Black Friday

I will not shop today.  I may not shop all weekend.  I am DONE all my Hanukkah shopping and most of my Christmas shopping.  What I have left to do will be done online.  I do not understand running out to stand in long lines in the cold and fight with other people over a "bargain."  What happened to being thankful for the things and people we already have in our lives?  We do not need more THINGS!  We need more time with our families. 

Today is also Black Friday for me because Evey and Eric fly back to California this evening.  They took a late flight, which is going to be very hard on them.  They fly out around 7:15 tonight, stop over in LA, and get into San Francisco around midnight Pacific time.  Then they will have an hour drive home.  That was a lovely gift to us by maximizing their time today with us.  It is very likely that they will not be back in Florida for two years.  I can hardly even believe that, but it's true.  Next year we all plan to go to Kip and Denise's new house in Snohomish, WA for Thanksgiving.  Who knows if I will even host Thanksgiving again the year after that?  Maybe we'll all go somewhere else.  I will see Evey and Eric next in July in Maryland for Lowell and Emily's wedding.  We also plan to go visit them in CA in January of 2015.  Seeing them only once or twice a year is hard, but we all made these choices about where to live.  There's no blame to go around.  I am thankful for every minute that I can be with them.  I am also thankful for cell phones, email, digital photos, text messages, and Facetime/Skype.  What a magical age we live in.

I hope everyone ate as well as we did yesterday.  LOL!  Of course, I am up a pound and a half since Wednesday morning.  I am not surprised or upset.  I have time now to undo that damage before the first of the two December cruises.  I'm actually up three pounds now since Wednesday before last.  It's okay. It was expected.  I certainly did enjoy all the food I consumed yesterday. This morning I'm going to have my traditional day-after-Thanksgiving breakfast, PUMPKIN PIE!  LOL!  Yeah, getting back on track might start tomorrow!

For Evey and Eric's last day, we are going over to WDW to play mini-golf.  It's going to be sunny and in the low 70s, a good day for golf.  We will have lunch out somewhere, pick up Mark's comic books (well, okay, he's going to go in and shop for those, but I'll wait in the car!), and eventually we will drop the kids off at the airport about 5 p.m.  I will be sad, but I will enjoy the HECK out of the rest of the day before then.

Happy Black Friday, everybody.  STAY HOME or do something fun with your family that does NOT involve shopping all day.  That's my advice.

Decorating the Hanukkah cookies Evey baked Wednesday night.

All done!

Thanksgiving dinner

Showing off his new decals.

My new flatware.

Star Trek and Disney!  Two of his favorite things.