In the entry hall, a Santa Claus with dazzling blue eyes surveys a room filled with dolls, huge presents and an antique dog carrying a basket of Christmas balls in his mouth.

Down the hall, beside an opalescent mural of a fairy, another large Santa pulls a sleigh. And in the living room, a white dove flutters onto the branches of a 20-foot Noble fir, settling quietly among the garlands and shining balls as if she lived there.

Welcome to Christmas in Yelm, at the home of spiritual leader J.Z. Knight. Once a Tacoma housewife, Knight now attracts an international following for her reputed ability to "channel" - to abdicate her body and voice to a 35,000-year-old warrior named Ramtha.

Though she can speak as an ancient spirit, Knight still celebrates Christmas. She - and Ramtha - love Jesus for saying that the Kingdom of God lives within you, she says. And every year, Knight works hard to create the Christmas spirit throughout the four-bedroom, 12,800-square-foot, French chateau-style home that she designed.

"What I'm doing with this house is to never let that feeling of magic and awe and really mystical feelings die," she says. "I want you to feel like you're 5 years old."

In her elegant pool room, J.Z. Knight holds a favorite dove, Snookie, who was hand-raised and often leaves its aviary to follow her through the house.

In an eclectic, Victorian style, Knight adds Santas, Madame Alexander dolls, bears, silver-winged angels and well-dressed rabbits from Best Bunnies of LaConner to rooms already filled with antique furniture and her collection of fine European, British and American paintings.

In every room there are silver dishes of candy or nuts and pots of flowers - orchids, amaryllis, narcissus and dozens of poinsettias.

Christmas objects dress tables and walls alongside fanciful creatures and symbols from other religions. An 18th-century French fruitwood buffet displays a statue of Buddha - and beside it, a manger scene, complete with Baby Jesus. A large gold angel with silver wings lives in a doorway niche but around the corner, in the dining room, are those flying monkeys.

Sometimes, Knight creates a Christmas scene that relates to one of her paintings. A 19th-century work by French artist Felicie Schneider shows a boy with his head on his desk, tired from doing homework. Below the painting Knight placed a collection of "boy things" - reproductions of antique cars, planes, a circus wagon.

Knight especially treasures Christmas because she didn't experience it until she was 5 years old. Her mother was single, poor and working two jobs in Artesia, N.M., but somehow brought "just a little tree" to their home in an old Army barracks.

"My mom put it on the nicest piece of furniture she had - the radio. And my brother and I got one gift each," Knight recalls. Also that year, she saw Santa Claus for the first time, riding a fire truck into town.

By a winding staircase, a 43-inch-tall Saint Nicholas escorts an elegant doll from Germany. Loops of greens and Christmas balls decorate the oak bannister.

When her mother remarried, the family continued to celebrate Christmas. But when she was in 9th grade, her stepfather decided that decorating a tree was too much trouble, and, Knight remembers bitterly, "I saw the death of Christmas."

She is determined "never to let the spirit of Christmas be thrown away" again.

So she and her staff - including housekeeper and former Los Angeles interior designer Nancy Trent - try to capture "that feeling of magic and awe" throughout her house.

Knight says she thinks all year about how to create magic. As she travels around the world - channeling and meeting with students from the school she started, Ramtha's School of Enlightenment - she also finds time for shopping. She buys statues of angels, elegant ribbons, an old wooden cart that could hold a Christmas display. "I'll see these things and I'll just ship " `em home," she says.

Back in Yelm, the Christmas mood is set early. Last year Knight started playing Christmas music on Oct. 15. This year, she and several staffers began decorating, as well, in October, often consulting photographs in order to recreate a design from years past.

For all the planning, some decorations come from impulse. Sometimes Knight takes apart a decoration her staff has just carefully re-created from a past year's photo and builds a new design.

Or sometimes she finds something new. The tall Santa in her front hall came from a Nieman Marcus catalog. Knight liked his blue eyes. "I looked at him and said, 'He's gonna come home and live with us.'"

A hall near the entry displays an oil painting by 19th-century French painter Felicie Schneider of a boy tired from doing his lessons. Below the painting Knight arranged "boy things" - a toy sailboat, a plane, a miniature wood-paneled station wagon.

The visit by a bird named Sugar Dove to her Christmas tree was also unplanned. It flew into the living room one night from Knight's pool-house aviary.

Also in November, Knight begins serious Christmas shopping for family and friends. And she turns her three-car garage into a Christmas workroom, filled with wide shelves full of ribbon, 20 bins of wrapping paper and a sign proclaiming, "I believe in Santa."

In late November, she and boyfriend James Flick, an an associate with the School of Enlightenment, visit a nearby tree farm to cut a Christmas tree (sometimes two trees - one for the living room, one for the front hall). Then they and her staff decorate it, with balls and garlands of birds and pears designed by artist Christopher Radko, plus literally thousands of lights. Last year, "it took us two days to do about 5,000 lights," she said.

As Christmas nears, Knight's sons Brandon and Chris visit to roast chestnuts and play pool in her "pub." Grandchildren Austin 7, and Sidney, 5, stop by, too, to help Knight make cookies.

Another Christmas-time pleasure - a trip to Seattle with friends to see "The Nutcracker" and two days of shopping. On Christmas morning, she meditates, then hosts a family celebration, opening stockings with her sons and grandchildren.

In the dining room, a white-bearded fairy rides a chair back. Red ribbons, red candles and red amaryllis mix with garlands of greens, golden balls and, above the mantel, a huge, handmade star. The table is set with Christmas china and red and green goblets.

Much of Christmas Day is spent in Knight's comfortable "viewing room." Garlands of greenery decorate the entertainment center. Huge bells hang from doors leading to an outside patio. And nearly every table displays some treasure - a Santa Claus, a dollhouse, a Ralph Lauren bear in a Polo coat.

Here, she and her family can "eat, watch a movie, put on a fire," Knight says. And here, on Christmas, they open presents. "There are stockings for everyone," adults and children alike. All day long, they open gifts, "so everyone can see what they got. There's lots of music, lots of cheer."

After all, Knight says with conviction, "We're all kids at Christmas."

Writer Lanie Lippincott Peterson lives in Vancouver, Wash.