In my experience of the past half-a-dozen years, the 10th of December is always an exhausting day. The seeds for this fiesta were of course sown many years ago (no pun intended!). But the annual celebrations have taken on a unique pattern of their own. Uncannily, I can now trace similarities between his birth day and his birthdays!
The whole family typically gets involved & plans for travel are made. The first time, parents and in-laws had to come to us of course. As a first grandchild on both sides, his day is special to everyone in the family. So each year since then, one or more grandparent(s) come visiting or we all head to an exotic locale to celebrate.
It starts out with much fanfare and a countdown can’t be ruled out. There are multiple announcements of “It’s coming!” strewn about in days and weeks preceding. I had a little “countdown to EDD” app on my phone, and H has now taken up the task of creating a calendar for himself that he happily crosses off days on.
I also make a lot of ambitious “setup” plans by scouring many Pinterest boards. Once a new board has been created and jammed with a hundred different ideas, a hundred more are suggested every time you log in to this wormhole of an app. My reaction to most pins I save can eventually be categorised into:
- That looks so easy. I’m sure I can manage that
- I wish someone would make this for me
(Spoiler alert: People justifiably charge a lot of money for doing things which you may feel are easy to do yourself. Also, it’s never as easy as it looks!)
The day starts off with excitement and a lot of photo-recording of the things that are happening. I feel that my plans are starting to come to fruition so I’m generally strutting about, oblivious to the fact that things are about to get out of control.
Somewhere in the afternoon or early evening, the actual event happens. And by then, I’m so physically tired that I just plonk myself and let others take over. I never manage to get too many good photos of the evening, and am literally ready to sleep at 7 pm!
That’s how it all started, and that’s exactly how it still going!
