My Christmas Wishes

It's Christmas Eve. We have everything ready for our holiday celebrations. Although HB and I have only been together five short years, we've already established some strong tradition and practice that we both love during this time of the year.

The one practice that I love the most is our mutual refusal to get stressed out at this time of the year. The first year we were together, the kids' mother started to make a fuss about when the kids would see HB. She has a lot of family tradition that is important to her, and that involves the kids. We gave on that one immediately. It's more important to us that we're relaxed and able to enjoy the kids than it is to see them on the actual December 25th date. To us, that's only one short day of this marvelous season!

So HB will go see them for an hour or so this afternoon before he comes home to me. We play guitar and sing at an early mass celebration at the parish I've gone to for years, and then we'll go visit some friends who have an annual Christmas Eve open house. This year, we're adding Midnight Mass to the mix ... we want to just go and "be" at a Christmas Mass in addition to the one we sing at every year. After that mass, we've been invited to a traditional Cape Breton Christmas Eve party that goes on all night long! We'll drop in there for a little bit, before heading home to get some sleep. We've both been sick with colds that are threatening to knock the best out of us if we're not careful.

Tomorrow morning, we'll get up when we get up. We'll open our gifts from each other, and our stockings. We'll have some breakfast, and then we'll load the car up for the one hour drive to my parents' place. We'll have a full day of music, family, food and gifts there with my side of the family. My father absolutely adores my husband, so it's always lots of fun to get together with them.

On Boxing Day, the kids will arrive for three days with us. We have all their gifts under the tree where Santa has left them on Christmas Eve ... Santa also fills a stocking for them at this house too! The grandparents (my parents and HB's mom) all arrive, along with HB's sister, her son and various other friends and cohorts throughout the day. We cook another full dinner and enjoy the company of friends and family for another celebration. Inevitably the guitars and mandolin get broken out, and a good old kitchen party takes place.

We like it. The kids are not driven from house to house and family to family. They are much more manageable in terms of their excitement, and we all get to enjoy each other over a period of days, rather than trying to cram everything into one day.

I have lots of Christmas wishes this year ... and I will leave you with my Christmas wish list.

• That Cecily will continue to have a healthy pregnancy that results in a little person filled with all the awesome characteristics of both she and Charlie ... imagine the beauty of that baby;
• That Olivia will experience pain free days and be discovered by the rest of the world as the amazing artist that she has shown us to be;
• That Tiffani's home visit brings about exactly the results she wants;
• That Julianna gets that regular experience of lightness and laughter again that she has asked for;
• That Sara will continue to experience the honeymoon happiness she's currently living;
• That everyone on this list gets a moment of peace on this hellish journey of infertility.

I'd be lying if I didn't add myself to the list. I'm continuing to wish for the acceptance of what is to be for me in my life - as a stepmother, wife, daughter, sister, friend, employee, student (did I mention that I got accepted to the Master's program for which I had applied???), and if it's to be, as a biological mother. I wish for acceptance and strength.

Merry Christmas.