Boo Hoo! Today is the saddest day of the year - Christmas being over and done with for another 365 days. Oh well, it was great while it lasted.
On Christmas Eve, we began our day by heading over to Austin. We had so much fun last year, cruising the aisles of the amazing new Whole Foods flagship store, that everyone wanted to go back this year to search for goodies to add to our Christmas feast. My mission was to find El Rey chocolate. According to Rebecca Rather, of A Rather Sweet Bakery in Fredericksburg, it's the only one worth baking with. Mission accomplished! Austin was not so fortunate. His goal, having just turned 21, was to cruise through their "Beer Alley" and find something unusual, or interesting to try, which he did. Unfortunately, since Christmas Eve fell on a Sunday this year, and it wasn't yet noon, Texas law forbade them from selling it to us. Poor Austin. Luckily, he did find an interesting hot cocoa mix containing cinnamon and ancho chilies, so that cheered him up a bit. Alexis had a great time wandering aisles full of clothing and beauty products made with natural fibers and ingredients, while John, as usual, ran around like a crazed person, filling his entire cart with more stocking stuffers for everyone (as if we didn't already have more than enough!) and trying his best to keep us all from spying on him. In our family, you only have to do something two years in a row before the kids will be saying "But Mooommm, you know it's a family tradition!" I guess a Christmas Eve trip to Whole Foods has now joined the hallowed ranks.
By the time we had finished lunch at a new spot called S. Congress Cafe (Yummo!), we needed to get our fannies back to Wimberley Pie Co., before they closed for the holidays. We had just enough time after that to kick back for a read or a snooze, before cleaning up and heading off to church. This year we decided to try St. Stephen's Episcopal, a beautiful little church that resembles an old Spanish mission, and which is just down the road from us. We were a little nervous about how to behave. However, despite the priests and kneeling benches, the similarities to what we were used to far outnumbered the differences, and we managed not to make any embarrassing mistakes. Since it was extremely cold, wet, and windy out, we opted to forgo walking the trail of lights this year, and went directly home to prepare our feast, which was followed by the usual bad "B" movie - this year the special anniversary edition of "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes" (the one that started this whole crazy tradition!)
In typical fashion, on Christmas day I was the first one up. I wanted to be nice and let everyone sleep a while longer, so I crept quietly out of the bedroom, softly shut the door behind me, made a cup of tea, then sat in the living room, writing and enjoying my beautifully lit tree. I was so good, I didn't even try to peek underneath the afghan that John had draped over the entire chair that held my stocking. When it was finally light outside, John woke up and joined me in the living room. After a while, when there were still no signs of life from downstairs, he got up and turned on some Christmas music, hoping that would rouse the kids. We waited patiently a while longer, and when I just couldn't stand it anymore, I started doing a hippo-ballerina dance, back and forth across our wood floors, directly above where they slept. That did the trick, and pretty soon we heard the pitter-patter of not-so-little feet, coming up the outside staircase. Surprisingly enough, they weren't dragging as I had expected, and even sounded almost perky. Even more amazing, instead of coming through the door with grumpy you-woke-me-up faces, they were actually grinning their heads off! When asked what was so funny, Lex began snickering, and Austin explained that not long after they heard the music, Alexis said "I guess we'd better go on upstairs. It sounds like Mom is getting restless." Austin replied "Nah. If she was really getting restless, you'd know it. She'd be clomping around on those wood floors, trying to wake us up." No sooner were the words out of his mouth, than they heard me launch into my hippo dance, and Austin just lifted his hands, gave her a what-did-I-tell-you grin and shrug, and they both burst out laughing. I'm afraid my kids know me a tad too well.
We had a lovely time opening gifts, and if Austin was a little disappointed in the crockpot he received (Lex let it slip that he was guessing the package contained an xbox), he hid it well. Once we had finished John's yummy Christmas breakfast, picked up the piles of wrapping paper balls that he and Austin insist on shooting at each other every year, and had a little time to play with our new toys (or crockpots), we were ready to head out for the traditional Christmas day movie. This year we decided to go see Ben Stiller and Robin Williams in A Night at the Museum. We also decided that if we drove into Austin this time, rather than San Marcos, we might have more choices of where to eat afterwards. We were correct and, in fact, had a whopping three choices. There was a fast food place that John abhors, a cafeteria which, my kids claim, doesn't allow anyone under 60 to come in, and yes, you guessed it, a Chinese place. At least this one wasn't an all-you-can-eat buffet. Instead it resembled a 50's diner, and the food wasn't half bad. When we got a cute little waitress with jet black hair, and with dimples and piercings to match Austin's own, and who couldn't seem to stop grinning at him, every time she came to the table, I sensed a new "family tradition" coming on. Sure enough, as soon as she walked away, Austin let out a long, low "Oooohh yeahhh - we are definitely coming back here again!"
On Christmas Eve, we began our day by heading over to Austin. We had so much fun last year, cruising the aisles of the amazing new Whole Foods flagship store, that everyone wanted to go back this year to search for goodies to add to our Christmas feast. My mission was to find El Rey chocolate. According to Rebecca Rather, of A Rather Sweet Bakery in Fredericksburg, it's the only one worth baking with. Mission accomplished! Austin was not so fortunate. His goal, having just turned 21, was to cruise through their "Beer Alley" and find something unusual, or interesting to try, which he did. Unfortunately, since Christmas Eve fell on a Sunday this year, and it wasn't yet noon, Texas law forbade them from selling it to us. Poor Austin. Luckily, he did find an interesting hot cocoa mix containing cinnamon and ancho chilies, so that cheered him up a bit. Alexis had a great time wandering aisles full of clothing and beauty products made with natural fibers and ingredients, while John, as usual, ran around like a crazed person, filling his entire cart with more stocking stuffers for everyone (as if we didn't already have more than enough!) and trying his best to keep us all from spying on him. In our family, you only have to do something two years in a row before the kids will be saying "But Mooommm, you know it's a family tradition!" I guess a Christmas Eve trip to Whole Foods has now joined the hallowed ranks.
By the time we had finished lunch at a new spot called S. Congress Cafe (Yummo!), we needed to get our fannies back to Wimberley Pie Co., before they closed for the holidays. We had just enough time after that to kick back for a read or a snooze, before cleaning up and heading off to church. This year we decided to try St. Stephen's Episcopal, a beautiful little church that resembles an old Spanish mission, and which is just down the road from us. We were a little nervous about how to behave. However, despite the priests and kneeling benches, the similarities to what we were used to far outnumbered the differences, and we managed not to make any embarrassing mistakes. Since it was extremely cold, wet, and windy out, we opted to forgo walking the trail of lights this year, and went directly home to prepare our feast, which was followed by the usual bad "B" movie - this year the special anniversary edition of "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes" (the one that started this whole crazy tradition!)
In typical fashion, on Christmas day I was the first one up. I wanted to be nice and let everyone sleep a while longer, so I crept quietly out of the bedroom, softly shut the door behind me, made a cup of tea, then sat in the living room, writing and enjoying my beautifully lit tree. I was so good, I didn't even try to peek underneath the afghan that John had draped over the entire chair that held my stocking. When it was finally light outside, John woke up and joined me in the living room. After a while, when there were still no signs of life from downstairs, he got up and turned on some Christmas music, hoping that would rouse the kids. We waited patiently a while longer, and when I just couldn't stand it anymore, I started doing a hippo-ballerina dance, back and forth across our wood floors, directly above where they slept. That did the trick, and pretty soon we heard the pitter-patter of not-so-little feet, coming up the outside staircase. Surprisingly enough, they weren't dragging as I had expected, and even sounded almost perky. Even more amazing, instead of coming through the door with grumpy you-woke-me-up faces, they were actually grinning their heads off! When asked what was so funny, Lex began snickering, and Austin explained that not long after they heard the music, Alexis said "I guess we'd better go on upstairs. It sounds like Mom is getting restless." Austin replied "Nah. If she was really getting restless, you'd know it. She'd be clomping around on those wood floors, trying to wake us up." No sooner were the words out of his mouth, than they heard me launch into my hippo dance, and Austin just lifted his hands, gave her a what-did-I-tell-you grin and shrug, and they both burst out laughing. I'm afraid my kids know me a tad too well.
We had a lovely time opening gifts, and if Austin was a little disappointed in the crockpot he received (Lex let it slip that he was guessing the package contained an xbox), he hid it well. Once we had finished John's yummy Christmas breakfast, picked up the piles of wrapping paper balls that he and Austin insist on shooting at each other every year, and had a little time to play with our new toys (or crockpots), we were ready to head out for the traditional Christmas day movie. This year we decided to go see Ben Stiller and Robin Williams in A Night at the Museum. We also decided that if we drove into Austin this time, rather than San Marcos, we might have more choices of where to eat afterwards. We were correct and, in fact, had a whopping three choices. There was a fast food place that John abhors, a cafeteria which, my kids claim, doesn't allow anyone under 60 to come in, and yes, you guessed it, a Chinese place. At least this one wasn't an all-you-can-eat buffet. Instead it resembled a 50's diner, and the food wasn't half bad. When we got a cute little waitress with jet black hair, and with dimples and piercings to match Austin's own, and who couldn't seem to stop grinning at him, every time she came to the table, I sensed a new "family tradition" coming on. Sure enough, as soon as she walked away, Austin let out a long, low "Oooohh yeahhh - we are definitely coming back here again!"
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