Until Next Year...

My lips are the color of bright pink hot pants and my face, arms and jeans are covered in body glitter. Such is life when you get a makeover at a 4 year old's birthday party on Boxing Day (Canada's version of Black Friday, retail-wise).

Tomorrow I attend Christmas gathering five. Five! So overwhelmed am I by this Christmas season that I've been getting up early (relatively speaking, of course) just so I can move to the couch and nap in the glow of the Christmas tree, enjoying every possible moment before it's time to put it all away.

I wish I had taken time off work. To prolong the inevitable. To putz around the house, doing nothing more than catching up with friends between cheesy movies on the W channel and naps in front of the fire. But, alas, it's almost all over. Tonight is the last night I don't have to set an alarm and tomorrow is the last of the Christmas gatherings. I'm down to the last of the candles for my German pyramid... A Christmas trinket I've wanted for years and stumbled upon in a local flower shop. With no price tag, I played the game of "I won't pay more than..." in my mind, knowing I had paid $80 for one as a gift to my mother almost two decades ago and having seen similar ones online not that long ago for $300.

And so, with trepidation, I asked the store manager how much it was... only to be told he'd give it to me for $45. And so it came to be, this new Christmas tradition. The heat from the candles causing the blades to turn, making the characters on each level
go round and round. It's a shame to put it away. It all seems to have gone by so quickly.

It ended too soon.