Parol

My cousin, Peachy visited last Friday and she gifted me with a home-made white parôl (a Christmas lantern, lower right) as pasalubong. We ourselves have actually started making parol frames from our own bamboo but have been fence-sitting whether to use weather-proof (though hideously shiny) plastic sheets or the old-school, hard-to-find paper ones.

So to complement what Peachy gave, we bought some red and white papél de japòn and grouped them altogether. Peachy's home-made gift affirmed what we have been thinking all along: making the traditional version without the glitz and the blings, which looks and feels far more organic to our place. What I like the most about these paper lanterns are the cut-out tassels as delicate as pastíllas wrappers.

The name comes from the Sp. faról, and symbolizes the star that the Three Wise Men followed to find the Christ Child.