Ho-Hum-Ho-Ho

Ali as close to Santa as she would get last year

I haven't felt much like writing lately.  Maybe it's the dark and the damp weather.  Maybe it's because Thanksgiving is just around the corner and it means Christmas is closer than I'd like to think.  Maybe it's just the other side of the political campaign and I'm tired.  Maybe it's because the physical therapy appointments for my Mom go on and on.  Maybe it's merely a down time--can't be up, up, up every single day, can I?

Thanksgiving is only 9 days away.  Our turkey-day dinner is the regular fare--with only my Mom and brother and my husband and me.  I invited my 88 year-old Aunt Billie to come but her son is driving all the way from Oregon to pick her up and take her down to be with her family.  Neither one of my brothers ever contributed any wives or children to the world so our family has gotten very small.  We'll eat turkey, stuffing, salad, homemade cranberry sauce, garlic mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes cooked in some fashion, Costco pumpkin pie (I can't make a pumpkin pie as well as they do) and a new pie I'll bake this year, Apple/Cranberry with a crumb topping.  The dinner will take all day to make and will be eaten in 15 minutes or less. Then we'll watch a movie (maybe Nemo) or play Quiddler.  I can't decide whether I like it quiet like this or whether I'd like a bunch of sisters-in-law and nieces and nephews around.  I don't get to decide.  This is what we have, so there you go.

Four days after Thanksgiving I'm on a plane to Wisconsin for the annual visit with my son's family. Every year we get in the car and journey to the Mall of America, across the river to Minneapolis, to have pictures taken with The Real Santa Claus.  This year there will be two little girls sitting with Santa.  Alison hasn't sat on Santa's lap yet, preferring to have him hide behind her, or lay on the floor in front of her.  We are interested to see what happens this year, with her little sister, who will be a year old on December 4.  Will Ali finally, at age 3 1/2, let Santa near her?  Will she be brave for her little sister?  What will Little Sister think of a rosy-cheeked, white-bearded, suspender-wearing stranger?  Zuzu loves all her grandpas and her boy cousin, Jessie, so she may think Santa is okay.  We'll see.  Regardless, we will have the pictures taken and laugh over them later.  

When I come home from Granddaughter and Santa adventures I will have much to look forward to.  My daughter, Erin, and her husband are coming from Norfolk on December 21 for the first time since they moved back East many years ago when husband, Kent, was still in the Navy.  And my second daughter will be coming from San Diego with Granddaughter Alecia and Grandson Alex on Christmas Day, to stay in the area for almost two weeks.  This will be a test of how much I like lots of people around at the holidays.  It will be so unusual that I will hardly know how to act.  I expect lots of baking and coffee drinking and talking and looking at old photo albums. These two sisters haven't seen each other in a very long time, so I hope their time together is happy.  They will have an opportunity to get to know each other again.  An opportunity like this may not come around for a long time.  Since I lived in the same vicinity as my brothers all their lives, it is hard for me to imagine losing touch with my siblings, though even living in the same county it was possible to let things slide.  Relationships between siblings is complex.  Jealousies, hurtful words, slights (imagined or otherwise), misunderstandings, disagreements, different views of life--all can keep you from enjoying one another.  And aren't we all supposed to love our brothers and sisters?  Doesn't it say that in some book somewhere?  As has been said over and over--you can't pick your family.

So that's what's coming up.  In the meantime, I'll cook, bake, decorate and take pictures and look forward to quiet and noisy holidays and then the New Year coming.  It'll be here fast.  I hope this rather dark mood lifts soon.  I think it will the minute I smell the turkey roasting.