Oh Happiness! Holidays Coming!

I love Thanksgiving. I love Christmas. In fact, I pretty much love the entire stretch between the 29th of October and the 2nd of January.

I used to be a purist. Before Halloween (but not before Labor Day) you are supposed to have ghosts, graveyards in front yards, and the turmoil of figuring out what you are going to dress up as. Me, I don't do ugly. On purpose at least. I think Halloween is about celebrating a part of you that you don't usually let the rest of the world see. Or just have a little fun. So I've been a belly-dancer, a mime (big mistake, I did that for a party once), a medieval princess, a pirate, an earthquake survivor (my one foray into the ugly)and a cat to name a few. When I became a mom I expanded to family themes which included a pumpkin patch and a Host of Angels.

After Halloween you are allowed to start decorating for Thanksgiving. Everything becomes golds and oranges and browns with Indian corn and pictures of turkeys. I don't actually like turkey but I love ham so every year I make it for Thanksgiving dinner with the extended family. Nitrate free so it tastes good. It is now known as the "ham that Dad F" likes. One year we hit on the fact that I make a "sloppy spinach" - canned spinach with an ungodly amount of butter in it - that the kids like too. So every year I wait for my cooking orders and then I figure out the logistics. And every year I pretty much know I'm buying a ham and canned spinach and then working what little cooking magic I have in my fingers.

This year my brother and sister-in-law are hosting. They happen to own my parents old house, a big rambling brick split level that the father of an ex-boyfriend of mine used to refer to as a "the mansion." So it will fit us all very nicely and my sister-in-law, whom I often refer to as a sister of my heart, is a magnificent hostess. Oh, and I bet there will be WINE!!!

But the day after Thanksgiving, THAT is the day I wait for starting sometime in March or April. THAT is the day the decorations come out and get put up. THAT is the day I begin my Christmas shopping, often with my one sister online at the same time and our fingers sing-songing back and forth between the websites we are surfing and the chat session we have open between us.

I will stop at absolutely nothing to make my home look and smell like Christmas. I will have Christmas cards bought and ready to be addressed - even though I'm likely never to finish getting them sent.

I know that one of the gifts my family (extended) has given me is that we never celebrate Christmas all together on the 25th of December. Instead we pick a different day and we end up have TWO Christmases. My step-children, when they discovered this, thought they'd died and gone to heaven. So already they are asking "When is the F Christmas this year?" and I will have an answer for them on Thanksgiving day. I will also know which sibling I will be buying for this year because, oh glory how lucky am I, the family is just too BIG to buy for everyone.

Do you know how wonderful it is to be part of a family that is so big? It is amazing!!! It is a gift!!! Because not only are we a big family, we are only a little bit dysfunctional all things considered. But no one is in jail and no one is dead and that means everything else is just peanut butter.

So I am itching to start my Christmas shopping now. But I will wait. Oh, and here is where I need to give a shoutout to my sisters:

ISO and LilSis: I need Christmas shopping ideas for my niece and nephews. You know where to find me. Oh, and LilSis...I need a shipping address. :)

And finally, we got our very first snowflakes today. YAY!!!!

I'm dreaming of a White Christmas.

NL