Beginning to look like Xmas

Mozart just did this quickly on a post-it but I thought it was cute with its little angel on top and lots of presents under the tree and I found it interesting that she wrote Feliz Navidad instead of Merry Christmas. She is very excited about her first Xmas in Spain. Well, she is always excited about xmas like most kids.

The decorations are up in our little village and in every shop there are xmas displays. I love the little Santa’s that people have climbing up their wrought iron balconies. We only brought one stocking with us, so I already miss our xmas decorations as they are a big part of our ritual as I have been collecting and saving them for years and years. Even as a child one of my favorite parts was opening up the special ornaments that were like seeing a magical friend again. Mozart loves that part too, but perhaps we will cherish them even more after a few years away from them. I guess we will add a few from Spain to our collection now!

I am just starting to get into the xmas spirit as it always seems to hit me late. We don’t usually put up our tree until no more than two weeks before xmas. I am not even sure yet exactly how we will do the xmas tree here or where exactly we will put it. The other day when we were in the bigger city nearby, we saw a home with a xmas tree up, so they must have them somewhere here.

It always seems a little strange to have beautiful sunny days mixed with xmas, but I am more or less used to that now with California. There is skiing not too far from here, so we might look into that for the New Year as that is our habit at home and its nice to see a little snow at this time of year.

I don’t like a full diet of snow, but a little sunny skiing after the crowds have left suits me fine for a winter. Spoiled aren’t I? I know some people love to live in snowy winters and I must say I did enjoy them as a child, but I am glad that most of my adult winters have been out of snow and the shoveling and scraping icy windshields that come with them.

Once when I was living in LA  on the beach, I got nostalgic for a NYC winter after watching a Woody Allen film that romanticized it, so I went back. Ah, good lesson for me to remember all the things the movie did not show like how miserable it was shopping in the hot crowded stores with a heavy winter coat on and how miserable it was in the freezing cold trudging thru the crowds as taxi’s were impossible at that time of year. I vowed to remember the good AND the bad from that point on and interestingly I haven’t been back to NYC since at Christmas. Yes, I had a lot of fun sometimes in the winter in NYC, but I also remember why
I often flew down to the Caribbean or California to escape it. I guess I am one of those who dreams of a “warm Christmas”.

I am wondering what our memories of our first xmas in Spain will be like and how we will romanticize them in years to come. I suppose with an  overly enthusiastic child  who loves Christmas it can  be nothing but fun. I haven’t even started my shopping yet, but there seems to be plenty here to choose from, not much different than home. We have not been to it yet, but we hear there is a ToysRus near the closest airport. We have the oven working now, so looks like we can even have those pumpkin pies with that Xmas dinner and maybe make some cookies or home made fudge for our friends here. Grandma has already sent her package out so we will soon have it under our tree. Sounds like a promising one!