And a Happy New Year

Did you all have a Merry Christmas? We certainly did!

Full of silliness and family and food and fun and Farkle (have you played it? It's addictive!) and late night and too much traveling.

Presents we didn't want (aren't there always?) and those we did, and more importantly, memories made with family.

My parents and Carl's mom are coming to us for New Year's, and then that will be the end of an exhausting and rewarding holiday season. Whew!

Next year, family? You get to come to us.

Ho ho ho.

Christmas Cookies

I was fretting just a little about not being able to find Grandma's recipe. With her passing this year, it was really important to me to use the recipe I always remembered using with Sister and Grandma and the younger aunts and uncles.

I glumly resigned myself to not having it, and asked on FB if people had favorite recipes from their families they wanted to pass along. Within minutes, one of my dad's cousins had found their family's version of the recipe, almost identical to Grandma's, and shared it. I almost cried, I was so happy.

It didn't take long after that for the fun to really begin.

And of course, the reward at the end of all their hard work.

Spurred on by the cousin's sharing on FB, my youngest aunt, the one who inherited Grandma's recipe box, went through her files, founds the original recipe - OUR original recipe, took a picture, and posted it on my wall. By the end of the day, Sister, two aunts, and two uncles all announced they were getting ready to make the family Christmas cookies.

And that? Makes this plate so much more important to me than just the sugar high. Carrying on the family tradition, keeping those ties that bind firmly in place even in my own little family.

Thank you so much, Dad's cousin Marilyn.

Solstice

About this time every year, we gather to celebrate the winter solstice with family and friends. It's one of my favorite holiday traditions.




On the longest night of the year, we gather under the dark sky to celebrate light.

Sometimes our fate resembles a fruit tree in winter. Who would think that those branches would turn green again and blossom, but we hope it, we know it.
-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

Second Cousins

Getting to know you ...

My first pumpkin

Last night we (I) carved Lulu's first jack-o-lantern.


J.D.: It...kind of looks like it had a stroke. Like...all lopsided.

Me: It was the last pumpkin at Trader Joe's that didn't have warts. Next year, I'll get a good one.

MIL: I like how you carved in laugh lines. I've never seen a pumpkin with wrinkles before.

Me: Those are eyelashes.

J.D.: What's up with his eye? It looks like he is leering at someone. "Hey, baby, I'll jack your lantern any time."

Me: He is not LEERING. He is WINKING. And he's a girl. Hence, the EYELASHES.

J.D.: Or like he's lost a contact lens. "Oh hey you guys do you see it? Where is it? Is it, like, on me?"

Me: I don't like how you started using a Valley Girl voice when you found out it was a lady pumpkin. That is insulting. You have a DAUGHTER. You should be above stereotypes.

J.D.: "Seriously, you guys, I, like, can't see! Omigod! Help!"

FIL, passing by: Hey, nice pumpkin! I like how he's shooting death rays from his eyes.

Me: THEY ARE EYELASHES.

With the lights off and a candle inside, it was still pretty. And that's the point, right?



Right. So suck on that, HATERS.