile of feathers in the morning. I'm guessing Dottie will be fine, as long as hawks don't look for food after dark (I don't think they do) and as long as an owl doesn't swoop down for a midnight snack.

As my dear friend Frankie would have said-- "Let's not put that thought out into the universe, child."