This morning at 10 a.m. my family came to open presents early as Tony, Gretchen, Henry and Fritz will be going north to visit granny and grampy for Christmas this year; they are Gretchen's parents. To see Christmas through the eyes of young children is one of life's wonders, isn't it?
The presents given to me this year were simple and deeply meaningful, the kind I like the best. Following are Henry and Fritz's hand prints made into a butterfly and framed in a beautiful Pottery Barn frame.
A local company called Tender Impressions gave a presentation to the parents at his school and check out the website. There are many choices of how the hand or foot prints can be made into unique art and it's all done by local artists. This is simple enough that most of us who enjoy making art could do lots of innovative impressions of our own, given a spurt of creative juice.
Christy, my daughter, and her family, gave us all notes as follows and this was another deeply heart-felt gift. "In your honor, we have adopted a needy family this year to give them a wonderful Christmas experience. This is through the Dept. of Family and Social Services. Our family consists of a very young couple, along with their 4-month-old daughter."
And, to top it off, Ray, who has had our 8 mm film of our kids growing up, got it all out and prepared it for Costco to burn into DVDs. There is 5 1/2 hours worth; because I was cooking, I only saw about 10 minutes of it, but it ranges from Joe being a baby (now 46) into their high school years. It took him a lot of time, but he gave copies to all of us. I will be watching this all of Christmas week.
Tonight Tony and Gretchen invited me to accompany them and the boys to the outdoor light displays in Sleepy Hollow, a Torrance neighborhood renowned for their extravaganas. It was bumper to bumper traffic, but it was so fun to share it with them.
And here are Henry and Fritz at grandma's house this morning after we opened presents.
I was probably the only one who was holding the solstice in her heart today, but when I took Cookie out tonight, the sky was clouding over in prep for tomorrow's rain storm and I knew winter was officially here. Cookie has taken a downward spiral this week, hasn't been eating at all, but she ate people breakfast today and has been much perkier since. She is such a social animal. My family took lots of photos of Cookie and me today.
