On the Homefront: Celebrating Christmas 2013

We did not celebrate Christmas last year, but here is a photo of
Christmas 2011 (I am always a year behind posting my
Christmas tree photos)

This has been an especially hectic holiday season.  Thanksgiving was so late in the year that there was less time for Christmas preparations (not to mention that fact that Hanukkah fell on the same day as Thanksgiving which meant double the effort for both of those holidays).  Right now I am also missing my sweet Dalmatian mix Diamond, who we lost to renal disease last December.  Her loss was so devastating to me that we did not even celebrate Christmas last year, and I had a hard time getting in the mood for the holidays this year.  I wasn't even sure I was going to get our tree up (not one of my favorite chores anyway), but I finally did get that done over the weekend, and now here we are all ready for Christmas.  The weather has been atrociously rainy and even warm, but for Christmas we should have a cold, clear day -- much more appropriate for the season.

I will do some last minute shopping today, then some cleaning, gift wrapping, and even a little baking tomorrow.  We will have our traditional Christmas Eve dinner of Blue Corn Tamales, and the Christmas lights will stay on all night.  I always get up very early, even on Christmas day, so I will walk the dogs, get my chores started, and find the local channel on TV that displays the burning Yule log until 9:00 AM (I am addicted to watching that log burn every Christmas!).  Then we will set the television to the station that shows the movie "A Christmas Story" (1983) all day long and spend a leisurely day opening gifts, eating a special Christmas breakfast (one of my husband's gifts this year) and then a seafood Christmas dinner.  I always make sure our dinner is almost effortless (the preparation is either done earlier in the week or by someone else) so that we can both spend the day being as lazy as possible, which for us is the best Christmas gift of all.

I hope everyone is on track for a joyous and stress-free-as-possible Christmas this year!