One of the reasons my parents abolished the giving of birthday presents is that 3 of my brothers have birthdays within 2 weeks of Christmas. It's just a lot of gifts. Now, BoopityBoop share my brother JP's birthday a few days after Christmas. Katie and Adam have always celebrated the girls' birthday but never with a big party. The girls don't mind having a nifty, fancy birthday party with their parents all to themselves. Especially since they've just had their fill of the rest of the family, what with three days in a row jammed with family fun. This year, BoopityBoop celebrated turning 7 at a Chinese restaurant.
It seems like just yesterday we were all together having my birthday dinner at a supper club when these two were toddlers...Boopity sat like a little princess in her booster seat, acting like she ate dinner out every night while her sister, Boop, climbed on the table eating off everyone else's plate. Now they both know company manners.
Jay and I took it very easy in the days right after Christmas. When you're over 60, your recovery time is longer. We did have a very fun party to attend on Saturday, the 30th. It was an Epiphany party at a friend's house. I had never celebrated the Epiphany in such a style before. There were about a dozen of us at a sit down dinner of pizza and wine! Our host passed around a box from which we each chose a slip upon which was the name of a Saint. This would be our patron Saint for the year of 2024. I got St. Rose of Lima. I'll have to look her up, as I know very little about her. Then we chose another slip which had a verse of scripture on it, which we were to use kind of as our mantra for the year. Mine had something to do with courage...I haven't memorized it yet. Finally, we chose another slip upon which was simply a number. The number corresponded with a beautifully wrapped gift! The gifts were random, thoughtful and wonderful, ranging from a personal waffle iron to a fire stick! I don't remember what everyone got I only remember that all the gifts were things I'd be perfectly happy to take home! It was a lovely and very generous evening.
New Year's Eve was spent the same way Jay and I have been celebrating it since 1981: just the two of us with a tenderloin dinner and fine chocolates. When we had kids at home, we managed to farm them out to relatives and now we're empty nesters. Happy New Year! The only difference this year was that we actually did stay up till midnight. Most years, we're sound asleep by 10.
Today, I write this from a lovely hotel suite in Chandler, AZ. We're in town for the wedding of a great niece. The sun is out and the sky is blue and it's quite a bit warmer than what we left in Minnesota but not exactly shorts or swim suit weather, for which I'm grateful. I can't think of anything less comfortable than trying to jam my post Christmas butt into a swimsuit.
After the events of the last two weeks, I'm not surprised that Jay and I slept for nearly 10 hours when we got to our hotel. This should be a fun week!