Yuletide

Unlike in the days of youth, I slept in pretty late, knowing that the gift of sleep was the one I wanted the most. Once I got up, I found that Robbie was already awake in the living room and she had made a little plate of cookies for Santa (actually, brownies that Shannon had given me) and that she had seemingly attacked one of my fruitcakes. Anyway, I made coffee and then I went and got Dylan up out of bed. The first presents we opened were from Robbie and they were these ultra-soft robes that felt very luxurious. We put them on right away but I ended up getting hot soon after so I had to take it off and just wear a t-shirt and pajama pants. Then we opened all the gifts that mom and dad had sent and I gave Dylan his gifts. Unfortunately, he had planned to do his shopping on the 23rd which was the day he ended up feeling like he had an ear infection and at my urging to go to the doctor, ended up in the ER after failing to find any other doctor’s office that was open. So, he didn’t have any gifts to give and he felt really bad about it.
We were supposed to go to his sister’s house that morning and she told him we should be there by 9, which of course was not going to be possible. We didn’t make it there until 1pm and by that time everyone was gone - literally. Luckily, as we were walking to the front door, a white pickup truck pulled up. It turned out to be Tracy, Chris, Caitlyn and Codi, and the truck was Caitlyn’s present from her dad. So we hung out with them for awhile, playing Just Dance on the wii, which was hilarious! We were supposed to be at Dylan’s aunt Renee’s house at 3, but we wanted to give Connor his present, so we dropped Robbie off at the grocery store near Renee’s and then we went to Jennie’s cousins’ house to see them. Connor seemed really excited when he opened his gifts, exclaiming “COOL! OLD SCHOOL”! when he saw the Rock’em Sock’em robots that we got him. We played with the robots for awhile and hung out waiting to see Dylan’s brother, Sean, who got there shortly after we did. But we couldn’t stay long because Robbie was calling to find out why we weren’t at Renee’s yet so we left to head over there. At this point I was getting a little drained of the holiday spirit and felt like I had screwed up everything, from not baking enough treats to give as gifts, to not getting to Tracy’s house on time, it seemed like I could have done things so much better. Dylan tried to tell me I had done everything right but it only cheered my up slightly.
We got to Renee’s and there was already a full house there, so I grabbed a glass of wine and went in the living room to sit with Shady, Melissa, and a group of others. It turned out to be a lot of fun, and we saw Dylan’s cousin Bobby who we hadn’t seen forever, and his uncle Dickie who is a musician and reminds me a lot of my uncle Ronnie. Renee had made lasagna for dinner and we stayed for quite awhile until after the gifts were open - again, I felt bad because I hadn’t really arranged to get gifts for anyone here other than the fruitcake, cookies, and carmel-bacon-cashew popcorn I had brought for everyone.
We took Robbie back home to Valencia and then drove to Atwater Village to bunny, cat, and house-sit for Brandon and Angie. We fed and watered the animals, and I changed out Bettina’s little hay bucket that she sits in, and then we opened the gate and let her do her crazy running around the living room for awhile. Then we enjoyed the hot tub while it was raining outside, it was a perfect way to end a not-so-perfect but still very special holiday.