[Open] A Bit of Home for the Holidays

[Rhiannon Pryce]

1 December, 2025 x • x Open x • x Dialogue: X

"New tradition" is an interesting oxymoron. Can you really call it a "tradition" if it hasn't been repeated yet? Then again, there is something beautiful about the intentionality of deciding to repeat something for the sake of repeating it, for tradition, for the beauty of whatever you're trying to instate.

However, the student body felt about new traditions, Rhiannon was starting one.

The 6-meter-tall Christmas tree in the center of the entrance hall was not a new tradition; it had been a winter spectacle for Penwick Castle for as long as any of the faculty could remember. What was new, however, was that instead of appearing overnight adorned with hundreds of coordinating baubles, the tree was entirely without ornaments. Gold and silver garland wrapped around the tree, small enchanted tealight candles flickered without producing heat, and the picturesque gold star was placed atop the massive fir.

It created quite a buzz, rumors flying around about the possibility of someone having stolen the ornaments, or perhaps casting an invisibility charm on them as a prank. But at lunchtime, Headmistress Rhiannon set the record straight.

She clapped twice, the sound echoing throughout the dining hall and quieting the student body. "As you may have noticed," her voice calm, amplified by magic, "Our traditional Christmas tree in the entrance hall is missing ornaments. This is intentional, and no we have not lost them. Instead, this year we will be decorating the tree." Some students groaned, but Rhiannon didn't notice, a warm smile on her face. "If you'd like to participate, I invite you to owl home, asking for an ornament you hang up at home to lend to our tree. Or, perhaps you'd like to make or buy one instead, that will do just fine. I would love to see this tree fill with the styles and traditions of you and your families, and create something truly one-of-a-kind."

After lunch, the tree already began filling up with small parchment ornaments made in class, some baubles that had already been used for decorations in common rooms, and a few sentimental tokens that weren't exactly "ornaments", but had been used to trim the tree nonetheless.

Students lingered longer than usual in the entrance hall, pointing out their handiwork, comparing stories of the ornaments they'd brought or planned to bring. A few professors stopped as well, quietly adding their own pieces when they thought no one was watching.

The tree wasn't something you would see in a catalogue. It was not symmetrical. It was not coordinated. It was not curated.

It was better.

Help Headmistress Rhiannon trim the tree!

The Christmas tree will be up in the entrance hall IC from December 1st to 31st, and students and faculty alike are welcome to add their own ornaments to decorate it in that time.
Pictures of whatever ornament(s) your character is adding are not required, but are appreciated!
Ornaments can be added by hand or by a simple casting of the Levitation Charm (a tier 0 first-year spell, so everyone has and can use it), and will be returned to their owners at the end of Winter Break.

[June Selwyn]

JUNE SELWYN
*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧
Date: December 6, 2025 | Solo | Dialogue: X
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June Selwyn had not expected that the thing to make her feel at home this term would be a Christmas ornament.

Penwick's new holiday tradition would have been background chatter to June, normally. This year, though, she was wound tight. A new school, new social circles she still hadn't quite managed to break into (it really was first year all over again, wasn't it), and OWLs were all pressing on her like a weight she couldn’t quite shift. If one more professor asked her if she was revising, she might strike a wall. She was June bloody Selwyn. Of course she was revising. Didn't they read her transcript?

So this year, something inside of June actually wanted to participate, and not just participate, but... Do a craft. And she knew exactly what she was going to make.

Selwyn Manor sat on a stretch of land bordered by a small wood of walnut trees, old enough that their trunks twisted like knotted wands. The family of 3 used to wander through them in winter, usually for a walk after supper, snow crunching beneath their boots, pockets stuffed with the best fallen walnuts they could find. They'd usually end up roasted or on top of a Christmas pie, but once every year, when June had found the Best Walnut of the Season, she and her father would take it into her grandad's old workshop. Her father would lift her onto a stool beside the workshop table, sleeves rolled, tools set out as though this were serious, sacred work. Together they'd split the shell, carve a small mast, and fold a parchment sail from an old manuscript draft that always caught the candlelight just so.

“It stays afloat as long as you do,” he’d say to her, which meant absolutely nothing, and yet she’d believed him.

Obviously, the Selwyn trio had not gone on a winter walk to the walnut grove in quite some time, and neither June nor Phinehas seemed particularly keen on picking up the tradition again. Maybe June would ask her father to do it again this year.

She brought her supplies back to the Mercator common room that Saturday evening: a single walnut from the dining hall, a toothpick pilfered from the kitchens, a scrap of old parchment she’d been meaning to throw away. She arranged them neatly on one of the long oak tables, sat, and simply let the stillness settle.

She cracked the walnut with a butter knife she'd nicked from supper, the two halves cleanly falling apart onto the table, and trimmed a bit of parchment into an elongated square (the irony of making something sentimental out of academic refuse was not lost on her). She set the toothpick mast into a dab of wax, reinforced it with a charm, and then shaped the sail so it curved as though catching wind.

With wax and charm, she set the toothpick mast steady, pressing it softly into place. Her fingers remembered the motions without fumbling. For the first time in several weeks, the tension behind her eyes relaxed.

When the small ship was complete, it looked all but identical to the ones she had set adrift in bowls of water as a child: gold-tinted walnut shell, parchment sail curved as if it were catching a winter's breeze. It made her chest ache, but in a warm way, like stepping into a familiar room after too long.

That evening she took the ornament down to the Entrance Hall. A few clusters of students were crowded around the huge Christmas tree, some arguing about aesthetics, colour balance, and whether enchanted snow counted as an ornament. June slipped between them quietly.

She chose a branch neither too high nor too low, touched by the golden glow of the floating candles. Carefully, she hung the ship there. It rocked once, twice, and stilled itself, as if it had found harbour.

June stepped back and simply watched for a moment.

A warmth spread through her chest, slow and certain. A little piece of home, her home, not the manor, but the feeling of being where you know you belong, now nestled among the branches of a school that was slowly, tentatively, becoming home too.

[Tristan Verona]

Tristan Verona

2025/12/02

Apparently, no snowflakes were supposed to be identical, but somehow, every single one of them reminded Tristan of home. It rarely snowed back in Anglesey. The last time he remembered seeing snow was before they had moved there, but that had already been a few years ago. He couldn’t help but stare out the window at the falling snow covering the high mountain tops and slumbering gardens alike.

The tree in the entrance felt quite bare when Tristan had first seen it appear. He had just exited his alchemy class when he heard whispers and murmurs. Something had come over the wandering students in the halls. Rumours were common at Penwick. Tristan had heard his fair share of crazy stories and wild tales; he had even lived through a few of his own. None had circulated as quickly as this one had. Hints of thievery and something missing, Tristan only caught a few snippets of conversation. The story told itself as he came upon the empty evergreen.

Suspicions and worries were quieted when the Headmistress came to clear things up. It was up to them to ornate the tree. Tristan was relieved, as a tree without decorations would have been quite depressing, especially in his first year here.

Finishing up his meal, he went back to the entrance hall and sat down on a nearby bench.
Already, some eager students had started putting up trinkets and baubles on the waiting branches. Some of them were classics like painted Christmas balls and pinecones. Others were a bit peculiar, like a tiny miniature of a Christmas tree. Tristan even thought he spotted a medal from the trophy room on one of the higher branches. That one didn’t exactly scream sentimental value unless the sentiment was mischief.

Christmas in the Verona family was full of stories. His favourite moments had always been near the fireplace with a cup of hot chocolate, listening to his mother share some of the tales she had uncovered in her research. Of course, his father was still the writer in the family, but his mother wasn’t intimidated in the slightest. She could immerse you in the ancient myths and have you holding your breath over stories that had been shared countless times in the last millennia. Ever since they had moved, Tristan would ask her to recount his favourite story from the Mabinogion.

With that memory in mind, he knew what he wanted to make.

The following day, he found a few things that would help bring his idea to life. One of his black socks had the start of a hole in it. That would be perfect for the head. Two golden buttons from a vest he wasn’t using and a bit of white string from a sewing kit in the common room. He brought all of it to a desk and started working on his little project.

A few snips here and a bit of sewing there, a black sock filled with cotton became a round head with little triangle ears. Big golden eyes were created from the buttons and under them were whiskers of string. All together, the small feline ornament was as close as Tristan could get to the creature of legend he was fascinated by. A scarf made out of red garland was the final piece needed to add a festive flair to the design.

Tristan took a step back from where he had hung his creation. It was nowhere as beautiful or detailed as some of the other decorations that had been placed, but it was his. Imperfect and frankly a bit ugly, he loved it.

That month, every time he would pass by after class, he would search for the little kitten with a glance, and without fail, Tristan always would find little shiny buttons aimed in his direction.