I hope everyone has had a great holiday weekend, whatever you celebrate. We had a nice, but low-key Christmas holiday. Technically, this is the kid's second Christmas. Last year they were two weeks old and I was in a living hell. I don't remember much about last Christmas. Just that I was so panic-stricken about not having Ms. Wendy the Wonder Nanny for three whole days that I vomited the whole--count 'em cuz I sure did--TWENTY-NINE every two and a half hour feedings marathon that I did those three days BY MYSELF. Have I rubbed that in enough on this blog? Well, D helped for a few hours here and there. D's family had come over to give me some presents, and I was too tired to open them. They sat unopened for about three weeks.
Anyway, this Christmas was much better and FELT like the kid's first Christmas. Growing up, my family did exchange presents, and in the early years, were more active about Christmas, but by the teen years, we never even put up a tree. I was home for my mother's last Thanksgiving and Christmas and fought long and hard to be as festive as possible. I made my father go out with me and get a tree. It's a fake one, and now I have it. And I have not brought it out since that last Christmas before she died. This year, my excuse was that I thought the kids would just knock it over.
OK, here is a quirky thing about my family upbringing that I am trying to change for my kids. My family was pretty anti-entertaining, anti-tradition, anti-pomp and circumstance, anti-having people over to our house. I think that my mother grew up in a poor and abusive home and she was ashamed to have people over to her house as a child (And sometimes her friends were not allowed to come to her house because it wasn't safe.) I think she unconsciously carried this into adulthood. My father grew up the son of a Jehovah's Witness minister, and everything was done at the church. Parties and celebrations were considered "worldly." Although he is not practicing JW anymore, I think he has carried a bit of this over into adulthood. So, rarely did we have company, celebrations, or our friends over. Not never, but rarely. And when we did, it made my mother so self-conscious and nervous that she practically went batty cleaning the house and making everything perfect that she never wanted to do it often. So as a result, I am self conscious about hosting and entertaining people at my house. Somewhat because I've had no practice and never gained the skills, and somewhat because I don't have all, nay ANY of the accoutrement's of entertaining. I don't even have matching glasses. I have like four plates and bowls that are not in that good of condition, and my table was ruined in storage and the finish got like soggy and now everything sticks to it. I plan to replace it, but just decided to wait until the kids are a bit older and NEATER.
So, I'm trying to change. I always wanted one of those houses that people felt comfortable just stopping by and dropping in for dinner. But I'm not going to be able to change over night. And I'm not going to be able to buy a new table, dishes, serving dishes, stemware, etc. overnight. I never had a wedding or even a baby shower. I didn't get all the free loot. So I've been doing a bit of practicing and having small gatherings. We had a small, very small gathering for the kid's birthday. And it was good practice. I'm getting better at it. I can cook OK, mind you, but I just can't cook entertainment style, where everything goes together and looks so pretty and presentable.
So for holidays I'm trying to add traditions and celebrations that I didn't grow up with. This year for Christmas Eve, I wanted to go to church and for Christmas just have a gift opening for the kids with D, a small "traditional dinner" and invite one or two guests over. So that's what we did and it was very nice. (Well, one of my guests was a no-show, a friend w/o family in town. But he's kind of flakey about these things so I wasn't that bothered or surprised by it.)
D insisted on a tree even though I did not haul out my mom's tree. So he brought over this little 4 foot fiber optic tree and we got a few cheap decorations at Rite-Aid! My star I got wouldn't fit up on the tree, so it is too the side! Christmas Eve-Eve, The black orphan kitty with no name and I decorated it. We had no little hooks that you use to hang the ornaments so I ended up using paperclips! Wow! We were festive! Black Kitty With No Name tried to knock things down as fast as I put them up. We also put up stockings that were, uh, scotch taped to the chimney with care, for the kids and put a few items in them.
On Christmas Eve, the four of us went to church and the kids stayed with us rather than going to the nursery. They were good for the first 45 minutes. They were fascinated by the lights and the people and the children that were dressed in costumes in an impromptu nativity play. Then, at the very end, they passed out candles and turned off the lights and we sang all verses of "Silent Night." I was holding Naim with one hand while holding a lit candle WAY away with my other hand. He was getting very angry at his mean, abusive mother who would not let him touch FIRE! And in this solemn, candlelit moment, Naim starts SCREAMING at the TOP OF HIS LUNGS. It is so dark that I can't see anything, but I try to move over to a nearby small room at the side of the church. Suddenly, someone comes and yanks the candle from my hand. I was actually glad to be rid of it. But this is Unitarians for you: The woman who did it came up to me and apologized profusely because she thought she did something so terribly politically incorrect in regards to my disability. Apparently, she saw that I was going to walk that candle right into the wall of our over 100 year old wood church. She didn't want to embarrass me, she said. Ha ha! I would have been significantly more embarrassed had I burned down our local landmark of a church on Christmas Eve, while everyone was singing "Silent Night."
After church, Naim never got over his fit. I took him home and sent D off to his family's house for the night. Then, I ended up sitting on the floor with that child for 45 minutes while he continued his tantrum. Nothing I did seemed to help. I just ended up talking to him and rubbing his back. Finally he calmed down just in time for bed. After the kids went to bed, Kitty and I wrapped their presents while I talked to good friend, Nik, from Toronto on the phone. So it was a nice night.
On Christmas day, I slept in a bit because I knew that this was probably going to be one of the last Christmases in a long time where the kids won't be up at 5 am. D also didn't come over until 2 pm. He was supposed to come in the morning! By the time he came, the kids were too tired to open presents and so I put them down for naps. Flash forward 5 years and see if this flies! I said if he did that again, I was going to send them over to his place and poke him until he got up.
D and I open our gifts for each other. He got me a DVD/video recorder for the TV in my room because I can't really see my dad's TV downstairs. I got him a magic bullet (you know the blender thingy from the infomercial!! He's all into grinding his own coffee and making protein shakes and stuff.) Apparently, I also got him some video editing equipment and apparently he got me a sterling silver bracelet. I say apparently, because we really picked out these gifts for ourselves and then made the other one go get it. We do this every year. This year, though, we didn't even make the other person go buy it. We bought it ourselves! So I wrapped my own present and he wrapped his, and he didn't know what HE got ME until I opened it and vice versa. It was kind of funny.
When I can afford it, I try to buy organic and fairly traded foods. But I cannot afford to do it 100% so usually that food goes towards the kids. It is more important that they eat organic than us. But for Christmas dinner, I bought all organic for us as well. We had lemon herbed chicken with fresh chives, cilantro, thyme and something else I forget now and pepper. The stuffing was organic version of stove top, but I herbed it all up, too. Mashed Potatoes and gravy, butter steamed fresh green beans that I steamed for a really long time with the tatoes, so they were really good, and organic rolls. It was pretty good, IMHO. The kids had some stuffing and potatoes. This time Naim did not throw it all up like he did at thanksgiving!
D's dad came over and we opened the kids gifts. We didn't get them a whole lot of stuff. I got them a big pegged easy puzzle and two books each. D got them each a stuffed cat and a magnadoodle to share. D's dad got them each a push toy and an outfit. They also got finger paints and crayons in their stockings. D also got them a little cell phone from the dollar store which is Aaron's favorite. Naim likes a book that I got him with lots of textures to feel. Aaron likes the phone and the puzzles. They kind of started getting into the whole unwrapping process after a few presents. They liked the bows and wrapping paper as well as the presents, of course.
We let the kids play a bit and then put them to bed. They were tired out. Then we had a chocolate cheesecake I had made (and even put fancy whipped cream on it and organic dark chocolate shavings so see what you missed Mr. No-Show J!!). I made a pot of coffee for D and hot chocolate for me and we added Irish Creme while we ate the cheesecake and just relaxed in front of the fire for a couple of hours.
It was nice. It will be fun when the kids get older and can participate more. I'm hoping to add family traditions for us as we go.
So far, I'd like to keep Christmas Eve church service. Irish coffee. I'd like to add some lights outside next year, and get out my mom's big tree and maybe get some of her ornaments from Kansas. I'd still like to invite some nonfamily members, (even if they don't show) because I have been home alone plenty on Christmas and why should you be? I don't think Christmas has to be "only family." The problem is getting people to know that they aren't intruding upon you. I don't want a big, huge celebration, but a few people over on Christmas would be nice. I don't care if D or I spend Christmas with his or my family on Christmas Eve, but I'd kind of almost like it to be just us, our family and a few of our friends for Christmas. Though it was nice to have D's dad come. We'll see.
This being an adult and being able to make your own holidays what you want them to be is kind of fun!
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