Pardon any random thoughts in this one, guys... I'm just now sipping on my coffee, so the caffeine has not hit my brain yet. There's no telling where this might lead if I'm not careful.
Tomorrow is the winter Solstice! We call it Yule, and it's a celebration of the return of the Sun to the earth and the new hope that He brings with him for the coming year. He's born again from the Mother, who now fades into the winter Crone, and slowly as He grows He brings light, warmth, and renewed life to the cold, barren world. The official Solstice is at 6:03 PM EST according the Old Farmer's Almanac website, but that's not always the best time to celebrate it. Things get in the way, you know? So tonight, I'll be staying up til the Sun rises again, holding a vigil with my candles lit to let Him know, He's not forgotten. After all, every light and every spark and flame are a little bit of the Sun here on earth. Maybe if there's enough of them, He'll return right on time.
At work recently, a friend asked what exactly staying up all night entails. I wasn't sure- I've only done it once or twice before, and both times, I spent the night hanging out with my Sims. Makin' babies and conquerin' towns, mwahahahahaha...... Ahem. Not a whole lot of spiritual depth there. Maybe a few psychotic tendencies, but not much religion. (I did light my Yule candle, though, so that counts for something, right?) This year, I find myself needing to go a little deeper, especially with the new moon coming up at the same time. It's a time for renewal, for creation of good things to last the year through. So I did a little thinking, and a little brain picking in my favorite Pagan parenting Facebook group, and I've decided that a) I need to have no couch surfers tonight and b) I need to spend the night doing seasonally productive and festive things.
So, tonight will start with a trip to Winterhaven with my mom and V. After all, the celebration of light is the reason for all the fuss, so what could be better to kick off the anticipation with a visit to an entire neighborhood COVERED in lights and beauty? After that, it'll be the usual night time routine for the kiddo: dinner, bath, medicine, and bed (assuming we don't get home so late that all he wants to do is pour himself onto the mattress with a boob and go unconscious, like last night). While I'm waiting for the Sun to be reborn, I'm going to be making Christmas presents, wrapping presents, addressing the holiday cards that should have gone out two weeks ago, and I think I'm going to replace the white lights in our front window with multi-colored ones. (I checked it out from outside last night. It was uninspiring, to say the least).
Oh yeah. Last night.
LAST NIGHT WAS AWESOME.
The original plan was to go see Winterhaven last night with Andrew. This did not happen, because at some point I got a call from Phil! Yay, Phil! He's back from basic and home for Christmas, which is great, and he managed to not only get ALL FIVE brothers together at the same time, but we even had the corresponding families, people were dressed nicely, AND we ate dinner at a good restaurant! I was and am thoroughly impressed. It is no small feat to do such a thing. I admit, the fact that it's cold helped- it means that Andrew is forced to wear jeans and not comfy shorts when he leaves the house, bwahaha. Unfortunately, with five brothers, three womenfolk, and three kids... we take up a lot of space, which takes a long time to arrange in the restaurant business. We managed to squeeze into an 8 person booth at Chili's, with 4 people on one side, 5 adults and one kid on the other, and a child on either end in a high chair after waiting for about 45 minutes. And unfortunately, that much food is also difficult to get out at the same time so we had another long wait for dinner. I have to say, the kids did a good job at the table. Polite, not too much mess, and no screaming! When I say, kids... I mean V. Mattie and Mase are good kids and old enough to know how to behave in such a setting. V spent about half the night saying "Eat, please! and "Thank you!" to our waiter. But with the wait times, we didn't get out of the restaurant til 9:30... and Winterhaven shuts down at 10:00. So, we went home. But dinner was great! Most of the ride was spent on Genie civil rights... Dinner itself covered a variety of topics, including Spiderman vs. Batman and the proper soup to salad ratios.
I have to admit, I got pretty lucky with my choice of husband. Not only do I get him, I get more brothers than I ever knew I wanted, and all the weird conversation that entails.
And now... I have to get going. I just realized, I never bought one very important ingredient to the Gift in A Jar bit we're doing for Christmas.
The jars.
Michael's here I come!
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