I have been meaning to write a few posts, but the holidays were busy and I've been trying to play catch up since. I know, not the best excuse, but with everything that has been happening around here I also haven't really been in the mood to write blog posts.
Actually, I just wasn't in the mood for Christmas this year either.
I did start my shopping as early as I could and a couple of weeks before Christmas I put the wreaths up, but that was pretty much it. Even hubby wasn't in the mood and didn't feel like putting up the lights outside, and I honestly didn't really mind. When it came to putting up the tree, I just couldn't find the motivation to do it, though we have an artificial tree which I could have kept up for most of December, I just couldn't do it. Part of the reason for the delay is the similar to what it was last year, I have two young children the youngest of who was mobile this Christmas and I knew the tree would be a big temptation to grab at, I also have a large dog that doesn't seem to know her size and sometimes tries to fit into spaces or behind things she shouldn't. The other reason was just not really being in the Christmas spirit, which is rare because I normally do love Christmas, but it's hard to be in the spirit when financially, things are tight. I also knew this holiday season would be a busy one for us as I decided to visit with family I haven't celebrated with in a few years. That means I had 4, yes 4 Christmas dinners. The first 3 spanned the weekend of Christmas, starting on Christmas eve evening right until boxing day, and the final dinner, the night before New Years eve. While I love my family and love seeing them, it meant long days. The dinners that spanned Christmas weekend were all located an hour away and the final dinner was an hour and a half away. That means traveling with 2 small children and late nights...by myself! Oh, did I mention that hubby also had to work over the holidays and the only dinner he was able to make was he one that was with his side of the family? Ya, kind of ruins the holidays a bit when you can spend part of the day with your partner, but they have to miss the celebrations. That's also part of the reason it was such long days for us, we returned home every evening so we could spend the first part of the day with hubby before he had to go into work and we had to leave for the next celebration.
While I really wasn't in the mood, there were bright points. I finally put up the tree on the 22nd and the kids were so excited when they saw it, it was so cute to watch, though we had a couple of days of them trying to take off decorations. And while hubby wasn't with us, we saw family and the kids had a blast playing with their cousins and they were completely spoiled, not to mention, all the yummy food! We also enjoyed watching their faces as the four of us opened our presents together on Christmas morning and on Christmas eve, my younger brother proposed to his girlfriend, so that was nice to hear.
I guess what I'm getting at is, even though we weren't really in a festive mood this year, we were still able to find joy in the holidays, though, I will admit, I'm kind of glad that it's over with.
