Christmas is usually a pretty routine deal, even sharing the holidays between two families. Usually it involves dinner with Will’s side of the family and then opening a few presents and dinner with my side. This year we added a little pizazz to our Christmas festivities.We had already seen Will’s mom the week before and they don’t really celebrate Christmas since they are all in the military and were almost never in one place over the holidays. So it was dinner as usual, just a week early.
We drove up to Richmond to see my parents on Christmas Eve. We did something completely new and decided to cook them dinner since for some reason they love frozen dinners…not going to fly with us. We eat fresh vegetables and meat so we were going to have a non frozen dinner.We broke out all of the pots and pans that I’m sure have barely seen the light of day since the 70s… yes they were almost all over 20 years old… We made fresh and from scratch mashed potatoes with russet and sweet potatoes, vegetable casserole with zucchini, squash, onion, peppers, green beans, etc.We then grilled some DELICIOUS steaks in the skillet. It was a huge success as were the diabetes friendly carrot cake and not so friendly cookies that we shared with friends we saw later. Stuffed to the brim we bid my parents adieu and left to see some Christmas lights. Before you get all offended that we ditched family on the family holiday, my parents go to bed super early so we stayed a while then went to enjoy the night.
Downtown Richmond always has tons of neat lights, especially at the Jefferson, but we went to something a little less ritzy and saw a local’s favorite Christmas spot. Richmond has a Tacky Lights Tour every year that brings out hundreds of us in droves…if you know where to look. They have paid tours that take you everywhere, but it’s not necessary. Two weeks before Christmas they have a fun run 5k that lets you run past all of the houses with the amazing lights, but we missed that.In order to be qualified to be featured on this Tacky Lights Tour you have to have a minimum of 40,000 lights on your house and in your yard. I’m pretty sure they all have at least double that. We drove and somehow found parking on the first try in the middle of a neighborhood packed with people walking around seeing the lights on two houses on the tour. We even brought Atlas who had several toddlers fall in love with him and follow him around for 15 minutes straight.
We were blown away. The amount of lights on these two houses was insane. It was so bright they lit up the entire street. How they could afford that electric bill was beyond me, but they did have donation stands set up, hot chocolate you could buy and pictures with Santa. I’m sure they made out well, especially since it was their 41st year of doing it. They had your regular string of lights bedazzling the trees, but they also had crazy unique lights set up like melting snowmen, bowling alleys, kissing reindeer, hot air balloons, airplanes, and so so so much more. Pictures are probably the only thing that can do it justice.
After having our minds blown we decided we wanted to walk around more so we hopped over to Short Pump Town Center, which is a giant outdoor mall that allows dogs. We walked around and saw some lights, but nothing on the level of what we had seen, but definitely enjoyable nonetheless.Another tradition of mine before both of us moved out of state was to go over to my long time friend’s house (Laura) and enjoy being with her family and maybe sing some tunes together on the piano. We walked in and her dog immediately fell in love with Atlas and followed him around all night and kept trying to play with him at all costs. They clearly had an amazing time. I hadn’t seen Laura in over a year and her family in over 2. It was great to catch up with them, play with the pups, and just relax with some piano music and good friends.
Christmas morning was uneventful since my parents decided to sleep in to almost 10. I took the dog for a 1.5 mile walk and enjoyed breakfast with Will. When my parents finally woke up we enjoyed unwrapping super neat presents and just hanging out together. We stayed for a while and enjoyed the day, but headed back to Greenville that afternoon so we could beat traffic. All in all it was a great holiday with lots of the same old tradition and new experiences that made this Christmas unique.The spirit on Christmas is the spirit of love and of generosity and of goodness. It illuminates the picture window of the soul, and we look out upon the world's busy life and become more interested in people than in things."--Thomas S. Monson
