Wednesday, December 30, 2009

The Trip, Part 2

Blogger tells me that I last posted on Dec. 23, so here's what happened after that ...

On the 24th we went to Cost Plus (a.k.a. World Market) so Bill could buy his contribution to the "stocking bags" we do with my mom's family. Each individual person (not each family) is supposed to contribute a stocking stuffer. I do the same thing every year: a bag containing an Illinois lottery ticket, a Target gift card ($5, and this year I used the new Target "gift coins"), some candies, and some other random item (this year it was hand sanitizer). In total, I spent about $8.50 per bag, which became a significant expense after 13 bags. Anyway, at Cost Plus World Market, Bill purchased jars of chocolate spread from Holland for his contribution, which cost $4 each. So, our family was in for about $12.50 per bag, which becomes a significant detail later, I promise.

After that we went to In-N-Out Burger, for Nathan's first visit there. Then we went to Costco, where I got a free cookbook with recipes made from stuff you get at Costco. So that was cool.

Sometime later it was Christmas Eve, and we had the traditional tamales with Bill's family. Oh, the cheese tamales my mother-in-law got ... oh, I think back on them with such love. They had sour cream or some kind of creamy sauce inside them. Anyway, following dinner we did the name draw gift exchange. As I have previously mentioned, this was our first year doing name draw with that family. Although I was previously in favor of it, I'm not sure it totally worked out. It felt sad not to be buying for Bill's parents and siblings. I feel like in an effort to curtail gift-giving to more distant relatives (aunts, uncles, cousins, cousins' various significant others), we gave up giving to our actual close relatives. I think maybe if I were in charge, we would just ban gift-giving to all but immediate family next year. A solution was proposed to instead have everybody go on an outing together (a.k.a. "the experience gift") next year, but I think people will complain that they are spending way more money on the outing than they would on some random gifts from T.J. Maxx.

Anyway, we slept over at Bill's parents' Christmas Eve, and in the morning we did stockings and kids' gifts and ate breakfast. Bill's parents did an excellent job giving Nathan gifts that were easy to carry back.

Then we drove to my mom's house around noon Christmas day, where I got to work making brownies for my traditional brownie sundae dessert, and I folded the napkins like I always do. (This year's fold: the slightly boring silverware pocket fold.) Then I got Nathan down for a 3-hour nap, which was my best Christmas gift of all! And during the nap I sat around drinking champagne and eating appetizers with my relatives. Then we ate Christmas dinner and got to the opening of the stocking bags. Remember before when I mentioned that my family spent $12.50 on each bag? Well, some people interpreted a $50 Target gift card for each person as a stocking stuffer. So we felt all kinds of guilt.

Nathan cleaned up, getting all kinds of instruments (like, seriously, both an acoustic guitar and an electric one), vehicles, and play-dough things. Then we ate the brownie sundaes and we all crashed.

December 26 is my grandparents' anniversary. They have been married 67 years. Isn't that awesome? So we always go out to breakfast with the whole family to celebrate the anniversary. And that was the most interesting thing that happened Dec. 26.

On the 27th we went to the Richard M. Nixon Library and Birthplace, which was having a giant model train display for the holidays. As my mom said, they had something for everyone. Bill enjoyed all the Nixon stuff, Nathan enjoyed the trains (featuring a Thomas section), I enjoyed the rose gardens, and my mom enjoyed the tour of Nixon's childhood home. I don't know what my stepdad liked best, because he pretty much likes everything. Then we had dinner with Bill's parents because they live near there.

Then we went to my mom's, and Bill and I got into a big argument concerning how to get all the gifts back home to Chicago. In the end, we agreed to borrow a big duffel bag from my parents and check it, so we had a total of 4 huge suitcases for the 3 of us.

The next day was the flight home, which I have to say went extremely well considering how much stuff we had. And Bill and I agreed not to argue. Plus they have a Pinkberry yogurt in the airport now, so I enjoyed a plain tart yogurt with strawberries and mochi topping (which, yes, cost a whopping $6, so it's good that it was a one-shot deal). Anyway, Nathan slept on the plane and we got all our luggage at baggage claim, then somehow got it all to the parking lot and drove home. Total time spent on ground and air transport that day: 11 hours (9 if you don't consider the two hours lost to the time change).

So now I'm home and faced with the overwhelming number of tasks that pile up when you return from a trip. I am one of those people who wants to get everything done, right away, and I just have to tell myself that things will get back to normal slowly. Each belonging that I unpack and put away is one less belonging in the suitcases.

And tomorrow is New Year's Eve. I really have no idea why New Year's Eve is even a holiday. Like, why can't we just wake up New Year's Day and have it be a new year? Why must we feel the need to do something meaningful to count down to the new year? Now, let me say that I have never been the type who wants to go out an attend some wild drunken gathering for New Year's. But I still feel this pressure to have some kind of special gathering, even though we are still recovering from all the special gatherings of Christmas. And I feel sad because none of my friends are available to come over for dinner this year for New Year's. Then it occurs to me that I am really lame for not realizing that the most important people in my life are always available to have dinner with me. So our family is going to get take-out and watch TV, or maybe play board games (though it's hard when you only have 3 players and one of them is a toddler).

Tomorrow I will do a standard year-in-review sort of post, so tune back in.

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