Weekend

I have had the opportunity to think about alot of things this weekend. These past few weeks, I have heard rumors about a friend of mine. I didn't know whether or not they were true, and it was bothering me that so many people felt as though they had to "weigh in" on the rumor without even knowing whether or not it was true. This person has always been special to me and we have always remained friends over the years. So, I emailed them to ask if the rumor was true. I felt really akward being so forward and direct about such a sensitive topic, but I felt as though I owed it to them to find out directly from the source whether or not it was true. My friend was very sweet in their reply and answered my question and made sure that I knew how much they appreciated me coming to them. I am glad that I went directly to my friend because after I had my little baby Robin, apparently alot of people were all wondering why I couldn't tell that she had died. Instead of asking me this question directly, I had to hear it through the grapevine and it really hurt my feelings that people wouldn't just ask me that themselves. I know that people are trying to be sensitive when they talk about things like that, but I would have really appreciated someone asking me directly instead of it going around the whole city with no one actually wanting to find out for sure. When that happened to me, it made me realize how hurtful gossip can be, even when we think that we are sparing others feelings.
This weekend, my sister, Amanda and her husband Dayln came down for Friday night and Saturday. My brother Jason, his wife Suzanne, my sister Kristin and her friend Elise all came over and we hung out for the evening. It was really fun. It was really neat for me to realize that we actually do alot of things with my siblings now that they are older and starting to get married. I never thought that this day would come because when we were growing up we were all so different from each other and we fought all the time. I really hope that my kids can grow up to be close to their siblings because it is really important to me to have the family spend time together.
As Christmas time gets closer, and I keep getting more and more excited for the holidays, I have begun to decorate my house for Christmas. Some people have told me that this is a bit early, but then again, they don't know me very well and so they don't know that I have actually been buying Christmas presents since August. Silly people. In my family it has always been tradition to have each of the kids have their own Christmas trees. In our house, we decided that it would work better if each of the kid's bedrooms had their own trees. That will bring the grand total of Christmas trees in our house to 5. Not quite the 7 that my mom had when I was growing up, but give me a few more years and we will see!! For Abby and Anne's room, I bought this gorgeous 7' tall white christmas tree with white LED fiber optic lights from Costco. I then went out yesterday with Amanda, Dayln and Kristin and bought a whole bunch of silver, blue and purple christmas decorations. . . . with sparkly ones of course. This tree is every little girl's dream tree, I think. We have decided to call it the Snow Princess tree because it sparkles so much and we even found sparkling tiara ornaments that are on the tree. It really is a beautiful tree. Caroline is lucky enough to get the tree that I had when I was growing up and all of the leaves on that tree are made out of aluminium. It is a really pretty tree, and I remember how excited I was every year to decorate it. She also gets all of my old ornaments, which I think she will like because they are all pink and silver and white. Dustin's tree is a fiber optic tree that changes color. . . . I can't wait to see him at night once it is turned on!!
I have decided to do a memorial tree for Robin. I call it my Angel tree. I have ordered a bunch of angel ornaments from Willow Tree and I am excited for them to arrive so that I can decorate my tree. It is going to be hard to go through Christmas, this year, knowing that we are missing someone, but hopefully we will be able to feel as though Robin is with us when we look at this tree. It is a really weird feeling that I get inside when I think about Christmas because I am so excited, but it really makes me miss my little baby that I should have had. We will not have an infant to play baby Jesus in the Christmas Eve Nativity this year, and so I am dreading Christmas Eve just a little bit because of that. It will be hard.
Well, I seem to have written a novel today, and maybe that is because I haven't written for a couple of days, or maybe that is because most of my family is now sick and this is the few minutes of peace that I seem to be able to steal away for myself. Either way, thanks for taking the time to read this one.