Christmas

We celebrated Christmas today, which was probably a very smart thing to do. Today is my forty-fifth birthday and the first one without my mother. Fortunately I refrained from dwelling on it.

We woke up this morning, and because we'll be in Florida on Christmas Day, we celebrated Christmas. Complete with all the usual traditions, yuletide coffee cake, potato pancakes and too many presents for the boys. Beckett was more into opening presents this year, so it was more fun too. Every single thing he opened was exactly what he wanted. Every little thing in his stocking produced shrieks of joy and happiness.

Frank has shown no signs of missing my mom, which is beginning to worry me. I don't know if he is hiding it from me or avoiding it for himself. This was my first anticipation of his acknowledging that she isn't with us, but he doesn't seem to be.

My birthday is typically a miserable day. Too many bad memories from childhood I guess. Days when my mother worked and sent me to the local grocery store to pick up my own birthday cake, and I was Frank's age (he's eight). This year was different. Because it was "Christmas," the paradigm shifted. I was going to open the store (we're not usually open on Sundays), but decided against it. The boys took me to sushi for lunch and then Thad, Leecy and the kids came over for cake (which Doug and the boys went and got for me, I didn't have to do it myself!).

We leave in the morning to spend Christmas with Doug's parents, something we haven't done since Frank was six months old because of my mother. I'm really looking forward to another paradigm shift.

Thanksgiving

In an effort to do everything, or as much as possible, differently this year, we spent Thanksgiving in New Mexico. First stop was Santa Fe, which I grow more and more disappointed with each visit. The galleries are interesting, but seem somewhat trite, and completely full of themselves in spite of it. It was good to go, to know.

Next stop was Taos. Much better. Limited galleries in comparison, but such an enjoyable overall atmosphere. I was struck, markedly, by how impoverished New Mexico is. More than I remember. It would depress me far too much to ever consider living there.

Thanksgiving Day was fantastic. We opted for an early dinner out, which was good. The day before we had gone to the market and picked up lots of goodies. Did I mention we stayed at a bed and breakfast and had a 1,000 square foot suite? We went back to the B&B after dinner and hung out in our pjs, watching movies and snacking on our goodies throughout the afternoon and evening. The part of the B&B we were in seemed empty except for us, so I didn't feel as though the boys were disturbing anyone with their running about the room, and I was able to relax.

We awoke Friday morning to a winter wonderland. It had snowed Thanksgiving night and we were prepared to ski! We immediately jumped on the web and booked a room in Red River for the night. As luck would have it, everyone else had canceled reservations thinking it wasn't going to snow. Doug and I skied together for the first time since we've been together, Frank and Beck each took lessons and it couldn't have been a better way to celebrate the holiday. We skied two days and then made our way home Saturday afternoon.

Of course I had to make Thanksgiving dinner on Sunday, enough for at least sixteen people even though there are only four of us. Well we'll invite Tia and Chris over for leftovers since they didn't enjoy much of a Thanksgiving this year.

Thankfully (again), the store has been busy since the day after Thanksgiving. August started to slow down, September, October and the beginning of November have been dismal. Is it us? Monument? The national economy? God knows, but I'm praying for a decent December or we won't be in business by this time next year.