Once in awhile-now and again-this is us

Well, the holiday festivities have come and gone. It seems as we age, Christmas takes on a different feeling, even a different meaning. Putting up our little tree brings memories of joy from Christmas’s past, and for me, they mingle with the current year’s happiness bringing more joy to this Christmas. Losing Ted and Midas this time last year, did put a little more stress on that notion.

I think little children that still believe in Santa Clause anticipate Christmas on a much different level than adults. Of course adults get to see the joy the gifts they give bring excitement as the children rip open presents squealing with delight.
But then Santa gets all the credit, until kids figure out the logistics of Santa’s sleigh and flying reindeer?

Besides Santa, there are other beliefs about Christmas. Being catholic, as a child we always had a manger scene with Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus and the three kings bringing gifts, with all the animals gathered around on Christmas for his birth. It always sat on the tv. Here’s something from google about that.

We didn’t make new year’s resolutions this year because those always go to the wayside too soon. But we did quit drinking our beloved cocktails and are already seeing a little weight loss. We are trying to eat less, cut down on sweets, and who knows we might even start exercising on a regular basis, maybe even join a gym, but that’s not a resolution, just a thought🤔

We had a very nice Christmas dinner at Tony’s. Since Tracy lives so far away, Tony and his family have taken over the dinner preparations, even the girls participate. Usually I make a pumpkin pie. If Tracy were there I would make a pecan pie too.

But Tony made an apple pie this year

It was delicious.

We spent New Year’s Eve with Frank and Linda in their beautiful home right next door, how lucky are we? Linda is an exceptional cook and never disappoints us with her homemade cooking and beautiful table settings. She tells us in her younger days she often made meals from Julia Child’s cookbook. Have you seen those recipes in that huge book? Yikes! Any of you ever cooked Julia Childs recipes? I haven’t. I did watch her tv show in the 60’s though. I still remember her dropping a chicken on the floor and her comment afterwards😂

We celebrated the ball dropping listening to New York at 9pm. Who stays up until midnight any more? Any of you? We had a glass of champagne, blew whistles, kissed, and hugged, then walked home. A very fun evening.

Here’s a very brief summary of the origins of how the new year got started. (for those of us who didn’t know, well, basically for me) I researched it.

it also has many traditions that people all over the world celebrate:

The only thing we do now is make a pot of black eyed peas. I waited too late to find the dry peas in stores, that’s never happened, so I had to use canned black eyed peas this year. Then going to several stores couldn’t even find a ham hock to simmer with them. So I used the leftover pork shank Linda had given us from Christmas Eve dinner in them. I added broth and simmered them for over an hour. So we did cook them and eat them on New Year’s Day for good luck. They were delicious. I know Tracy cooks black eyed peas also, anyone else use this age old tradition or any of those others?

now a few other things…..

A interesting ‘cirrus intorus’ cloud according to google lens.

I will still see hearts⬇️ sometimes in Jerry’s strawberries

And of course a blog would not be complete without pictures of our great granddaughters, here with their mom and dad.

Taking a selfie.

a beautiful sunset yesterday

we’re going to the Queen Mary for Valentine’s Day ❤️
stay tuned 💗jilly

p.s. that’s ‘tit’ and ‘tat’, delightful crocheted characters that Tracy made for us on the header image😊