My Holidays

So after spending most of the past week in Salt Lake, alone in my cold apartment, working retail and slowly growing to despise Christmas music (for real, the chipmunks should be shot) and watching old movies I am finally home sweet home in Mapleton Utah, ready for "the holidays" which is a rather vague description. I guess that makes it so every person can decide what it means to them. For me "the holidays" means traditions and family. Every year, excepting the year we got stuck in a blizzard, the traditions get up and rolling on Christmas eve. Christmas eve means that either my family goes to my aunt's house or my aunt's family comes to us and we eat our Christmas eve dinner. I bet I know what you're picturing, some sort of delicious large meat with potatoes and gravy and rolls right? Wrong. In the Swensen household Christmas Eve dinner means crepes filled with strawberries, chocolate and whip cream with a side of greasy sausage and bacon. I don't actually like crepes all that much but once a year, and only once a year, I choke one down because... it's tradition! Even the year we got caught in a blizzard and couldn't make it to my aunts and had no fruit filling we stopped at a Walgreens and got frozen fruit bars and came home and made crepes. After the crepes theres some adult time talking and child merriment before everyone gets in their vehicles and heads home, or stays where they are depending. After the family frivolity our family gets down to bidness. We open our Christmas eve present, not to give it away, but it's alway pajamas. The kids go and change. Then we listen to "The Happy Prince." It's this super old recorded story that started as a record from my great grandma and trickled down until my dad had it turned into a cd. It's old and scratchy and one of the most beautiful stories ever. Then we usually read the story of Christmas in the Bible. We round of the night by watching "A Christmas Story" or some other festive film. Then it's off to bed for us kids, who usually pile in one room to sleep. Christmas means waking up early, and waiting anxiously at the top of the stairs for the parents to awake and for Christmas to start. Santa always leaves our presents on the couch, but this year is going to wrap some too. After Santa we unwrap the rest of the family gifts. Then everyone plays with their new toys or takes a nap. The day after Christmas is where the family comes in. It means a 4 hour drive up to Twin Falls Idaho. It means seeing all the aunts and uncles from my dad's side of the family. It means a massive tempura fry with veggies, shrimp, and chicken for the kids and me who can't eat shrimp in one of the family owned grocery stores. After stuffing ourselves with the Japanese version of KFC its back to grandma's for the gift exchange. Which is huge. And takes forever. And is awesome, as long as you don't have to be "Santa," which is just annoying. After that the kids are shooed away and the adults play white elephant. This game is epic on it's own, but when you have two uncles who own grocery stores the presents are even more epic and range from Tide racing jackets to beef jerky trucker hats. The following days pass in a haze of movie watching, wrestling small children and playing a lot of house. But wait there's more. See we have yet to cover New Year's eve. We're back home by then and always party hard with our family friends. There's a nice meal and then the older kids find a party while the adults go to sleep or talk. It's always loads of fun.

I don't know why I felt inclined to share every last one of my holiday traditions with all you readers. I guess with so many of my friends married and or engaged it makes me think of a time in the distant future where the Holidays will be different, and mean something different. I'm not sure how I feel about that, and about making new traditions. I mean it's part of life, but does it have to be? Oh well. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. For now I guess this blog post will be incredibly boring to most and a documentation of my history for others, and by others I mean just me. After all they are my Holidays.