Christmas is over and a new year has begun. Every single year, this takes me by surprise. How is it that we have tucked another holiday season under our belts and girded ourselves for 2013? 2013! That still sounds impossibly futuristic to me. I do love the beginning of new years, though. Jon and I rang this one in very quietly, at home on our couch, watching the latest Batman movie on our new Blu-ray player and tuning in to a time-delayed NYC broadcast just in time to see the ball drop and to share a sweet kiss. I’m okay with that start to this year. Quiet, at home with the things that really matter. Maybe next year we’ll dress up and find somewhere exciting to go. But this year, quiet was just right.

It was a good Christmas. We spent a week with Jon’s family in Georgia. Corin spent long hours roaming the cold, wet outdoors with Grandpa, and I enjoyed the freedom to get down on the floor and really soak in Baby Girl. Lina is smiling and cooing like nobody’s business, and it makes me happy. Sometimes I feel as if she might be getting gypped with how divided my attention often is at home. I do make time to cuddle and talk to her, to get down to her eye level and cheer for her tummy time achievements, but often I’m stopping to tickle her for a moment or to get in her face for a quick smile and hello as I pass on my way to put away more laundry or to help big brother with his pants for another potty break. (Ah, potty training, there’s a topic for another day. I’ve said that before, haven’t I?!)

In any case, this Christmas, the riches of family willing to entertain my children meant I got to spend some good one-on-one time with each of them. And then there was the glorious food, the gifts, the holiday movies, the church musical, the telling and re-telling of the Greatest Story until Corin could recite it back to us. (By the way, if you don’t have it, this is now my very favorite kids’ Christmas book.)

We made a stop to see friends in Knoxville for one night on our way home, and then it was New Year’s on the couch and a second Christmas with my family, which was complicated by sickness that has since taken up dwelling at our house. (Croup? Really? I had the clearly mistaken impression that only happened in Anne of Green Gables novels.) But Corin and his cousin still got some good time together to play with new Christmas treasures, and as always, the memories are the very best thing we take from the holidays into the new year.

Watching Christmas movies with my boy