To My Youngers,

Well, the holiday season is coming to a close... alright not technically as yet, but our big family visits finished up yesterday and for me that's what has always made the holidays feel like 'the holidays.'

So many people dread spending time with their families, especially the full-family gatherings that take place around the holidays. I am happy to say that I am not one of those people (nor, I think, is anyone else in my family!). Getting together with my sisters and parents, aunts and uncles, cousins, cousins of cousins, kids of cousins, and not-technically-related-but-still-family 'aunts,' 'uncles,' and 'cousins,' has always been my favourite part of Christmas. We eat lots of tasty tasty food (read: family recipes passed down from great grandma who took Mary Poppins' advice about that spoonful of sugar quite literally...), play games, and sit around for hours just talking and catching up. We have very strict rules about wearing your holiday-cracker-hat (you must. period), saying grace (even though I rarely say grace at any other time, Christmas dinner requires a best-we-can-do rendition of Johnny Appleseed, complete with the chain-of-claps), and going back for seconds (why would you not go back for seconds?), which work well with the laissez-faire structure of the rest of the afternoon-evening.

This year Sopio played a (perhaps predictably) entertaining role in the festivities (perhaps most notably being the prime ingredient in keeping G awake after his long flight back from India), two engagements were toasted, and we randomly decided to do 'all the kids' birthday celebrations, exchanging birthday cards as well as Christmas presents.

As usual everyone had a great time catching up and I was once again reminded how lucky I am (we are!) to have such a wonderful extended family.

Happy Holidays!

-E