Holidays

For me holidays are bittersweet.  I miss my parents much more during this time.  For several years Thanksgiving included my parents, Dennis' mom, my cousin Lana and her son Matthew, my aunt Rochelle and cousin Mark, sometimes Will would come up from San Diego (but no too often because he doesn't like Thanksgiving much).  Occasionally my brother and a friend or two would join us as well.

Mom, Dad, Roseanne, Rochelle, and Mark are gone now.

So it's just the 5 of us - Den, me, Will, Melissa and Kaylee.  

Makes me a bit sad.

My brother goes to his ex-wife's or ex-brother-in-law's house (don't ask).

My cousin works part-time at JC Penney's so has to be at work by 4:45pm today!  Which seems so unfair to me.  Since she lives in the valley we would have had to have Thanksgiving breakfast for her to join us.  Matthew has his own friends to spend time with now that he's 24.

But I am looking forward to Hanukkah and Christmas because all the kids will be here. 

And we're going to celebrate our 25th anniversary on December 17th with a dinner party.

But still, I miss the big family celebrations from my childhood.  Highlight wasn't the turkey it was putting the black olives on our fingers with my cousin Lana and giggling like crazy!

Hope everyone had a great day.