Decorating with Christmas lights is one of my favorite ways to get into the season. My choices for the Christmas tree are the colored lights with preprogrammed patterns. My family has been using them for years. Although I don’t have a Christmas tree yet, I did decorate our balcony with a garland and lights:

Some people really go crazy with the outdoor Christmas decorations, and I can only imagine how high their energy bill must be. Here is a cool Christmas Lights Map which maps out the most extensive Christmas light displays in the U.S. Zoom in to see more displays in any area. There are a few here in Austin, including the famous 37th street neighborhood, which is an entire street completely covered in Christmas lights and decorations.

Here is a video of my favorite Christmas lights display. The music was broadcast on a specific radio station so that people could drive by and listen to the music in their cars. This video is from a few years ago, but this particular display was also featured in a beer commercial.

FreeRice.com is a great site which allows you to play an online vocabulary game to donate rice to the hungry. For each correct answer, the site will donate rice through United Nations. This is how it works: as you play the game, each page load brings up a banner advertisement which goes to pay for the rice. Read more about it in their FAQ.

Not only do you get to help donate food to the hungry, you can also improve your vocabulary! Each question gets harder or easier, depending on whether or not you are getting the questions right. So it plays to your own skill level and helps you learn new words. Try it out!

A creative chef over at WoW Insider has posted a recipe based on the World of Warcraft game recipe, Murloc Fin Soup! The recipe includes the translation into real food (for example, murloc meat = boneless skinless chicken breasts). Personally, I always thought murlocs would taste more like tuna than chicken given that they are fish people, but the recipe sounds fun.

RlrlrlGLGLGLGLGLglglglgll!

Hark how the bells,
Sweet silver bells,
All seem to say,
Throw cares away

Christmas music is both loved and hated. For some it is a way to celebrate the excitement of the Christmas season, while for others it only emphasizes the over commercialization of the holiday. I still belong to the former group, though I struggle not to get sucked in to the commercial aspect of it.

When I was growing up, Christmas music was a very strong tradition in my family. My Dad would put on orchestral or choral Christmas music over our sound system at home when the holiday drew near, which is why I still prefer instrumental or choral Christmas music to the pop versions of traditional songs. The music was part of our family celebration, and listening to it now brings back memories of celebrating the holidays with my family.

My favorite Christmas melody is Carol of the Bells, both instrumental and choral versions. Unfortunately, this song has been used quite a bit in stores, TV ads, and even parodies, but I don’t tire of it around Christmas time. Other favorites include The Nutcracker Suite, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, The First Noel, and O Holy Night.

Although I prefer traditional Christmas music like that of The Morman Tabernacle Choir and the Vienna Boys Choir, I have also expanded my music collection to include newer stuff like Charlotte Church and The Trans-Siberian Orchestra. I especially like TSO’s take on Carol of the Bells and The Nutcracker Suite. Having different styles of the same songs helps break up the monotony of it, even if I do love the songs themselves.

This is hopefully just the first of a series of posts I’m going to make about Christmas. It is, after all, my favorite time of year, and music always helps me get in the right mood.