And so this is Christmas...

This year has been topsy turvy for all of us.  Christmas time just makes it blaringly obvious all over again.  Honestly though, things are a little more "normal" around here than for some people now that the government has loosened restrictions a little bit and the bar can be open until 10:30pm.  Of course, at Chistmas that's ridiculously early...but we are happy and relieved that we have a few more hours to do business.  In an attempt to save some money, I am on-call for Angelines to help out (except for Christmas Eve and probably New Year's Eve either).  

Yesterday I spent cooking from about 3pm on.  It was a little like a mini Thanksgiving.  Every year for Christmas Eve my mother-in-law comes over and the three of us (Emily usually passes out before mama gets home from the bar) have a nice quiet dinner together.  In that respect, this year was completely normal.  We didn't make my mother-in-law eat in the garage, we weren't wearing masks.  We see her often enough that it would be silly, honestly.  Yes, Angelines is working now, but that doesn't actually put her in close contact with people and she wears a mask (as does everyone else) so we felt it was okay.  Most importantly, my mother-in-law felt comfortable with it and I think we were all happy to be able to carry on with our Christmas Eve tradition--Emily most of all.

She had her abuelita all to herself all evening and was thrilled.  I think abuelita thought she was being unhelpful, but of course, just keeping Emily occupied and allowing me to carry on in the kitchen was the most helpful thing she could have done!  They played games, danced, abuela gave her a shower (Emily refused otherwise!).  It was a fun-filled evening and Emily reluctantly went to sleep at about 10pm.  She really wanted to catch Santa, but... ;)

For dinner I made my first ever stuffed pork loin.  It came out quite well, if I do say so myself.  When I asked Emily if it was good (she ate before we did), she said, "No, mommy.  It's DELICIOUS!"  So that was pretty high praise, I thought, even though Em really isn't a very picky eater.  It was very tasty, although because I couldn't forsee Angelines's arrival time, and when she got here we were just hungry, our meal was luke warm at best.  Still, it was yummy and so we enjoyed our leisurely meal and chatted until close to midnight.

When abuelita had gone home, Santa had to get busy.  If you remember last year there was a slip up and Emily discovered her present ahead of time because I thought I was so clever assembling before Christmas Eve.  Not this year.  We weren't going to risk it again, so last night we busted out the screwdrivers and wrapping paper and got down to it.  I was terrified Emily was going to wake up and catch us!

This year Santa brought a beautiful puppet theatre with hand puppets.  She also got a few books and a new watch.  Santa left a few things at her tita's house, too and so Emily got a huge box of 80 markers and a new scooter to top off the morning.  She was pretty excited.  We got to open our stocking with my parents on a video call at about 11pm PST and later this evening we got to be a part of their Christmas morning, too.  I guess having video call gift-opening is something we've been a little ahead of the curve on. ;)

This year, however, was the first year that Emily was really interested in watching my family in the States open their presents.  At first, Emily started to moan about wanting more presents, but once we got on the video call, she was rapt watching how they all took turns opening and admiring each other's gifts.  Finally, as the evening wore on she whispered to me, "Mommy, will you wrap my presents back up so I can open them again?"  How could I resist??  Fortunately, I did have enough wrapping paper (not my mother's daughter in that department!).  So I re-wrapped a few of her presents and she got to have a turn for about three rounds of gift opening.  It was adorable how much she wanted to be a part of it all and I thought it was quite an ingenious solution to ask me to re-wrap the gifts, most kids would probably throw a fit or just get sad and mopy about not having more presents.  She is a Christmas kid, through and through.

It's been a wonderful day.  I feel so grateful for living where I do; for a job that gives me the same holidays as my daughter; a wife who works so hard in the time she's given and for my most amazing little girl with whom to share this magical holiday.  I am so happy, too, that Angelines wasn't too worn out to participate in the fun of preparing for and partaking of Christmas morning.  This year is all about taking stock of what's truly important.  We aren't making the money we usually do this time of year, but I am certain that I am one of the wealthiest women on the planet.

Merry, merry Christmas to you all.

(...and to all a good night!)

The face paint was also a Christmas gift. ;)

Happy, happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!  I'm only a little late...We celebrated, as always, the Saturday after Thanksgiving since Thursday obviously is not a holiday in Spain.  So this post is just under a week late. ;)  Not bad.

This year is a strange year (understatment of the century!), but I'm sure now that Thanksgiving has passed you'll all agree with me that it is so anti-natural to have to think about distancing and masking and quarantining or just flat out NOT celebrating with the people you love.  

About a month ago I warned Angelines that whatever the situation of the pandemic, we would be eating turkey and celebrating Thanksgiving...even if it was just the three of us.  In my mind, I had decided to make up little Thanksgiving day baskets of food to leave at my friends' doors and we could maybe zoom for a bit to toast.  The week before Thanksgiving I was talking with a friend about it and she reminded me that the current restrictions allow for gatherings of up to six people, so why not invite a few friends.  One good friend who always attends Thanksgiving lost his father just two weeks before and I wasn't sure he would feel up to getting together to celebrate.  Another good friend lives with her elderly and diabetic mother and I thought maybe she would be concerned about coming over to the house.  But in the end, I thought I might as well ask, worst case scenario, they would say no and I'd take them a basket of turkey and pumpkin pie anyway.

I decided to call my friend who lost his father first.  When I asked if he thought he and his partner would be up to coming to celebrate his answer made me cry: it's not about what I feel up to, it's actually something I need.  Now, more than ever, I need to be with the people I love and the people who love me.  Of course we'll be there.  I was in tears on the phone.  My friend who lives with her mother also accepted the invitation immediately.  And really, except for Emily, who is in school, and I guess myself, teaching in Estepa, none of us have really been socializing or seeing anyone.  So it was relatively safe.

When I hung up that morning I was overwhelmed by grattitude.  I was so grateful that I could offer this "excuse", or perhaps opportunity is the better word, for us to all get together and soak up the love and friendship that we are all starved for lately.  I was so happy and so proud that the most beautiful of American traditions has also really become a tradition here in La Roda; that my friends are all so willing and excited to partake and share with me in my traditions turned theirs; and above all that I could do this for them.

This year was the first year in 14 years of celebrating that Angelines wouldn't have to rush off after "dinner" (actually lunch) to open the bar.  It was also the first year that I didn't have to clean the bar the morning of our celebration while the turkey was cooking in the oven.  For the first time, Angelines and I could prepare together, cleaning, washing dishes, setting the table.  Everything was ready and set before our guests arrived...I think this is a first, too!

Emily helped too, of course.  First thing she said in the morning (her eyes popped open at 6:50am) was, when can we go put the oil on the turkey??  She LOVES Thanksgiving and was especially excited this year to have our friends come: "I haven't seen them in so long!"  It warmed my heart to see how much she loves our friends.  She made each of them a little present and was in her element as the center of attention throughout our feast. 

Our Thanksgiving menu has become it's own tradition.  We don't usually get too creative when it comes to the food prep because we all love the food we've always made.  My pinenut-raisin stuffing is a classic at this point, a friend always brings the mashed potatoes (amazingly good!), another brings a gorgeous green salad.  We always have some kind of cooked veggie, too.  This year, I asked Angelines to make her grilled mixed vegetables--soooo good!  Then of course we have turkey, gravey, cranberry chutney and pumpkin pie with whipped cream.  We did branch out this year with the desserts: in honor of my good friend Adam, we made tapioca pudding (a tradition he shared with us when we celebrated together 13 years ago).  It was delicious!  I made it with coconut milk rather than cream...and it was fabulous. 

Even amidst the strangeness of having to limit our invitations and worrying about things like having windows open despite the cold, this was one of my very favorite Thanksgiving celebrations ever.  We were so starved for each other's company that we didn't even really eat turkey, but just feasted on stories, laugher, friendship and love...really what Thanksgiving is all about.