So December is always a weird time of year for me especially since I moved to Florida. It never feels like holiday season because it is so warm here. Case and point it is 80 degrees today. For the past 5 Christmases, the girls have not been with me. The reason of course is that I have to work and they are out of school for at least 2 weeks. This year, I THINK, they are going to be with me. That means I actually have to get the house into the Christmas spirit.
To be honest, I have not put up a tree in a long time. There is no reason to have one when the girls are gone plus it makes me sadder if the tree is up and they are not here. I was thinking a lot last night instead of sleeping about how things have really changed since I was the girls' age. Growing up Thanksgiving and Christmas were about family. While we spent most holidays with relatives on my Mom's side, we did see my Dad's family some as well. We had huge Thanksgiving dinners with left overs for days. Christmas was all about dressing up, bringing out the good china and spending time with family.
Now that I am older and a mom, I wonder what happened to those traditions. My sister, brothers and parents don't get together very often. We certainly don't spend holidays together. The last time the majority of my family was together for a holiday was Thanksgiving of 2003. So besides the fact that I have to work over the holidays, I feel guilty when the girls are with me because it is just us, the Three Musketeers, on Christmas day. I want them to have the same family centered holidays that I had. But the reality is that is not an option. For some reason, my family does not really care to spend holidays together anymore. Plus we are spread literally across the country. Most of the time one or the other of us is fighting with another one or the other of us. So I let the girls go to their dad's each year. I know that this way they will have the huge family get togethers like I had as a kid and a young adult.
I know that family size does not make tradition and that we have our own traditions. Sometimes I just feel like the girls are missing out on one of the better things in life by it being the three of us all the time.
I think this year, Frick, Frack and I need to make traditions of our own.
XOXOX,
Elizabeth
1 comment:
I love the idea of your making some traditions of your own. It was always just the 3 of us, except for rare Christmases, when I was growing up. I'm Polish though so Christmas Eve is a huge tradition that we always did. Bill and I did Christmas cookies every year until the girls were born too. This year they're finally big enough so we're going to set aside a Saturday (hopefully) to cook Christmas cookies like mad!
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