How old are you??

I hope you all are getting ready for Christmas and we all wish you and your family a Blessed Holiday season!!

So my side of the family (Jill) is getting together for Christmas this year. No one wanted to venture to the frozen tundra of Massachusetts during winter, so it has been a little while since we have all gotten together. Needless to say, I am an excitable person, I look forward to everything, and this is no exception. I am getting really excited thinking about family and presents and traditions...yay:)

So the other day I am on the phone with my parents, me on one end, and the both of them on the other, telling them how fun it will be and asking what the plans are and all of that. Well, lots of stuff is going on, so due to many different schedules and stuff, my parents told me that we would not be opening presents until Christmas Day, in the afternoon... I knew we had to wait until Christmas Day this year (we normally open up presents on Christmas Eve) but I didn't know we had to wait until the afternoon!! I can't wait that long, I say, what torture!! My parents are like, ummm, hello, you are the parent now, this is about your kids and they don't know any better. This is true, I think to myself, they are too young to know what we would "normally" do, so to them we just set out a time in the future and tell them to behave until then or they don't get to open presents, simple enough. Neither of them remember any past Christmases or are aware of our traditions yet anyway. So we make some more jokes about how I am not even getting any presents anyway (they say that every year, but money is still a present, mom and dad!!) , and hang up...

Then Ross comes home and I am being all dramatic and preparing him for the news... that we have to wait until Christmas AFTERNOON to open presents... He looks at me a little confused, thinking, what did I miss here?? So I start to tell him again, we aren't opening presents on Christmas Eve or Christmas morning, but Christmas AFTERNOON!!! All he says is, "How old are you, eight?"

I have nothing more to say... Seriously though, I do realize this is not all about me. I actually enjoying giving more than receiving (seriously!) and just love the magic of Christmas and all that it stands for... If it were up to me and my childlike ways, December would go something like this...
December 6- St Nicholas Day, put shoes out, get goodies
December..... Hanukkah, that's right, Jesus was Jewish after all and He celebrated it, so I would too, plus 8 days of presents
December 24-25- Christmas... you get the picture

p.s. I would celebrate my half-birthday every year too, except it is Feb 29th, what kind of cruel joke is that?