Deck the halls! St. John Lutheran is right on it, preparing for the Boar’s Head and Christmas. Busy making our season bright are Bob Fredland, Vern Barg, Paul Dahlstrand and Kathi Dahlstrand. Kathi is the very gifted seamstress who creates all the costumes for the Boar’s Head Festival.

All the stores on Madison Street are keeping storefront secrets until Friday evening at 6 p.m. Let’s play fair this year – no puppies! Put a puppy in the window and naturally everyone will vote for your display. Puppies win every time. It was a clever move on the part of one store (I’ve forgotten which one). I only remember the puppies and that they won.

Centuries & Sleuths will host the Pippin Singers of Medieval Christmas music as well as a possible surprise visit from another local group.

On Dec. 10 at the VFW hall, Sherry Maughm will display some of her amazing knitting projects from 3 till 9 p.m. Many of these beautifully crafted items will be for sale just in time for Christmas. The VFW hall is located at Adams Street and Hannah Avenue.

Congratulations and thanks to Nancy Greco and the Michael Teolis Singers who will present a Christmas concert at First United Methodist Church, 324 N. Oak Park Ave. on Sunday, Dec. 3, at 7:30 p.m. Come hear the songs you’ve always loved and you’ll have the opportunity to hear and sing along with familiar carols. You’ll also be delighted by Christmas classics you haven’t thought about in a long time.

Birthdays this first week in December: Bradley Edward Specter, Roland Maughm, Jane Holmberg, Reagan Hosty, Carli Loyd, and Kallen O’Shea. Happy anniversary to Geri and Roger Grant.

Some historical events worth noting: the creation of the game of basketball (just in time for the return of the NBA season) in Springfield, Mass. by James Naismith, a gym instructor at the local YMCA; the game of BINGO by Edwin S. Lowe in 1929; the arrest of Rosa Parks in Montgomery, Ala.; the first artificial heart transplant in 1982 in Salt Lake City, Utah, received by Barnay Clark, who lived for 112 days; Enron deservedly bit the dust; the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction at the University of Chicago by Enrico Fermi (the Henry Moore sculpture on the campus commemorates this event); and the Monroe doctrine, 1823. Dec. 5 is an Islamic holiday. St Nicholas Day follows on the 6th. Not much is known about him except that he was a generous man and the bishop of Myra in Turkey.

Thanks for your time. Enjoy the season.