the day after...





December 26 is upon us. The day where we look back on the month behind us and exhale a big gust of relief that we made it through another year. I love, love, LOVE Christmas, but let's be honest - it's alot to take in. To me it feels like a non stop force that keeps pulling me further along at a faster pace - that starts the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, and ended yesterday evening.

The reality of the fast paced style of the holiday season hit when I turned 18. Everyone in our family was growing up - and many of them having their own little families. When this happened, it was time to adjust. Change is something I sometimes struggle with, but have gotten better with over the years. Now we have like four different family Christmas gatherings that all happen in a month's time. Let me break down my Christmas for you...

Thanksgiving:
On the day of Thanksgiving I traveled with my parents to my grandparents' house in Carmi for lunch. We then ventured to Richelle's house in Marion for supper.

Thanksmas:
The following weekend after Thanksgiving is Thanksmas. This is a holiday we celebrate with our Michigan family to cover both Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Christmases:
We then have a Christmas dinner celebration with our Cinncinati and Northern Illinois family on the first or second weekend in December.

Then during the week before Christmas we have a dinner with The Williams crew.

On Christmas Eve we went to Richelle's family dinner.

And finally my yearly Christmas Eve night and Christmas morning routine with my parents, Nick, and now Richelle.




That is quite a bit of celebrating to do all in one month! Honestly though, I love it. Even though it is alot of work, and you feel like you are so off your normal routine you would lose your head if it wasn't screwed on - it is wonderful. I love spending time with family. AND I am truly blessed to have so much family that wants to spend time with me.

Christmas this year was a bit different. If you are an avid reader of my blog, you have read that my grandparents passed away this year. Therefore, the holiday season changed for my family. The Williams family always spent Christmas Eve dinner together at grandma and grandpa's house. Well....we didn't this year. Hard thing to deal with. It is hard enough to do something different, but this kind of different leaves that lump in your throat that you just can't swallow. You know what lump I am talking about? That one that creeps up when you are becoming emotional enough about something and you are about to cry, but then the pain of that lump distracts you just a bit. You try to swallow and it won't go away. The tears well up in the corners of your eyes, you *gulp* swallow, and choke back to hid the emotion and the lump. I have had to deal with "that lump" quite a bit the last few weeks. But, in the end my parents and I decided to make Christmas Eve as much like it used to be as we could. So...of course...we went to the kitchen. Christmas Eve morning we were all three working away in the kitchen preparing our traditional Christmas Eve dinner - just as grandma had taught us! Dad fried the chicken, and I made the chicken and dumplins. I have made many batches of chicken and dumplins with grandma, and on my own. This was the first batch I have made since her passing. I can't even describe to you the experience of making these dumplins on this day. There was such an ease about me this time. Everything I did just seemed to happen with a flow. There was no fuss, mess, or worry of something not going right. The rhythm of my rolling pin was the mood of the whole cooking experience....ease. I even felt different. Like I was somehow better at this task. And when I tasted them....oh BOY! They were the BEST dumplins I have EVER made! They tasted JUST like hers! I'm telling you this, grandma was with me in that kitchen. I could just feel it. I am sure of this. Even though I didn't get to see her that day, I felt her with me. And being the first year without her, it was exactly what I needed. What a blessing! Thank you Jesus for that! I later made her other Christmas specialty - Santa's Whiskers for Nick and Dad.



All in all it was a great holiday season. There was ALOT of change. And to be honest, I wasn't sure how I would handle ALL the change in one Christmas. It was wonderful. Christmas Eve was really nice, and Christmas morning was splendid. I stayed the night in my old bedroom at my parents' house, and woke up with my parents Christmas morning. Nick and Richelle showed up early for breakfast. We sat together at the table and just enjoyed each other as we always do. One thing I love about our family, is how much we laugh together. It is something we do almost non-stop when we are together. I love that about us. We all opened presents together, and had a nice lunch. Watched some Christmas movies, and most importantly told each other that we loved them. It was a very blessed Christmas. I will take all the changes that come my way as long as I have this family, our laughter, and love! I can't ask for anything more!!!

Comments

  1. LindaDecember 27, 2010 at 1:00 PM

    I always enjoy reading what you write because it's so sweetly and purely honest. It's a blessing to read. :)

    I start buying Birthday and Christmas gifts at the end of August, so September through December finds my focus on family birthdays and the Christmas season. That's a good chunk of the year and I agree that it can be overwhelming and while I'm sort of glad when it's all done, I'm also left feeling blue.

    We are still celebrating Christmas - tonight with our daughter from Canada and then we'll have New Year celebrations as well and then finally - it's all done. I leave up all of the decorations until right before we return to work/school - January 5th this year.

    Hope you have a beautiful start to 2011 and that it proves to be a good year.
    Blessings,
    Linda

    ReplyDelete

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