I can't believe it's Christmas already. I've commented to several people that there is no festivity in our house. I've been thinking that it's due to not putting up our big tree (trying to protect it from Lucy), but now I'm thinking that maybe that's not the total story.
With not putting the big tree up this year, we also didn't pull up our Christmas decoration bins, and we haven't hung our stockings. You know, the stockings for ALL of our kids. And then I think that Lucy doesn't have a stocking yet, and it makes me sad. At Christmas time last year, we found someone on Etsy that could do embroidery with our choice of thread color, and I was stoked, but we didn't know Lucy's color yet, so we didn't get any stockings done. By the time we did know Lucy's color, it was spring time and the woman didn't have any stockings available in her store. I checked her store in October, and she's not on Etsy anymore. Plus, with all the money we've had to put into our house since we've moved in, that we weren't planning on, we really shouldn't be spending the money on getting eight custom Christmas stockings made.
I'm also sad that last year we didn't do Toys 4 Tots, and we didn't this year, and both years didn't feel "right" when we did our donations for Oscar, Bella, Tittle and Firefly. Last year we were assigned a family, so it didn't fit exactly with the ages and number of kids that we wanted to do. This year, we did the Salvation Army's Angel Tree, and while we were able to choose the age/sex of the children we wanted, it just didn't feel right, either, especially when dropping the items off, they didn't keep the tags with the gifts. What we bought and donated with one of our children in mind wasn't going to stay together and would likely not go to the same child. A couple of days later I saw a Toys 4 Tots bin at the local grocery store that I don't normally shop at. Apparently, they have always been a donation site, I just didn't see the collection bin last year, when I did shop there regularly, or this year because I don't go in very often. I'm looking forward to next year when we can return to our original donation idea of buying one toy for each child and donating to Toys 4 Tots.
I think I'm just dissatisfied with what Christmas has been, as it relates to our dead children, the last two years, and that's making me not feel in the Christmas spirit. We're also trying to figure out each year, what our own family traditions are going to be. Last year was the first year we didn't do family rounds in Wisconsin, so we don't have any set traditions yet. We're working on it, and each year will be better as we think more and more of what we want our family's traditions to be, but man, it would be nice to have them set already so that I had something to look forward to.
This is not to say that I don't have something to look forward to. I'm looking forward to Gus opening his presents, and I hope he likes what he's receiving. I'm looking forward to watching Lucy opening her presents. I know she won't care what's inside, but I think she'll have a blast ripping the wrapping paper off the boxes. But that's it. It just feels like, again, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are just going to be like another weekend day. Gus will want to watch TV and play on his computer. Lucy will be her busy self. Jon and I will want to relax, but it will just be us and nothing any more special than any other weekend. I know this will eventually change, as we create our own traditions, but I'd be lying if I didn't admit that I miss seeing extended family for Christmas, as that's what our tradition used to be.
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