Christmas Festivities

What a weekend! As someone who leads a very quiet life and rarely has more than one outing on her weekend schedule, I found myself living someone else’s life and I am exhausted. Having children that are grown certainly changes the landscape of the holiday season. I find myself having to plan and cram things into short windows of time when the family can all be together.

Friday was my last day of work for the next two weeks, hallelujah! Honestly, I don’t mind my job but I really enjoy the laid back schedule of having time off.

Friday, December 16

I started the day in the usual way, up early (by 4:30am) and to the gym. My friend and I walk the treadmill for about 45 minutes before we go to boot camp. On this day, however, we went to the 6:30 boot camp class rather than 5:30. It kind of threw my day off and I felt like I was late for everything.

Around 11:30 I stepped away from my work laptop and met a friend for lunch at a local salad place Designer Greens. After visiting with her for an hour, I made an Amazon return at Kohl’s and then ran into Loft to pick up an online order. When I returned home, I worked a bit and then started prepping a dessert for an event on Saturday.

Our older son was flying home that night and his girlfriend was coming over to our house. She is finishing her PhD in Chemistry at UF so she lives in Gainesville. She was planning to come to our house and then pick him up at the airport when his flight arrived. Did I mention his flight was scheduled to land around 1am? Because we wanted to be home when she arrived, we opted to host our friends for dinner. I made an incredible slider recipe found on Tik Tok, salad, chips, and this for dessert. It was delicious!

Where things went wrong…

A few setbacks occurred along the way. The first was Emma’s (the gf) car breaking down in Gainesville. It was leaking coolant and she was bummed. Further complicating matters was that this happened after the repair shop was closed. Then, on the way out to his uber, our son jumped down a few stairs and landed badly. Very badly. Finally, while melting the butter for the sauce to go on my sliders, I spilled melted butter down the front of my dress. All I can say is that I am grateful I was wearing a sweater dress and it was thick enough so I did not get burned (because it’s happened before).

Saturday, December 17

Our younger son picked up the older one at the airport which was so helpful! I was up and out early to get my walk in because I knew we had a very busy day ahead. I am so happy I got up and out to get my 5 miles in. Once I returned home I learned that my son’s foot was very swollen and he was in a great deal of pain. I remembered hearing about an Orthopedic Walk In clinic so I took him there.

After a few hours and x-rays we left with a boot on the right foot, strong ibuprofen, and a scheduled follow up appointment. I picked up Crumbl cookies on the way home and then rushed around to get ready for the day.

Trans-Siberian Orchestra

My husband asks me to go every year to this concert and I always say no. This was the year I caved and we had tickets. The show started at 3 and we had dinner plans at 6:30. Tight schedules send my anxiety through the roof.

The concert was fine. It’s not necessarily my thing but everyone was in awe and loved it! So if you are a fan of TSO and you get the chances to go, GO! The performance was magnificent but now that I’ve been once, I don’t need to go again. As soon as the concert ended, we hightailed it to our car to get on to the next destination.

Family Christmas Tradition

One of my family’s traditions each Christmas involved our ‘framily’ – the neighbors my parents have had for so many years, they’re closer to us than our blood relatives. Each year, we get together at the most festive home and have dinner. This particular neighbor shops for each of the children in the family and gifts them Christmas ornaments. He’s been doing this for years! When the kids were little we’d have a big brunch but as they’ve gotten older it has become dinner.

The best news was that Emma’s car repair turned out to be a quick fix and she was able to make the drive from Gainesville to Orlando. We were so thrilled to have her attend this fun, family tradition with us!

Sunday, December 18

Exhausted. That’s how I felt when I woke up but after some coffee I had slightly more energy. I did manage to get my walk in but we skipped church. I honestly hate to do that, especially at Christmas since our church does such a nice job with the music and lights and it really brightens my spirits.

Lots of busy-ness took place along with some relaxing. We grilled steaks for dinner and then drove through our neighborhood to take part in the lights contest. Our neighborhood hosted a contest and 6 homes entered. We had to either drive by or walk by and vote for our top choice.

Afterwards, Nolan and Emma built a sugar cookie Target store and we watched some TV. We have some things on the social calendar for this week. It’s hard to believe Christmas is less than a week away .Are you ready?

Christmas Festivities