Happy New Year! As almost everyone else in blog world has said, "where did this year go?". Even though there was much going on in my family this holiday season, we worked hard to keep most of our family traditions and even to make a few new ones. Our month started with a Girl Scout Medal Award Ceremony at the Hilton where Morgan received her bronze award. That is the highest award a junior G.S. can earn so now that she is a cadette, she will begin work on her silver.
We also were able to fit in our Nutcracker weekend with our four oldest granddaughters. We have been doing this for many years and one day soon our youngest granddaughter Presley will join us. Who knows, maybe the boys may even choose to come some day but right now sitting still for three hours and watching a ballet does not even begin to compete with putting together a Lego spaceship or castle! Every year we head to dinner afterward where we discuss any changes in the choreography, scenery, costumes, etc. This being the 30th anniversary of our local performance, the changes were many and spectacular - really a vision to behold in a town as small as Ocala!
And, every year we must take a picture of the girls in front of this horse. A number of years ago, artists decorated many horses that were scattered all over Ocala. Most have gone back to their sponsors but many were donated to the city and remain on display. This horse stands in front of the Ocala Civic Theater and the girls just love it!
The rest of the pictures are just some of the things my family has done during the holidays. I wasn't there for all of them as it is difficult even for me to be in 2 places at once. But, that doesn't mean that I didn't enjoy hearing all about it and seeing all of the pictures. Take note in how reserved I was in only posting a few shots. I actually had 250 printed and don't have those from G'vlle. or St Pete done yet! From being the only kindergarten boy chosen to ride on his school float, to making cookies, visiting Santa, playing in snow, decorating cookies, feeding Santa's reindeer, looking at lights, having school and G.S. and neighborhood parties, and ......... these are the things of which our memories are made!!!
And just when you thought you had squeezed in all of the tradition that you possibly could, someone remembers something else. Jennie brought us all into the family room after our dinner and announced that she had always had a favorite tradition when she was younger. After everyone had left and things were quiet, we would all gather around a tape recorder and talk about our memories and then do a little concert with our guitar and rhythm instruments. So, she had come prepared this year. Yes, the times had caught up with us. Instead of our little tape recorder, we had a state of the art video recorder and instead of just rhythm instruments we had a state of the art keyboard. And now, we actually have some people who know how to read music and play some of these instruments. What fun we had reminiscing and singing. Oh sure, we got a few strange looks from the poor guys that married into this chaos but in the end, we all realized that when the tree and ornaments are gone and gifts just as quickly forgotten, these are the things we call traditions and truly the things of which our memories are made!!! And now, bring on 2011 and all of the new memories to come - after I take down the tree and all of the decorations that I am having a very hard time giving up this year! Anyone ever heard of a January tree?
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