Christmas comes to Blairsville, Suches, and Vogel
Announcements, Community, Union County Chamber December 4, 2019
BLAIRSVILLE, Ga – Christmas is in full-swing throughout Union County with events ramping up on Friday, Dec. 6 and continuing throughout the month.
Blairsville’s family holiday begins this Friday, Dec. 6 and continues all day Saturday, Dec. 7, culminating in the Christmas Parade at 6 p.m.
The Downtown Development Authority, Union County Historical Society, and Blairsville-Union Chamber of Commerce have teamed up to coordinate the 48-hours of events, so citizens can truly enjoy and experience all the city has to offer.
The Tour of Trees is already open to the public at the Community Center and features 40 festive Christmas trees decorated by local businesses. The trees and wreaths will be up until Dec. 31. Additionally, a Grinch village can be seen in the Community Center.
Downtown businesses are participating in Jingle Bell Buys from Wednesday through Friday and will be staying open late during the monthly Shop Late event.
Holiday Stop and Shop takes place at the Pat Haralson Civic Center on Friday and Saturday from 10 a.m. until 7 p.m.
Also on Friday, the North Georgia Chamber Symphony is performing at the Old Courthouse at 7 p.m.
Saturday is filled with holiday cheer with Holly Jolly Christmas and Breakfast with Santa at the Community Center from 9 to 11 a.m.
From 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. is Kris Kringle Market at the Union County Farmers Market, which has over 85 vendors this year and entertainment from the UCHS Chorus and Woody Gap Band of Steel.
Christmas on the Square begins at 10 a.m. with a bake sale and hot dogs. The children’s activities start around 2 p.m. including Pictures with Santa. At 5 p.m., these events end and preparation for the 6 p.m. parade begins.
If you’re looking for a more historical Christmas, the Byron Herbert Reece Farm and Heritage Center are hosting a Christmas Open House on Dec. 6 and 7 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Woody Gap School is hosting a Christmas Tree lighting and open house on Sunday, Oct. 8 at 6 p.m. The school asks for attendees to please bring a finger food to share.
Christmas events continue the following weekend across the county.
UCHS Theatre troupe are performing Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer on Thursday, Dec. 12 and Friday, Dec. 13, at 6:30 p.m. at the Union County Fine Arts Center for $5 admission, which includes dinner an hour before the show. The $5 goes toward the fine arts students’ trip to NYC.
On Friday, Dec. 13, the Union County Historical Society hosts the Elvis Christmas Concert with Roy Perren at 6:30 p.m.
Also on Dec. 13 starting at 2 p.m., Change In Out World’s hosting its annual Christmas event, featuring Pictures with Santa, Caroling, activities, and dinner at 5 p.m. The event is free to the public.
Vogel State Park is holding its tree lighting ceremony on Dec. 14 starting at 4 p.m. The state park is offering hayrides, log fires, and hot chocolate. The ceremony begins around 5:30 p.m. Attendees please bring an unwrapped gift for a child between newborn and 12 for Union County Sheriff’s Office Give-a-Gift program.
On Dec. 21, Blairsville Dance is putting a new twist on the classic Nutcracker at the Union County Fine Arts Center at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $16 for adults, $14 for ages 12 and under, and children under five are free.
Union County offers something for everyone this holiday season. Seasons Greetings!
THE DECLINE OF CHRISTMAS
Opinion December 17, 2019
Has anyone ever thought of the fact that most of our Christmas songs and traditions are only
about 75 or so years old? Doesn’t it seem like this array has just always been there, always been
that way?
Well, it hasn’t always been so joyous and celebrated as it came to be after World War II.
Why is that?
Prior to the victory of the Allies and their return to home and family, Christmas was more
reserved and localized. Songs such as The Messiah and other religious hymns were in place, but
jolly and more secular songs came along with popular movies, such as White Christmas and
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, among others were the result of a desire to make the
Christmas holiday a very special time for families and friends.
Dad, brother, uncle, son and military women etc. had faced the horror of war, with its death and
destruction. There were sights that they could never unsee. Those who were able to return home,
to their wives, husbands, sweethearts and families, wanted to erase those thoughts to the best of
their ability. They had fought pure, unadulterated evil and had won. It seemed their intention to
eradicate such influences in the years to come.
Many of our Greatest Generation put a great deal of time and effort into making the world as
right as possible, to bring as much joy as possible to those they loved. Not only did they save the
world, they saved the best part of themselves and shared that desire for happiness and perfection
with the making of happy stories, happy songs and familiar bliss. No one can argue that the
generation of the 40s and 50’s worked very hard to create as much perfection in society as they
could. It was a halcyon time that, unfortunately, will never be repeated.
Television and movies had their morality department and strived to show family life as a
network of love, discipline and happy endings. Father always knew best and the Donna Reed
show lauded the middle-class family life.
What has happened to society that it has come from the pure entertainment of those shows to
today’s reality television, moral corruption and disdain of most things that relate to God and
religion?
In 1965, a wonderful radio announcer named Paul Harvey made an amazing prophecy on his
weekly show. The title was, If I was the devil.
Anyone who hasn’t heard or read this far-reaching piece that has come to pass in ways that no
one would have guessed. One of his lines quoted from the transcript is “If I were the devil, I
would make the symbol of Easter an egg and the symbol of Christmas a bottle.”
How close is that? He had it nailed and 54 years later, it is true.
Christmas was still reverent in the 70s, and the 80s. People dressed up, had parties, visited with
family and it was a happy time. God was still the Man in Charge in the White House (mostly)
and it reflected on the nation.
The 90s brought us the Clintons and their version of “morality” and the great decline began for
America.
Now in 2019, there are fewer parties, fewer gathering of family and friends than ever. Christmas
cards are not a thing anymore, just send a generic online greeting.
People are well engrossed in their electronic devices. Social life and the moral pressure of
society is long gone. Stores decorate for Christmas in August and begin the big sale that lasts
until well after the New Year.
Retailers completely pass over Thanksgiving, a uniquely American holiday from the Pilgrim
days when living through the winter to harvest was an occasion for thanking Almighty God.
Even Charlie Brown and his gang in Peanuts, when it aired in 1965, complained of the
commercialization of Christmas, lamenting the lack of meaning for monetary gain.
When Christmas songs from the 70s and 80s are played, it is depressing almost to the point of
tears when a comparison is made of the warm, loving, wonderful time of those decades to
today’s commercial apathy.
Maybe, this is an “old folks’ rant about the good old days, but what can be gleaned from today’s
lukewarm electronic holiday?
America has best go back to Ronald Reagan and remember his line:
“If we ever forget we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.”
If Christians don’t stand up and fight for our basic joys of the Lord, His sacrifice for us
and the right to celebrate such, these rights will be taken away by the Liberal Left with
their Atheistic and destructive ways. There are no more free countries to find with such
liberties as we enjoy. They must not be lost, as they will never be found again.
Shop with a Cop bringing Christmas to over 100 children
Community December 4, 2019
BLAIRSVILLE, Ga – Blairsville Police Department enters its 19th year participating in the Shop with a Cop program, and through generous donations and fundraisers, over 100 underprivileged children will be receiving Christmas presents this year.
On Dec. 14, officers will meet the children at Union County Middle School before taking them shopping at the local Walmart. Children are chosen to participate with the help of Union County Family Connection, which works to meet the needs of children in the school system.
It’s common for children participating in the program to buy items for their siblings and parents, never thinking of themselves during their shopping expedition.
“This year, I know we have some who are in elementary school, and we have some that are all the way up into high school,” Said Police Chief Michael “Bear” Baxter.
Around 64 families are benefitting from Shop with a Cop, they will be receiving food baskets from Fellowship of the Hills Church, $100 gift card for groceries at Save A Lot, and the children will have lunch provided by Chick-Fil-A.
Shop with a Cop is only possible due to the hospitality of those in the community, not only law enforcement, but their significant others, teachers, the Blairsville Cruisers, and everyone who donates funds toward the event.
“We live in a good community, where people have been very, very generous in giving to us, and in return, 100 percent of the proceeds that we collect for this cause goes to Shop with a Cop,” stated Baxter, “and we spend that money locally.”
A Christmas Message
Opinion November 29, 2018
Thanksgiving 2018 has come and gone and about all we really know about it comes from
commercial sources. Through the constant drumming of the media we are basically told all we
need to know about Thanksgiving, when to start, when to stop and, by the way, ‘don’t forget
those great deals on Black Friday’ because, well, Christmas is just around the corner and after
all, America’s economy depends on commercialism. Their point is, It’s okay to go into debt but
don’t eat the Romaine lettuce. Is it who we really are? Apparently!
But this year I sense a distinct change in the atmosphere. I’ve heard more detailed explanations
of the real Pilgrims story at Plymouth, Mass. in attempts to correct the re-written history some
elements in our society want us to accept. I feel a perceptible shifting of moral values going on
and I sense a not so subtle shift back to religious faith especially as the destructive tenants of
Islam are flooding our country. The leadership of our churches, long beaten into compliance to
accept the dictates of a secular society, must return to their mission of spreading the gospel and
abandon the demand that we must accept the perverted deviancy of 1% of our population that
demands acceptance, without consequence.
What Americans know about Christmas is mostly suggested to us by the years of Macy’s Day
parades, Hollywood movies and Coca-Cola. TV quickly changed our values. Decades ago,
Coca-Cola embraced Clement Moore’s poem, A Christmas Carol, “Twas the Night Before
Christmas” and lo, we now have an indisputably accepted short, fat, happy ol’ elf who enters
homes down chimney pipes, never gets dirty and enjoys their product while winking at us.
When I was a little boy, a world war was underway yet the traditions of Christmas, and even
then they were commercial, were anticipated and observed. We decorated Christmas trees, had
special seasonal attractions and attended Church programs singing hymns while we little
children read or recited memorized snippets of scripture to the audience. I recall my surprise
upon learning that even Germans soldiers observed Christmas, indeed was responsible for
introducing the Christmas tree as a tradition. And, they sang “Silent Night.” What a revelation.
Among the big traditions were Christmas cards. My mother saved Christmas cards for years
and she gave them out in profuse qualities herself. Those that came to me, mostly from mothers
friends and sisters, were scenes depicted as cartoons. Family cards were actually incredible
works of art depicting scenes of happy home fires or snow, doubtless of a Victorian England, the
country where greeting cards and Santa Clause were introduced as a tradition.
Until Coca Cola’s depiction, St. Nick was tall and skinny, a poor emaciated figure, hungry
looking with a limp bag hanging over his shoulder. None of that has changed except Santa’s
size, but I am sensing once again, with Christmas day still weeks away, a change in the public
attitude, a realization that a prosperous America is returning even with all its social problems of
drug addictions, homelessness and hunger. I feel a sincere longing to return to our old traditions
where good cheer and happiness are not feigned but heartfelt; where charity is freely given
without conditions and people actually enjoy helping other people.
But, we must be careful and not allow the Left to peculate our good thing and introduce social
changes we know to be destructive to a free peoples. Government in the hands of Progressives,
will sweep all that away and the once shining city on the hill idea, as Ronald Reagan coined it,
will be but a footnote in history. We must strive to preserve all of our God given liberties.
Remember, freedom is the goal, the Constitution is the way. Now, go get ‘em! (29Nov18)
Selecting and Caring for Fresh Christmas Trees
Featured, Lifestyle November 28, 2018
By: Eddie Ayers, County Extension Agent
In my opinion, there is nothing like a fresh Christmas tree in the home. Artificial trees look more
natural now than when I was growing up, but they are not the same. Choosing a fresh tree
should be a fun family affair, but you also want to get the best value for your money.
So let’s start with how to select a fresh tree. First, determine where in your home you will
display your tree so that you will be able to tell what size and shape you need. Next, if possible,
cut the tree yourself. This will provide the best opportunity to have a fresh tree throughout the
Christmas season, but you still need to care for it like you would any other “live” tree. If you are
choosing a pre-cut tree, you need to do a freshness test on it before you bring it home so hold a
branch about 6 inches from the tip then pull your hand toward the tip, allowing the branch to slip
through your fingers. Very few green needles should come off in your hand if the tree is fresh.
Here’s another freshness test: lift the tree a couple of inches off the ground, then bring it down
abruptly on the stump end. If the tree is fresh, outside green needles should not fall off in
substantial numbers. Remember, inside needles do turn brown and shed naturally every year.
Now let’s look at how to care for a fresh tree. The most important thing to remember has to do
with water. These trees need water daily, just like a fresh bouquet of flowers. You’ll want to
remember to keep plenty of water in the stand at all times. If you are choosing a stand, be sure
and choose one that has a big water storage area. A Christmas tree may absorb a gallon of water
in the first 24 hours it’s up and between two pints to a gallon of water a day thereafter. Check
the stand daily and supply fresh water as needed. If the water supply runs out, a seal will form
on the cut surface of the tree trunk and the tree will not absorb water and dry out. If the water
runs out, a new cut should be made.
When a tree is first cut, a seal of sap occurs naturally over its stump which keeps moisture in the
tree. It’s important to break that seal to allow the tree to take up water needed to keep it fresh
throughout the holidays. Once you’ve selected your tree and you have it at home, make a fresh
cut across the base of the trunk, ¼ inch up from the original cut. Put it in a bucket of water and
protected from the sun and wind until you get ready to move it indoors. If you are selecting a
balled and burlap tree, first make sure that the tree will grow in our area and second do not let the
root ball dry out as the tree will not survive when planted outside.
When you do bring the tree indoors, position it away from heat sources such as fireplaces,
radiators, heat vents, and television sets. When it’s time to put the lights on and trim the tree,
first test your light cords and connections before hanging them on the tree to make sure they are
in good working condition, without cracked insulation or broken sockets, and make sure all the
sockets are filled. Once you get the lights on, then it’s time to finish trimming and enjoy, but
don’t forget to unplug the lights when you go to bed or leave home. Never leave a tree with the
lights on unattended!
For more information, contact me at the Gilmer County UGA Extension office.
