We’ve been scurrying around trying to get our recent home purchase squared away with some of the final details of a fairly big renovation project. No square footage was added but a whole lot of ugly was removed – in particular some not so good carpet color choices. In it’s place is beautiful maple hardwoods and some walls were removed, a dropped ceiling lifted, and sparkly popcorn ceilings scraped. Lots of painting has been getting done and the final trim areas up in the vaulted living area was finally done over the weekend. I can thank my partner, Michael, for braving the very tall ladder that was necessary to reach those spaces. My phobic fear of heights kept me from doing it.
What’s kind of fun is “staging” my house for Christmas. It’s not really the normal kind of decorating because I don’t have a tree and I can’t find my fake garland or my door wreath so I’m taking some of our staging stuff (including fake plants) and throwing some white lights on it and attempting to make my house look ready to live in. We still have some work to finish but overall we thinks it’s ready for prime time (ok, pun intended because Michael always makes prime rib for Xmas). 
As usual, we’ll be hosting our “chosen family Christmas” celebration where a bunch of friends that either have family far away, or who don’t have much family, or perhaps who want to avoid their family for other reasons, come over and we have a wonderful pot luck meal and hang out for hours chatting, playing games, listening to music, and maybe watching movies. I’ve been hosting an event like this for coming up on about 15 years now and it’s always fun. The mix of people is what really makes it great and it certainly helps that everyone is a food and wine lover.
Do I miss seeing my own family at the holidays? Sure! But, I’d rather save the money on travel at this time of year, as well as the hassle, and go to see them more often throughout the year or to have funds available to buy nicer gifts. My guess is that they’d probably like to see me there but with all my siblings having spouses whose family are in the same city, I end up not seeing everyone as much as I would like because of the time split between in-laws and when I do go at other times of the year it makes for easier visits. Less stress for everyone, which I think is a good thing.
My wish to all of you is that you have a safe and Happy Holiday season.
Please be safe with “holiday cheer” because we all want to be here for the New Year and in the healthiest possible state we can be in. My family has learned all to well this year how what you take for granted can be taken from you in an instant.
Many blessings to everyone!
