Christmas Weekend

It has been a rather restful weekend for me. Sometimes you need that. After riding some emotional lows from earlier in the week, I needed some time in which to just loosen up and ride the waves of enjoying one a year pursuits. Allow me to share with you the highlights of the past few days.

Christmas Eve wasn’t all that hectic, believe it or not, considering all of the food we had. Since things like the cheesecake and the jello salad were made the day in advance, there were less things that had to be made. Mom and I issued the orders that Dad and Garrett had to get “dressed up” for dinner; we were going to use the nice china and have candles, so appropriate attire seemed to fit the bill. I can’t get Garrett in a tie, and actually, I prefer guys in button down shirts with the top button unbuttoned anyway! Dad’s friend came over (the dress code applied to him as well =) and we stuffed out faces. Afterwards, we sat around and talked as I played some Christmas carols. When he left, my family settled down for two movies: Charlie Brown Christmas and The Nativity Story. Both of these are familiar stories and familiar movies, but we watch them every year.

Christmas Day dawned…but I didn’t get up at the crack of dawn. Maybe that is done when you have little kids and they bounce out of bed as quick as a flask. Me…I slept in until around 9:30 (and was it wonderful!) My family did our traditional “gifts to Jesus” which we do before we open ours. Now for us, every person knew at least what one person was giving them for one reason or another, so that made things “anti-climatic” if you well. Leave it to Garrett to make me follow clues to find mine (and one those clues required me to go outside!) When all was said and done, Mom and I began making brunch (egg, ham, and hash brown casserole, orange bread, and hot fruit compote) and we at around 1:00. Being lazy was great; I stayed in my pajamas all day and in the evening hours, we watched “It’s a Wonderful Life”. Don’t you just love that movie?

The day after Christmas usually finds me doing nothing. However, every other year, Dad and I have a tradition. We go to the “expensive” movie theatre—provided something decent is playing. 2005 was “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. 2007 was “National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets. This year, we decided to go see “The Blind Side.” I could go on and on about it, but this blog post would get so very long. Maybe it is its own post for another time. I will say a few things right now: it was an inspiring and heartwarming film, Sandra Bullock’s acting as amazing, Tim McGraw didn’t sing (which kind of stunk). It was comedic at parts and very dramatic at parts. However, language and a few minor things made it less than clean…but each family has its own opinion on what they can and cannot except. For me and mine, we can handle a little language more than we can handle nudity and sexual elements. Overall, I was very pleased with the film (and Dad and I saw an advertisement for another one we’d like the see in the next month or two.)

Those are the big highlights from this long weekend. I would love to hear about how Christmas was for your family!