A Storybook Christmas

I am a HUGE Hallmark movie fan and this one did not disappoint. My only complaint was the little girl. Why was she wearing red lipstick? She was not a very likable child, but she didn't distract from the story.

I thoroughly enjoyed this film. It is one of the better Hallmark films.

It had a more unique plot with great lead and other characters.

It is getting tiresome to see the same plots on so many of the Hallmarks.

Some reviewers seem to be so critical of some actors. These reviewers appear to want all their characters to be the same. I view those characters to be fake.

People are unique. So, it is refreshing to see unique characters.

I enjoy the diversity in characters, so I felt the characters in this film were great.

But I did wonder how old the little girl Finley was meant to be ! In some scenes she acted like a 6 year old, then with her hairstyle, pearl earrings and wearing lipstick all the way through the film made her look years older - like a miniature 30 year old. A pleasant enough watch

Ali Liebert is back in form in this latest holiday offering. There was something about her in the last one, A Gift to Cherish, that seemed a little off. It's been a week or more since I have seen this, so I'll just make this brief. This was the unexpectedly male nanny plot. He is a well-known children's author in disguise and she is an event planner who needs to wrangle this author to the career make or break event she is planning. Little does she know, this reclusive author is right under her nose. I loved that the male lead was just a normal-looking guy, and his rival, her boyfriend, was fictionally male model handsome. She is a controller and scheduler to the point that I really disliked her at times, and he has a more loosey-goosey approach to child raising. So it's kind of two plots for the price of one. It wasn't perfect. The constant repetition of "You are safe, You are loved" to her little niece (orphaned) was unbelievably cheesy. But all in all a complex story with a lot going on, some tension, and good chemistry make this worth watching.

This movie is a combination of inexperienced-nanny-fixes-controlling-executive, and another common plot line that isn't fully revealed until late, so I won't explicitly say what that is. There are enough clues as to what's going to happen at the end so most viewers will figure it out, certainly before Celeste does. (Even if it is easy to figure out, I wish reviewers would not give these things away without tagging spoilers.)

Ali Liebert isn't as controlling as I think she was meant to be, but then Liebert is just too sweet to be that rigid. There is a heartwarming aspect to the story as shown by Celeste's devotion to Finley reinforced by their backstory. Liebert does the role so well, and with tenderness, that it's hard to maintain her character as overly rigid.

Unlike a lot of Christmas movies where the female lead bonds with the male lead's child, the genders are switched, but the idea is the same. Jake Epstein has good chemistry with both the child, Habree Larratt , and aunt turned mom, Ali Liebert.

The story includes the token existing fiance which leads to some competitiveness in things like building a snowman, but the fiance never really seemed viable.