Grateful

                  I have to admit I should be better at gratitude than this especially at this time of year.   I have way too much to be thankful for to be so cranky.   Feisty Pants is not sick.  Everyone seems to be fine.  But I'm a little stressed. Usually we go out for Thanksgiving dinner, but nope not this year.  If you've never done it (and can afford it) you should go out for Thanksgiving.  Blasphemy, I know.  But, you say, what about the wondrous smells, and cheery warm kitchens and setting the table???  Bullocks.  That just tells me you are not the cook at your house.   Thanksgiving is crawling out of bed at crack of dawn to wrestle a giant carcass into a hot oven, cook like an Elizabethan servant, work your tushy off only to be rewarded by your nearest and dearest morphing into locusts like a reenactment of a biblical plague.  Bah Humturkey.  Call me a heretic but I'd rather sleep in, put on clean clothes and go out.  Besides, Thanksgiving is supposed to be about gratitude and it seems to have somehow devolved into how much can I stuff into myself before going on a giant shopping binge like some sort of hunter/gatherer on crack. 

                         Well, nothing for it then but to make it our own.  First, the turkey. OUT.   Hippie Pants is a vegetarian, Feisty Pants is basically one too. I don't like turkey. So we are having ham.  We will do Christmas Dinner twice this year.  Next, no waiting all day while kids lose patience.  We will do it at 2pm.  People seem to think that's odd. Too Bad. Works for us.  There will be a big dinner. We will all be together. It will be in the end, a lovely day.  And that's kinda the point of this post.  You have to learn what is really important and what is not when it comes to your traditions.  If you have a disabled kid you will spend enough time not fitting other's expectations.  If you keep trying to be just like everyone else, you'll just make yourself crazy. Trust me, you have enough on your plate.  Eff em.  If pizza makes you all happier than turkey, than put the cheese on in the shape of a Pilgrim Hat and call it a celebration of the tomato harvest.  We're ALL freaks in some way. Embrace it and move along. You don't have time for worrying about crap.  You will figure out which traditions really matter to you and those ones you should guard with your life.   We could give a rat's fanny about turkey and pilgrims but our Christmas tree is already up.  And Hippie Pants still dresses up on Halloween and takes her little sister trick or treating.  I have a relative who cooks a big Thanksgiving, not for the holiday itself, but the more relaxed "leftover day" (as she calls it) the next day.  She says its her favorite holiday of the year.  That's a tradition I could get into.

                           So, whatever your particular holiday tradition, I hope yours is happy. And virtually stress free.  And for the record, I am grateful.  I am grateful for my girls.  And the snow that is falling as I type.  And the fact that while I bitch about the cooking I will be doing, I have plenty to cook.  I am grateful for the creative outlet this blog gives me. I am really grateful for my new coffee maker.  And I am very grateful for all of you.  Thank you for reading. I wish you peace.