A really lovely day. Our house is now Christmas-ized inside and out! I am ready for the season. Our big tree is in the family room downstairs. Our little tree is on a bookcase upstairs, in the hall. Our manger scene and part of the angel collection, plus assorted gold reindeer in repose, are in the living room. The santa collection and stockings adorn the mantle. Outside, there is a garland draping the front entrance to the porch, and a wreath is hung. I love Christmas decorations.
I’d love to have Vegas style lights but we do not have outside power sources. Also, I fear if I put up lights like that my father would rise up out of the grave and smote the whole display. He thought outside lights were tacky. I don’t agree; often they are lovely. I just can’t bring myself to hire an electrician and go to those extremes. However, we have neighbors who have really impressive light displays. We love seeing them.
DN told Alesia that in a couple of weeks he would ride her around one night to look at Christmas lights. I thought that was a sweet thing to say.
She turned down a date tonight for a chance to make some babysitting money. Then, the little girl got sick and the babysitting job was canceled, but Alesia didn’t seem upset.
We worked around the house most of the day. Bruce brought sushi home from Kroger for the kids. He got my smoke alarms fixed up, and blew the debris off the roof. He let Mike blow the pine straw off the front patio. It’s good for Michael to learn how to do some of the outside work here.
We made another pecan pie. Michael LOVES pecan pie, and I made him read the recipe and do most of the work, under my supervision. I just picked out the pecans and broke them up. When Bruce was young he loved pecan pie so much he memorized the recipe.
Bruce and the kids had sushi for lunch.
Late this afternoon, we were sort of in the doldrums, with Bruce headed home and Mother napping. Bronwyn told me about an international farmer’s market not far from here, so I took the kids over there. The Buford Highway Farmer's Market is a FUN place to go, no matter where you are from. It’s enormous, very clean, and had a huge selection of foods, from everywhere. We stuck mostly to the Russian foods, but I want to go back and see all of it. I was hurrying to get Alesia back to babysit.
The lady who bagged our groceries was Russian. I introduced myself and told her my kids are Russian and she started chattering away to Alesia. I asked Alesia this later in the car: “I know my Russian is rusty, but was the first thing that lady said “Your mom is crazy to buy all this expensive food!” and Alesia giggled. “Yes! That’s exactly what she said!” I spent too much, but it was worth it, to see how happy and excited they were.
I also got challah, my favorite bread, a crusty loaf of ciabatta, German chocolate, some Turkish peach juice, and some English shortbread. I found some things for Bruce, for Christmas. He loves exotic foods.
It’s been the happiest day I’ve had in a long time.
