Christmas day times two

Here is a second installment. We enjoyed so much Chrismtas this year that I'll have to split it into two volumes.

Christmas mornig, Santa gifts, stocking with oranges and change that hints at your age (shhh! don't tell!), and always presents enough to go around.

Everyone had a lot of help opening presents, and it was often hard to tell who was more excited, the receiver or the giver (of help, that is).

Not all wrapping jobs required opening help, or even opening at all.

Nap time. Oh joy.

Squid for snack! An odd tradition, but Curits makes a mean dish of tentacles and it's hard to pass up. This year we didn't even wait to up the presentation, we ate it straight from the stove.

Christmas dinner at the Carman's, where the younger set had us playing with bristle blocks (remember those?), cash registers, and doll houses. Christmas is about the kids, after all, even the bigger ones.

AND...we are fortunate enough to have two whole Christmas Days; Jon's family, two years in a row now, have had a second Christmas on the 26th just so that we can spread our fun out, instead of burning out. Day two of Christmas, for both years now, has been relaxing, quiet, and completely enjoyable.

Upon arrival we were treated to a reprise of Calvin and Opa's juice squeezing. Fun and delicious.

Cameras, cameras everywhere.

Calvin made gifts for everyone this year. Wine charms for the men in his life, and Christmas carolers and hand painted book bags for the women. It was a really fun process, and a huge hit come gift opening time.

Joy on Christmas is being cozy and warm with family.

I think the horse on strings was one of the favorite gifts of the day. Jon's mom found him at the Renaissance Festival in Holly and new he just had to join our family. He doesn't have a name yet, but is certain to be well loved.

In Jon's family shuffleboard is a holiday tradition. I love old traditions, especially ones that are so darn entertaining.

Our New Years trip to Harbor Springs will be next up in the series, and I'll try to get to that later today or tomorrow.

Christmas Eve

It seems a very long time since I last entered this site, and in truth it is, though not nearly as long as it feels. The Christmas season is always such a busy one, and for all the right reasons; it feels as though we've lived a lifetime in the past two weeks, and not once did I import pictures from the camera. Thankfully our memory card is good for upwards of 600 shots, but as time passed and pictures amassed, the job just looked more and more daunting until, finally, today I ran out of space on that behemoth and was forced to import so I could erase it.

Going through them, on the other hand, is still a massive job waiting to be tackled and I am doing in stages and uploading in installments. Installment the first, then, is Christmas Eve. I'll be back in a bit with the continuation, after I've sorted through the over 200 pictures that are Christmas alone.

Christmas Eve at Kerrytown. It was chilly, but not down right cold, and unfortunately not even thinking about snowing. Santa hats don't have quite the same affect without snow and cold.

Christmas Eve means waiting in a jovial line at Monahan's to pick up our Christmas Eve oysters and squid. Some people think that's strange. I make no further comment.

Christmas Eve also means lunch at Kosmo Deli with a side of seafood chowder from Monahan's.

Christmas Eve means a romp through the delightful little shops that call Kerrytown home. I think Found is my favorite—a collection of everything yesteryear, and sometimes yesterday.

And I still remember Christmas Eve nights spent with cousins, all of us eager with anticipation of the following days splendor. Half of us now coddle those same expectations in our own youngsters.

Sinterklaasavond!

Saint Nicholas, the guy who is likely the fodder for our modern day, Americanized, secularized Santa Claus, is celebrated on his Saint Day, the day of his death, December 6th. St. Nicholas Day is celebrated in many European countries, but we are trying to emulate the Dutch, who make up a large part of our heritage, and they party down mostly on the eve of the feast day, or Sinterklaasavond. So on the 5th we gather in family numbers and make merry with holiday tunes, fun pakjes (presents), and Dutch food.

At the end of the evening's festivities we set our shoes by the fire, read a bedtime story, and hope that we've been good this year so that Zwarte Pieten won't come and whisk us away in the middle of the night. In the morning Calvin came running into our room asking if it was time to go look in our shoes just yet. Since he was still here, Zwarte Pieten must have deemed him a good boy. That must be why he got an orange, some pennies, and new Christmas pajamas in his shoes. For the rest of the family, Sinterklaas left a new Christmas book and Cooties. Thanks a lot Saint Nick.

There are more pictures in the December 2009 album, of course.

Thanksgiving is out, Christmas is in

Being thankful

Thanksgiving was a whirlwind around here. We started early by lazing around in our pajamas and watching the Thanksgiving Day parades. My mother always enjoyed parades and I harbor some pretty fond memories of exclaiming over floats ranging from beautiful to down right bizarre. For a while when I was a kid we knew one of the clowns in the Detroit parade and would watch for her when they walked by. We knew the Santa Claus, too, which never struck me as odd—Santa happens to sit next to my parents at the football games every fall, what of it?

We had Thanksgiving brunch with Jon's family this year. That's something we've never done before, but a tradition I might wholeheartedly recommend, since it kept our meal consumption down to just two for the day, albeit it two large ones. We arrived with homemade bagels and pumpkin cupcakes and Calvin went right to work with their juicer. You haven't lived until you've had Calvin's cranberry, orange, banana, something else Thanksgiving brunch surprise, let me tell you.

Brunch, lunch, dinner, it doesn't matter—the warmth of time spent with family, of hugs and of laughter, is what really defines Thanksgiving.

The late afternoon took us to my parents' house, where we put our pumpkin pie and cranberry relish to good service alongside a phenomenal smoked turkey (it's a three day process, I hear), and sundry other delectables. Food, to me, is another part of the definition of this holiday, and being able to contribute adds to the experience.

And what would Thanksgiving be without a little after dinner sewing challenge? We were, every single one of us, charmed into it by the three year old zipping around the table where we sat being too stuffed to move.

It's a grand life filled with love, and for that I am thankful.