Fleeting Moments and Traditions

Fleeting moments.

That is what we have when we raise children.

Days that seem so long and difficult are really just moments that are gone with the blink of our eyes.

You feel like you are going to be in the thick of it forever, but actually it ends too soon.

You wake up and the kids are grown up.

What of traditions? What will your children relish and remember most of those days?

Will it be the clean house? The new car? The organized closets?

They will cherish and carry with them the traditions.

It will be the birthday meals and the games played outside in the summer.

It will be the blueberry picking and the lightening bug catching.

It will be the Harry Potter movie marathons with popcorn and  smoked gouda and frosty punch.

It will be the swim days and the times the baby belly laughed while getting lotion on after his bath.

 It will all the times crafts were done together at the kitchen table. It will be the chores done side by side as a family.

 It's the family cookouts and days spent visiting.

Traditions are not elaborate schemes carefully put together. It is the small and repetitive occurrences that make your family a family.

It's the chance to snuggle the youngest sibling while he sleeps.

It's those fleeting moments. 

Hang on to those. Hold on real tight. It's those moments you will carry with you always.

Happy Wednesday Ya'll.

Thanksgiving My Style

In many ways I am not a traditionalist. In some ways I am very traditional.
I tend to break rules and go outside the norm and sometimes I walk the line. Lately, though, I am just figuring my path out and deciding which road I like best.

Growing up, Thanksgiving was a holiday spent with my grandparents. My early years were spent in Arizona and my grandparents would either drive up to stay with us or we would drive down to see them. Other times we would go visit my aunt and cousins. I can remember watching my grandma cook cranberries to make her cranberry sauce in her small kitchen.
Thanksgiving was about visiting family.

As I got older, and we moved to the South, it was a holiday at home. My sister would often times come stay for the holiday with her kids, and on occasion my grandma would fly out to stay too.

I remember Thanksgiving as my dad's holiday. He loved the food and the family. I still can picture him carving up the turkey and diving into my mom's pecan pie.

I am married to a healthcare provider, which means he works most holidays. We have always had to work the Thanksgiving meal around the actual day or partake of the meal without him present. Lots of people are in the same situation. That's life.

Lately, though, I have lost my feelings of nostalgia when it comes to Thanksgiving. I read about all of my many friends cooking for days and prepping their homes for family visitors. I have come to accept that we are not that family.
We have no "set in stone" traditions. We have no foods we must eat or desserts we must make. We do not have out of town family driving in to see us.
This year we decided to keep it simple and at home. We do have a few traditions that we decided to move into Thanksgiving, and so we are starting the holiday anew.

Pajamas, food and a movie marathon.

We do movies well and we love to hang out eating and watching movies. What I usually leave as a December tradition is now a Thanksgiving one.
The kids all picked out something to eat and then we agreed to watch the Harry Potter movies. The food menu for the day includes a Chik Fil A platter, mozzarella cheese sticks, bagel bite pizzas, cheese ball and crackers, smoked cheese and summer sausages, apple pie, pumpkin cheesecake and our famous family punch.

It's not traditional by any means, but neither are we...and that's okay.

Thank you to everyone who followed me on Instagram last week while I was in Utah! I had a great time visiting my family and celebrating my nephew's marriage. It is a beautiful state and I was really in awe every time the sun would set behind the snowy mountains.

I hope everyone has a wonderful day and Thanksgiving!