Tree is down, food is gone, presents put away and Zakiyas hoopball has returned! She got soo excited to see it this morning! I have to say, I was a bit nervous of rearranging the family room, putting up a huge tree, and all the commotion with the holidays but she did awesome! She was rather curious of it all instead of being scared and jumpy. Good time! Oh yeah...and the Patriots won last night!

Its always fun to see the holidays come, but its nice when they are over too. Everything is always so busy right before Christmas, traffic is awful and its usually so rainy (here at least) you don't wanna do anything outside.

You know you are old when you are glad Christmas is over! LOL I must be old!

You are not alone.........

But actually, Christmas is not over. It always amused us when we walk down the streets of New York City and see the trees on the curb a day or two after Xmas. There are 12 days to Christmas, and it begins on Christmas eve. It ends with the Epiphany, or in Mexico called the 3 Kings Day, that is the day they celebrate Christmas. The evening before Epiphany marks the end of Christmas.

My husband is European. Their tradition is to put up the tree on the 24th, decorate it into Christmas eve, then sing around the tree and exchange presents. The rest of the 12 days is spent enjoying Christmas as a family and social time, a celebration of light and festivities.

I always get a little bummed about Christmas being over.

Our tree went up around the 16th and came down on the 1st of January. I usually leave it up a couple of days into the New Year, but this time I had to be at work on the 2nd.

We have a sun room off the livingroom and that is where I put the tree this year. I wasn't sure how my Tiel was going to react having it in the livingroom. Replaced the spot where her home made cherry tree perch sits. She wasn't too shaken up over it all, so it was a good idea after all.

"Happy New Year" Too All....