All Decorated!

Well, now that the tree is up and decorated, I feel much better about things. Thanks to John and Erika for that! Thanksgiving, wedding anniversary, and the colonoscopy are behind me (in order of importance, of course) And sadly, John and Erika have gone home and I have that feeling of hollowness down deep inside like I always do after one of my kids leaves me.

The old, fake tree doesn't look too bad after all - a little skimpy compared to the fat mountain-grown Fraser Firs we've been having for 16+ years, but it's very symmetrical, I must say that for it. It's a good foot shorter than I'm used to, and we used a whole string of lights less and almost a box fewer ornaments. But there's more room in the living room this way. And we don't really need much room for gifts anyway this year. It still gives us the beautiful aura of Christmas, and John and Erika and I had a wonderful afternoon Saturday with the Carols and the hot chocolate laced with candy canes and chili powder. Mmmmmmmm! Missed you, Rachel.

Now it's back to the work world for a few weeks. But in less than a month I'll be visiting my very sweet grandbaby. What can I say about that except I CAN HARDLY WAIT! See you soon, DANO!

Bah! Humbug???

I cannot believe this! The two people I live with actually made the preposterous suggestion that, merely because I will not be home for a week at Christmas time we should not decorate the house for Christmas! What a HORRIBLE thought! Simply one person missing for the week of Christmas is no excuse for NOT DECORATING! That is almost like canceling Christmas completely!!!

Okay, I will agree to not going to the mountains to cut down a real Christmas tree, because after all, neither of our two kids are coming home for Christmas. It would be more enjoyable, but I will get out the old, probably very dusty and considerably flat 20-something year-old fake tree, and decorate it. But, NO CHRISTMAS TREE? NOT DECORATE AT ALL? What kind of Scroogey people are these people? In fact, Grandma even asked if we put up a tree before we had kids - of course we put up a tree before we had kids - we WERE kids before we had kids (hee hee). And as far as I'm concerned, I'm STILL a kid deep down. I guess that's why I'm a bit disturbed by the whole idea of not decorating. If I didn't put my decorations up, it would be like going to someone's home and not visiting with them. I need to "visit with" my Christmas decorations every December. I would miss them if I didn't. So many memories are asleep in those boxes, wrapped in the paper and excelsior, waiting for the week after Thanksgiving when I will awaken them and put them in their accustomed places, while the favorite carols are playing, and the rich aroma of spiced cider is wafting through the house. How could I simply skip all of that? IMPOSSIBLE!

I know they meant well - they probably wanted to spare me all the "hard work", knowing that I would be coming back just a few days before going back to school. But that's okay. I'll make time. I just couldn't bear to skip all the wonder of Christmas decorating. I'd rather cut off all my hair! And we all know how I feel about my hair. Right? Right!