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Showing posts with label christmas 2023. Show all posts
Showing posts with label christmas 2023. Show all posts

Sunday, December 24, 2023

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

While preparing macaroni salad yesterday, Sweetie started to play the piano. He began with "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas". I started to tear up because it's one of Mom's favorite Christmas songs. She would always listen to a radio station that only played songs from their era. "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" always played on that station and Mom would increase the volume. 

This is the first Christmas we're celebrating without Mom. December had always been a busy month for us since Mom, Tito Tony, Kuya Koko and Tito Ben would celebrate their birthdays. Then there's Kuya and Ate Joy's anniversary, plus our wedding anniversary. Since we got home we'd always celebrate Mom's birthday with her favorite food. And there has to be cake. She preferred celebrating at home than going out. Then there would be noche buena, Christmas day and media noche and New Year.


Last Christmas with Mom. 


Last year, it was very hard to convince Mom to celebrate her birthday and Christmas. She was just not in the mood for it. She still came to hear mass with us and eat, but her mood was very different. It was very unusual since she loved to eat especially if you provided her favorite drink, Coca Cola (original only please). 

And now she's gone. She would want us to celebrate as usual, so that's why I broke down preparations for noche buena across two days. Didn't buy any softdrinks since she's the only one who drinks it. We didn't get any gifts for ourselves since we got busy with me being hospitalized and recovery. We only got gifts for our support teams. I told family and friends I'm a month delayed with my to-do list, so gifts were affected. What's important anyway is we have each other. 

Just celebrating at home (as usual). No get togethers for now since I'm still recovering, plus it's too risky to go out. Hopefully, the boys will be happy with our noche buena spread. I'm cooking enough food so we have leftovers until Christmas day. 

Merry Christmas everyone. 

#BeKind #StaySafe

Wednesday, September 6, 2023

Listening to Christmas Songs in September

As soon as September 1 rolled in, I started playing Christmas songs. Because, why not? The Philippines has the longest Christmas in the world. I don't really know when that started because when I was younger it was usual for Mom to start decorating after All Souls Day. She'd usually do some "spring" cleaning and the next day the decors are up. 




Mom loved the Christmas season. Her birthday is in December. Oh, and Tito Ben's,Tito Tony's, my MIL and Kuya Koko's birthdays are also in December. We also celebrate several wedding anniversaries in December. I guess that's one reason why it's always a festive month in our family. Mom and Dad always invited family and friends in our home. They preferred to have people visit and my friends have happy memories of visiting our home. 




It's been awhile since I really celebrated Christmas. We had Mom over last Christmas and Sweetie just set up the tree on Christmas eve. We weren't able to send out all our gifts! This year I'd like to celebrate Christmas the way Mom used to do it. Told myself I have to prepare early and that's why I'm listening to Christmas songs this early.

It'll be Christmas before you know it, so I'll use the "ber" months to prepare and celebrate Papa Jesus' birthday properly. He is, after all, the reason for the season!

#BeKind #StaySafe