New Traditions

For the first time in 27 years, I will not be spending Christmas with my family in Illinois. The holiday begins on Christmas Eve; my parents and I go out for Chinese food while Santa makes a visit to our house. We return from dinner to open gifts and listen to Willie Nelson's Christmas album, Pretty Paper. We usually have to flip the record 3 times as we leisurely open gifts. Then, while my mom finishes wrapping gifts in flurry and pumpkins pies bake in the oven, I go to bed early. Christmas morning is up up and away. My dad and I go for a rosey run before we load the van full of gifts and food to visit first my mom's parents home and then my dad's brother's. At each place, we eat lots of great food--Mashed potatoes, casseroles, oyster crackers, deviled eggs--, drink lots of coffee, visit with my parents,their brothers and sisters, and our grandparents and open gifts for sometimes hours. We make it home by dark and crash. I love this family, food, intensity filled holiday. Justin talks of family Christmas gatherings at his aunt's house that last well into the night with similar nostalgia.
This year, newly married and figuring out how to navigate the Holiday, Justin and I have decided that its just not in the cards to travel to St. Louis or Pittsburgh. A few years ago, he got stuck in Vegas for a few days when he was trying to get home. Flying is stressful and crazy. Its makes landing and going to our childhood homes all the more satisfying, but the journey there is not the most enjoyable. So, this year, we have decided to put off holiday travels for a visit at a slower travel time.
We will be here, creating new traditions.

I'm excited! Yesterday, we began this journey by cutting down our first Christmas tree together. The Northwest's most bountiful renewable natural resource is lumber (trees), so the forest service sells 5 dollar permits around the holidays to cut down Christmas Trees from the national forest. So, that's what we did. Our first lesson, trees don't grow that same way that they do on tree farms. But, we found a sweet smelling little douglas fir that will soon be decorated in our family room--much to the amusement of our kitten, Scott.