The Thanksgiving Shuffle
Now that I'm an ol' married woman (10 years and counting!) I can share how Hubby and I decide which side of the family to go to on holidays.
No coin-throwing, no rock-paper-scissors or heated arguments about how "your" mother will "never" forgive us for not bringing her grandson to her on Christmas Eve.
Read on, grasshopper, and learn.
No coin-throwing, no rock-paper-scissors or heated arguments about how "your" mother will "never" forgive us for not bringing her grandson to her on Christmas Eve.
Read on, grasshopper, and learn.
When we were newlyweds, we had time and energy to do two of most holidays: Easter lunch and brunch, two Thanksgiving dinners, one Christmas Eve and one Christmas day.
But now that we have multiplied by two, the logistics have changed. Here's how it works: usually, the family that plans first gets first dibs. If my sisters and I get our act together and decide Thanksgiving will be a lunch this year, I will lobby my in-laws to plan a late dinner. It helps if my in-laws' other daughter-in-law and her family also plan a lunch. Kismet! If both families plan a dinner, we take turns, my family one year, his the next. But this has yet to happen, thanks to our successful wheeling and dealing for one lunch and one dinner.
Christmas Eve is sacred in my family, but Hubby's folks would just as soon sleep in, so we "always" spend the night before Christmas with Mom, my sisters, their families and a happy bunch of cousins. The next day, we head off to lunch with Hubby's side of the family, which includes an army of cousins, aunts, uncles and a great-grandparent or two. This party usually lasts through dinner.
New Year's Eve is bittersweet. When Grandma Lola was still around, we always spent the early evenings of Dec. 31 with her and Mom. Around 10 p.m., we'd vamoose to Hubby's family gathering, greeting the new year there and calling Mom at midnight for a quick greeting. Usually, she and Lola would be happily sipping champagne, accepting phoned-in greetings and hardly missing us anyway. After the boys came, it became harder to schlep them to two places so late at night (and I got more nervous about drunk drivers on the road), so we try to visit Mom during the day of Dec. 31 or on New Year's Day.
This Thanksgiving, we've stretched the holiday because three of my sisters will all be going to their in-laws for Thursday dinner, which is fine with Hubby because it means we spend all day with his parents. My family's Thanksgiving will be celebrated on Friday, instead.
There will still be turkey, ham and too much dessert. We will still gather to pray and count our blessings, talk too much and bond a lot. I will still take a Tylenol after my sweet potato high. And we will, as always, remind each other of what we have to be thankful for this holiday season. And be thankful we have each other.
But now that we have multiplied by two, the logistics have changed. Here's how it works: usually, the family that plans first gets first dibs. If my sisters and I get our act together and decide Thanksgiving will be a lunch this year, I will lobby my in-laws to plan a late dinner. It helps if my in-laws' other daughter-in-law and her family also plan a lunch. Kismet! If both families plan a dinner, we take turns, my family one year, his the next. But this has yet to happen, thanks to our successful wheeling and dealing for one lunch and one dinner.
Christmas Eve is sacred in my family, but Hubby's folks would just as soon sleep in, so we "always" spend the night before Christmas with Mom, my sisters, their families and a happy bunch of cousins. The next day, we head off to lunch with Hubby's side of the family, which includes an army of cousins, aunts, uncles and a great-grandparent or two. This party usually lasts through dinner.
New Year's Eve is bittersweet. When Grandma Lola was still around, we always spent the early evenings of Dec. 31 with her and Mom. Around 10 p.m., we'd vamoose to Hubby's family gathering, greeting the new year there and calling Mom at midnight for a quick greeting. Usually, she and Lola would be happily sipping champagne, accepting phoned-in greetings and hardly missing us anyway. After the boys came, it became harder to schlep them to two places so late at night (and I got more nervous about drunk drivers on the road), so we try to visit Mom during the day of Dec. 31 or on New Year's Day.
This Thanksgiving, we've stretched the holiday because three of my sisters will all be going to their in-laws for Thursday dinner, which is fine with Hubby because it means we spend all day with his parents. My family's Thanksgiving will be celebrated on Friday, instead.
There will still be turkey, ham and too much dessert. We will still gather to pray and count our blessings, talk too much and bond a lot. I will still take a Tylenol after my sweet potato high. And we will, as always, remind each other of what we have to be thankful for this holiday season. And be thankful we have each other.
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