kickin' off the season

Growing up, my family always took part in two sacred holiday rituals. (I realize these are not in order according to timeline, but bear with me.) Every Christmas Eve we read and act out the Nativity. I think it was cute when we were little... making my uncle Wade don donkey ears and crawl on all fours across the family room, with one of the little girls on his back. It's pretty funny actually - there came a point where there were too many cousins for all the "roles", so our parents made up extra animals and characters so that everyone could be in costume. I'm pretty sure someone was a frog one year. SO NOT KIDDING! The other, equally sentimental, tradition is that every Thanksgiving after we've gorged ourselves on "second dinner" (you know, the meal a couple hours after the meal), we watch White Christmas.

Anyway... since I've been married, I've had to tweak the latter tradition a bit. Since my kind, loving husband refuses to watch any movie filmed prior to 1980, and I don't want to spend Thanksgiving night alone in my living room, I've started watching White Christmas the day after Thanksgiving instead. And surprisingly, this new arrangement works out perfectly! I get to hum along to such tunes as "Sisters" and "Mandy" while performing my favorite task in the world... Christmas decorating! Which, since I splurged and bought a fake PRE-LIT tree this year, is actually a fun activity!

So folks, White Christmas has been screened, the tree is lit, Nat King Cole is in the CD player, and the Christmas season has officially begun!