Twelve Days of Christmas
Christmas is no longer one day a year… it is a whole season. And the heart of the season is a two week span… from a few days before the 25th to a few days after the start of the new year.
We have (like many lucky folks) been busy with family, friends and church. We have our family traditions that, although they don’t seem to change year from year, become more and more meaningful each year.
The Boy was part of the youth group’s Christmas play. This is third installment in the series; and each year we have the church potluck dinner first and then the play (nothing like dinner and entertainment, right?). They added a Sunday community performance – it’s a bit less attended, but still very nice.
There was supposed to be a Christmas party for my work, but Mother Nature and her pal Snow Storm got in the way. So even though there was no actual party, it was nice to know the bosses put the effort into the planning of it.
With my knee issues, decorating didn’t get done timely or in full swing. No lights on the outside of the house (the up side of that is – we don’t have to take them down, either!). The tree went up the week before Christmas – very late for us. I had The Boy do most of the actual hanging of ornaments. Traditionally, The Hubby is in charge of setting up the tree in the stand and putting the lights on; The Boy and I are in charge of ornaments. Since we got an artificial tree a few years ago, The Hubby’s portion has gone down in time, effort and swearing. And it’s even a pre-lit tree, so no untangling of strings of lights either. It’s pretty much get it out of the box, make sure we have the right parts in the right places, and plug it in.
I did the rest of the house decorating – but again, very light and modest in comparison to previous years. And my friend Sally give me her annual post-Christmas purchase for Christmas (she gets great deals after Christmas and gives me my ornaments in time to decorate for the next Christmas) – some nice sparkly (I guess that’s a word!) beaded ornaments.
The Hubby and I went to church the Sunday before Christmas. The Boy was doing the reading that day, and the Sunday School kids led the worship with a drama. We generally don’t go to Christmas Eve services. The early services tend to be packed with families (not that I don’t like families, but it is a small church and I like my space) and lately there hasn’t been a midnight service at our church. I did think about going to my aunt’s church – but their later service was only at 10 and I decided against it. We opened family gifts – the ones from me to The Hubby, from The Hubby to me, and our presents to The Boy. Santa came overnight and filled stockings and left more presents under the tree. We opened those around 9 or so – it is so nice to have a teenager who sleeps in and not a toddler waking you up at 4 am!!
I invited my parents over for dinner and made a chicken. I have to say, that was one of the best chickens I have ever had. I got a large bird – about 7 pounds – and roasted it in the pan I ususally use for Thanksgiving turkey. I really didn’t do much to prep the bird – just washed it out, put some salt and pepper on it and threw some salt/pepper in the cavity – then into the oven for 2 hours. I used the brand new Cuisinart hand blender my parents gave us for Christmas and whipped up some awesome mashed potatoes. Add in the green bean casserole, and it was a pretty good meal. I pulled out the banana bread, ice cream and homemade chocolates for dessert.
Friday was a prep day for our big family Christmas. I was making all homemade gifts for everyone, so I had to get cracking on the chocolate portion of the gifts. I had already made the cookies – but hadn’t had time to get the chocolates done. I was making baskets for K&E and J&S to give them on Movie Night, so I concentrated on getting those done first. It turned out we went to J&S’s early to talk with Steve about the XBox 360 and gaming, so I was really under pressure to get them done quickly. When I was ready, we headed over to J&S’s place for movie night. We were going to watch The Island (which is a great movie and I had actually just talked to someone about it), but once they heard that we had watched it, they wanted to pick another movie. Jo offhandedly said – hey we could go see The Spirit and The Boy was like “Field Trip!” and we ended up going out for movie night. I wasn’t overly impressed with the movie, but it didn’t suck completely.
So, Saturday was the big family party at my aunt’s house in Windsor. I had to get seven more baskets done before noon, so I was up at 8 am starting my chocolates. I managed to get everything done (the baskets, present wrapping for the niece and nephews, and wrapping the family swap present) in time and off we went to party with the family. We had a pretty big crowd (about 40, I think) and had a great time eating and drinking and playing games. The big boys (the over 15 year olds) actually took over the Wii and bowled quite a bit. We did a present exchange – whoever you wanted to give presents to. Aunts and uncles gave to nieces and nephews, brothers and sisters exchanged gifts, etc. Then we had a Yankee Gift Swap. The basic idea is to get a gift (you set a dollar amount – we used $20) and it gets put into the pot. Whoever gives a gift, gets a gift. We had 12 presents, so the twelve of us got to pull a number to determine what order to pick the gifts in. Number one has the best deal of all. That was my Aunt Joanne this year… she got to pick first. Then the second person picks a gift and unwraps it. They can either keep it or swap it for the first gift. This goes on and on – the current gift picker can exchange the gift in hand for any of the previous gifts. But… poor Number One you might be thinking… gets stuck with whatever they first got or got stuck with in an exchange….not so quick there. Number One actually gets to pick AGAIN at the end… so clearly number one is the best number to pick. And Aunt Joanne knows how to pick them – she opened the CVS gift card first and then took it from my brother at the end!
Then we did our new thing – the family story thing. I got nominated to start first, so I shared the story about the Camaro we bought in Rancho Cucamonga. Mom went next and shared a story about her father in law and her husband when he was a boy. Aunt Joanne shared some pictures of her parents with Cabbage Patch Dolls for Christmas presents. Aunt Marilyn told us how she and Uncle Carl met in college. My cousin Elaine shared a story about her and her husband’s trip to Canada. So now Mom & I will get the pictures scanned and type up the stories for a family book of memories. I hope this is something we do every year.
Sunday was our annual Holiday Halftime party. We basically have an open house for friends, co-workers, church friends, etc. Last year we probably had over 80 people, so we were expecting a crowd. The invitation was a bit late coming out this year, so I think that contributed to a smaller crowd this time around. We had so much food!! (And we still do!) Everyone was generous with bringing something and we had the basics of clam chowder, chili, and meatballs. My dad made a venison chili which was a big hit. I actually bought a deli platter that was to serve 20 – 24 people – and it never made it upstairs to the table!! Even though it was a smaller group, we still had a great time.
And for New Year’s Eve, we will be heading to J&S’s place for a night of games and The Twilight Zone. We’re bringing a bunch of food and drinks; they are providing soup and bread and other goodies.
On Saturday The Boy is having about 10 friends over to have a Rock Bank party. So I am sure whatever food I have left by then will be devoured by Saturday night!
I hope your holiday season, whether Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanzaa is happy, healthy and full of love and joy!