Christmas Eve is here again. I sure hope my children are behaved today. Yesterday they were demons. I was sooo disappointed. What kids wakes up and thinks, "Gee, Santa Claus is coming tomorrow night - this would be the perfect time to act like a complete a-hole!" My kids -that's who. I have PTSD from dealing with them yesterday. Yikes.
I sure hope today is better. Christmas Eve is my favorite. I love these few days because I am reminded of the happy parts of my childhood as we honor many of the same traditions that I had growing up. We always ate Shrimp Scampi on Christmas Eve. I make it now. Yesterday my 6 year old offered to peel the shrimp with me and we sat and talked and peeled. I recall sitting with my father to do so. He would ask me to help and I obliged because I knew I could sneak a few to eat. My daughter asked me, " How did you learn to cook?" "From my father." "How did he learn to cook?" "From his mother, I imagine." "How did she learn to cook?" "From her mother, I think. Her mother died when she was young." My daughter sat and thought about this for a moment. "Will you teach me how to cook?" I smiled and said, "Of course. Maybe when you are grown and have children of your own - you can cook Christmas dinner and mom and dad will come eat at your house." She pondered this and then said, "No - I think my family will just come to your house and you can cook for us." That's my lazy child not even going to commit to cook for me 25 years from now. Although- I will be happy to do it. I imagine a house full of grandchildren at Christmas will bring me great joy some day. I just hope my kids don't start as early as I did. :)
We will spend the day relaxing. Maybe I'll get a nap. We will go to church and then have dinner with my father and my sisters, my brother-in-law and my niece and nephew. When we come home we will drink hot chocolate and roast marshmellows and weenies in the fireplace. We will watch a Christmas Story. We will track Santa Claus and we will put the kids to bed early.
Tonight, my husband and I will play Santa as we have many times before. I will drink half of the milk and take bites of the cookie. My husband will unload the gifts from the garage. We will stuff stockings. We will chew carrots and spit them onto the front lawn. I will write a letter to the girls in Santa's hand. We will put a log in the fireplace and music in the CD player for the next morning. We will both be absolutely giddy as we stand back and admire our work. We will count our blessings.
I hope to find ourselves under the mistletoe. It is such a rare event in our house that both kids are sleeping and we are both awake. The best gifts in life are free!
I wish everyone a wonderful, magical, safe Christmas and a Happy New Year. See you in 2013!
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