Christmas Is Almost Over

I have one more Christmas dinner to go to tomorrow, and then Medieval Times on Tuesday and a show at the Hippodrome on Wednesday, and then my Christmas will officially be over. I'm always a little sad on Christmas evening because everyone has opened all their gifts, family departs, and the roads are empty.

This year was a different kind of Christmas for me and my family. My sisters were both busy with their new lives, and they weren't able to make it. My brother, Mom-Mom, Mommie, Daddy, Ed and I were the only ones at dinner. We didn't have a special guest. Every year we usuallly have at least one person who doesn't have someplace to go, and we invite them over to eat and hang out with us, but I guess everyone had places to go. I invited my friend Andrea, but she said she wanted to just stay home and watch movies. My younger sister was on call in NY, so she wasn't able to come down. My older sister went to England/Paris with her boyfriend so she wasn't there either. At first it was a little strange. The house was quiet (except for Jemma and her two Husky cousins. hee hee), and there was just an odd feeling in the air. I started to open my gifts because my brother had already opened his. I didn't have anyone to laugh with about my silly gifts like I usually did, so I just opened them and thanked those that gave them to me.

Then Mom-mom opened her gifts, and then Daddy opened his. My mom waits until after dinner and the table is cleared before she opens hers. She got tons of gifts from her 6th graders, and most of them used one of the vocabulary words that they learned in their cards. What smart kids. I thought that was pretty cool.

After dinner, my mom runs upstairs and gets our dinner presents. This is usually one present that we really wanted, jewelry, or something that she found during the year that she thought was neat. An example would be ceramic masks handmade for each of us, an ornament, I got the Liz Claiborne wallet to match my purse one year, and last year I got a stuffed koala with a locket and a Bible verse written on the toe of the bear. The koala was made out of an old Alpaca coat that my mom couldn't fit into anymore. My dad wasn't so happy that my mom cut the coat up to have gifts made for us, but what's the use of it sitting in the closet for the next 20 years? hee hee. He's a pretend grouch. This year, I got a beautiful, cranberry colored glass vase. It was handblown in Niagara Falls (the Canadian side), and it was engraved with the man's name who made it and said 2004. Pretty nice. I just have to find some flowers to fill it.

So, even though this was the first Christmas where my family wasn't all there, we lived, and all that were there actually had a fun time. Everyone commented how it turned out better than they thought. I still actually missed my sisters, but we're all getting older now. Hopefully next year, they can make it. It will be much more fun for everyone, I'm thinking. Goodnight!!