a precedent-setting Christmas

I've been planning this Christmas for over a year, ever since I knew there would be a new little person we got to spend it with, and thinking that my side of the fam-damily would be coming from Dartmouth to spend the holiday in O-Town. Though the latter never happened, it was still important to me to check off all the boxes I had built for myself. Ukrainian supper on Christmas Eve, complete with whole garlic cloves as an appetizer and the Lord's Prayer, even though we are so secular we are doomed to go to Hell? Check. Turkey and mashed potatoes on Christmas Day, capped off by the flimsy paper hats and lame-o jokes that come in Capitalist-Waste-In-A-Tube, uh, I mean Christmas Crackers? Check. There were new boxes to check, too, because this was a precedent-setting Christmas in my mind, and I thought long about new traditions I wanted to start for my own family. Gingerbread-house-building on Christmas Eve, to help keep people occupied while 12 meatless dishes were being processed in the kitchen, and so that Santa would have something to snack on during his delivery? Check. Being allowed to open up one present on Christmas Eve before bedtime, to tide you over til the morning? Check. (And in the Babe's case, this year has set the precedent that this gift should always be a special book from Daddy so that we can all read it together in bed before the lights go out.) Giving second-hand and homemade gifts whenever possible to keep costs low, and to allow myself to bask in the glow of environmental righteousness (but mostly to de-clutter my basement and get rid of all those books I've already read)? Check. And finally, Santa won't wrap his presents anymore in the years to come, and instead will leave his gifts on the floor in front of the tree, saving both time and paper.

Some precedents I hope won't be adhered to in the years to come: the stinging lack of grandmas and grandpas to spoil the Babe (though as we learned this year, they can still spoil him - and Mommy and Daddy! - even from hundreds of kilometres away), and the vomit. Because it wasn't pumpernickel bread that was making Boh sick. No. It was the nastiest bug that's ever taken up residence in my intestines, and Daddy's intestines, and Regina's intestines, causing each of us to alternate parading to the bathroom last night after the turkey to see which end the potatoes would come from this time. Who knew it could be both? As Daddy said this morning, This Christmas is OVER!