We’ve been settled in at Mission Bay RV Resort in San Diego since early December. Almost a month has flown by. Where does time go?
We are a couple days past Christmas. We just celebrated our third Christmas on the road. In our prior life, at this point, Other Half and I would be debating on stripping the house of holiday decor. In our open road life, no debate is necessary. Our holiday decor consists of a handful of Christmas cards.
Truth be told, I find it difficult to get into the holiday spirit – partly because the weather is just too darn nice. I’m still wearing sandals and only occasionally have on long pants. We’re Ohio natives, that means Christmas comes with cold weather and hopefully snow. Without that stuff the holiday spirit is a challenge.
The good news about spending the holidays in San Diego, besides the weather, is we are close to our daughter Meg, and her dog Beesly. We also have friends here, which helps. The bad news is we are a couple thousand miles away from much of our family and most of our friends. Missing loved ones is harder at this time of year.
As my good friend Lisa would say – Nothing’s free. No matter what you do or don’t do there’s a cost. The life we’ve chosen has its perks for sure. But, like everything, it has its cost.
At this time of year I find myself feeling nostalgic for the old normal. For us the old normal was hosting Downey Christmas the week before the holiday. Celebrating my sister Cindy’s Christmas Eve birthday with a pumpkin pie birthday “cake.’ Homemade cinnamon rolls and egg bake for Christmas morning. The highlight of the day was hosting our extended family for a prime rib Christmas dinner followed by marathon puzzle building.
So many years. So many memories. So much love.
I feel fortunate to have had the years of traditional holiday celebrations. I also feel fortunate to be building new holiday traditions.
Meg and I got into the holiday spirit with a day at Disneyland in Anaheim California.
Other Half and I spent a great evening at a pre-holiday party with fellow RVers. We had 22 people in a 45’ Tiffin Allegro Bus and there was still room!
This year our holiday dinner included our daughter Meg and our friends Donna and Mike Kuper. Donna and Mike are also full time RVers. Mike writes the daily blog flyingthekoop.com.
The five of us enjoyed a great meal of perfectly cooked prime rib, thanks to Other Half’s Traeger skills. Our sides were our favorite red potato/sweet potato mash, seafoam salad – a Winterhalter family tradition, and maple-chile roasted Brussel sprouts with butternut squash – prepared by Donna. Dessert was salted caramel cheesecake. We also had Bloody Mary’s, prosciutto wrapped asparagus, thanks to Donna, and edamame as appetizers. As you can tell, my GF Donna is a gourmet cook.
Meg and Beesly headed back to North Hollywood after dinner. The guys watched football. The girls gabbed. There may or may not have been wine and bourbon involved. It was a fun evening. Clearly, I set aside my FitBit Frenzy.
Our traditions may have changed, but there’s still lots of love. We know we’re blessed. Life is good.