Another Christmas Come And Gone...

All that preparin' months in advance and its over in a blink of an eye.

Our small family gatherin' is on Christmas Eve at my mamma's house. Before dinner we share Oplatek a Polish tradition.

Our dinner consists of different kinds of fish, but the delicious (clog your arteries) Polish food like Pierogis, Kielbasa, Krakowska, Galumbki and babka are what we really have a hankerin' for. For dessert, my homemade cookies and Kruschiki.

After dinner we go into the livin' room to open gifts. Its mostly flailin' arms and a whirlwind of Christmas wrappin' paper flyin' through the air. But when the tissue paper settles, we show each other the wonderful gifts we've received.

Truthfully, I struggle with the whole over the top gift givin' idea. Its seems every year our society puts more and more emphasis on that instead of gettin' together as a family to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.

I remember as a young'un our family Christmas gatherins'. My mamma came from a large but poor family of nine; so all her brothers and sisters and us kids would cram into my Grammy's tiny apartment. Lord knows how we all fit in there, but we did. My uncle Joe would play the accordion while we all sang Christmas carols at the top of our lungs. Gram sat in her rockin' chair with a big ol' smile on her face, thrilled to see all her babies and grandbabies together. There was always good eats (nothin' fancy), but not one gift was exchanged. There was no need for it nor did we even think about. It was all about the family gettin' together. Period.

Now, many have passed away, many have moved away, or many are "too busy". So these gatherins' no longer exist. Oh how I miss those days...

Santa hubs was good to me this year (as always). He gave me a fancy new digital camera. Its got lots of bells-n-whistles on it so it will take me some time to figure it out. I also need to figure out how to read the instructions. By the time I flipped past the Spanish, French and Chinese instructions then turned it upside down; I plum forgot what the heck I was tryin' to find in the manual.

He also picked me out some new perfume. Since he's the one who has to smell me, I figure he can pick it out. He went to Macy's and rummaged through all the perfumes to find just the right scent for me. Awww! Isn't he sweet?

When I unwrapped the box I almost busted a gut, but caught myself before I did.
He bought me Britney Spears "Believe." :> )

I told him if I dab some on and start reachin' for the hair clippers, its goin' straight in the (white) trash. I don't think I'd look good as Kojak. Although I do enjoy lollipops.

"Who loves ya, baby?" Buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz