Confessions of a Serial Swooper

Remember the Warners?

You probably don’t unless you read this (click for a blog I did roughly a year ago).

In short, we received a Christmas card last year from a sweet looking family.  A beautiful card.  A happy little boy.  Some heartfelt Christmas wishes sent from our “friends”.   The Warners.

Problem was, we had no holy idea who they were.

We struggled over it.  Wracked our collective brains.  Emptied the coffers of memory lane and came up with…nuthin’.

I felt badly that I hadn’t sent them a card.  Because clearly (considering the hand-written address on front — an address found for us despite the fact that we’ve moved a bajillion times in the last four years), clearly they were someone we knew.

I was sure Husband was forgetting someone.  He, I’m sure, thought the same of me.

So, I dutifully hung the Warners card with our others.  And did a blog, hoping maybe one of you might recognize them.  You didn’t.

The Warners.  Circa 2009.

You know where this is headed, right?

Guess who remembered us this year.

The Warners.  Circa 2010.

Can you believe it?  It appears our dear friends Kim and Brian made Bryson a big brother this year!  Congratulations Kim and Brian!

A new baby and still Kim makes time to send the annual Christmas card to her dear friends Chez Swooper.

Seriously.

WTF?

Who are these people?

Husband and I can hardly stand it.  He was convinced, again, that it was someone I know…

You’re the one, they know.  What with your 453 close, personal Facebook friends…

I’ll give him that I have a lot of “friends” via Facebook but I’m also damn sure that if any single one of them sent me a Christmas card I would certainly know who they were.  Especially when they give a last name (2009) and then all the first names in 2010.  No doubt.

I.  don’t.  know.  them.

I worked on convincing Husband it was a vendor of his from work.  Some random guy scoring some points when he asked his poor wife, Kim, to throw our name on a list once Husband took this new job and we moved back to the Boston area.

No dice.  Husband’s sure.

So, we resorted to the source of all mystery solving.

We Googled them.

B-r-i-a-n    W-a-r-n-e-r.

Ummm.

No.  Probably not that Brian Warner.

Anyway, here we are.  Again.  Remembered by this nice family from mail-routing-location BOSTON.  This nice family who took the time (again) to send us a card despite the clearly busy lives they must have, what with new baby Chase and keeping up with toddler Bryson and all.

I think I love you, Warners.   You are kind and giving and I appreciate that you cared about us.

I hope you send me a card next year even thought I suck and have never, ever sent you one in return.

But, I guess you never ask for that, do you?

Because you, my Warner family mystery friends?

You know the true meaning of Christmas.

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The emotions of the holidays have grabbed ahold of me.  And, tightly.

This time of year, I find myself casting a loving gaze on my children and lingering with it just a little longer than usual.  Pulling away as my eyes well up with grateful tears.

This season, I reach over to hold my husband’s hand across the gear shift of our car and the feel of his now 8-year old wedding band in my fingers makes me smile happily to myself.

Today, I breathe in deeply the scent of a crackling fire in our fireplace and feel so thankful — safe and content in my warm, comfortable home.   In the seaside town I love so much.

Tonight, I can barely hold back happy sobs at the touch of Little Brother’s tiny hand on my face.  Or, Big Brother’s homemade card hidden under my pillow.

It’s a beautiful time of year to take stock in all that we have.  All the love and sweetness that surrounds us every day.

My home.

My husband.

My children.

I see it all so much more clearly this time of year.

And, consequently, I’m finding my emotions are so close to surface.   All the time.

Maybe just a little too close?

Sometimes.

‘Cause, seriously, this ridiculous ad makes me bawl.   Like, every single time.

And, it airs about nine thousand times a day.

I mean, come on.

Collect yourself, woman.

Really.

_____

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I know, I know.  Haven’t been doing much in the blog lately.  If any of you actually missed me, my apologies.  But, the thing is I love love love this time of year and have really been working on making this season as special as possible for my boys.  At three and at six, they are in their prime when it comes to feeling the magic of Christmas.  They are full up to their little wide eyes with wonder and excitement.   And despite the fact that Big Brother quoted “The magic of Macy’s” the other day and this guy still showed up…

…Husband and I are working on making this year a little less commercial and a little more traditional.

My first big accomplishment was that I managed to put together a Gingerbread House (albeit a small one) and with Christmas music playing in the background, let the boys decorate it.   The second big accomplishment was the fact that I didn’t totally ruin their experience by micro-managing how neatly they did (or didn’t) apply all the candy.

And, then, yesterday we did the best, most traditional thing of all.  For the first time, we drove almost an hour out to a tree farm in Littleton, searched and searched and (yay!) cut down our very own Christmas Tree.  Despite the fact that there wasn’t any snow on the ground (which, admittedly, took away from the whole winter scene experience an eensy bit), it was a really wonderful trip for all of us.  And the kids got to see the tree go from this…

To this…

Ah, the magic of Christmas.

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