butterflydreaming | The Occasionally-Good Daughter

My mom was pretty happy with her birthday present of The Black Swan. I didn't mean to outdo my brother by giving her The Tales of Hoffman, a movie that she has talked about for as long as I can remember. Now I'm glad that I forgot to hand it over on Mother's Day. (Yup, it's been waiting around for over half a year.) She was positively gleeful. I don't think my mum knew it was available on DVD.

My parents were both freshly back from visiting my sibs in SoCal after a spontaneous trip to Spain, a gift from one of my father's friends who was traveling to the Ukraine and wanted some company. So I put in a contribution to the good daughter fund and didn't try to escape the family Christmas. I didn't have to fake being worn out by dinnertime. A couple of hours later, I got a ride home.

Christmas Eve & morning felt like my real Christmas. As soon as L left to work, I finished the last rows of her gift, then wrapped it up and felt the lack of tree. I cleaned the apartment and did token decorating while L was at work. I ran out to get stuff for dinner, then back out again to get candycanes and stocking snack foods. St. Nick or Old Nick, I don't want either of them coming down the chimney during the night, thanks, even if he's got tasty treats.

She brought home holiday music CDs. We listened to them while we wrapped presents and got giddy on nothing more intoxicating than hot dinner, no work the next day, and a clean(er) home. We were laughing so hard that my sides hurt. It probably helped that I wrapped my brother's gift in a pizza box that never contained pizza, and my sister's in an egg carton. L had a dog shoes box, but she ended up not using it.

In the morning we woke up too early, had a few circles of Nielsen-made Yule log (marzipan & hazelnut, covered in chocolate & decorated with gold flecks) with tea, and exchanged gifts. She loved the scarf, I'm so glad. One of her gifts to me was a handkerchief on which she had stitched the kanji for "chrysanthemum". Then I opened the present sent by my best friend E. And to me, that makes Christmas.

Still wished I could've had wassail and oatmeal cookies in Ballard, tho'. {kicks at carpet}

I still have an unopened bottle of mead in the fridge, and a housewarming/cooling party to throw in January. {brightens}