New Thing #362: Taking The Family To See The Tree

It's easy to do nothing. It's easier to stay at home and rationalize:

"By the time we got the kids packed up and ready…"

or, "It'll be too crowded..."

or, "We can always do it next year…"

And that's how you can live in a place for your whole life and not end up doing the kinds of things that people travel across the world to do in your home city.

There's a lot in New York that falls into that category - stuff I always think I'll get around to at some point but might never do.

That's part of why I wanted to try so many New Things this year.

But visiting the tree at Rockefeller Center is not one of those things.

We've been to the Rockefeller Center tree a bunch of times.

No trip there was more memorable than January 2, 1994. I know the date because I would have much rather stayed home that Sunday watching football (it was the day Emmitt Smith pretty much single-handedly beat the Giants on the last day of the season with what was later revealed to be a separated shoulder), but my mom arranged for all of us to go into the city, visit the tree, and go out to dinner.

There was another good trip in 2002 or 2003 - we took a family picture, including my future wife. That moment is still captured in a "Christmas in New York" ornament my mom got for us (and for her…and I think my brother and sister) that Christmas.

And four years ago my wife and my mom and my sister took my two daughters to see the tree. I was not there because my brother and my dad and I were in Indianapolis to watch a Jets game. (Such a great trip.)

All of this is to say that I've never taken my family to see the tree.

So this year, as part of our Christmas visit to New York, we included a trip to the tree. And it was great. Me, my wife, our three daughters, and my parents took the subway into Manhattan, walked over to Rockefeller Center, then back up 5th Avenue to get back on the train. It wasn't the longest visit, but it was effective - we had a great time.

I liked sharing Christmastime in the city with my kids.

And the best part of it all?

We can always do it again next year.

New Thing #355: Ornamentation

It's not the idea that's new today - we decorate for Christmas every year in this house. And it's not so much the decorations themselves, though some, like the Jets ornament you see at left (a gift from a friend who knew I didn't have a Jets ornament) are in fact new.

It's more the way that every year at this time, even the same old thing can feel like a New Thing.

I told you earlier this month about how decorating the outside of the house with a New Thing helped spice that up.

Inside the house, in addition to the Jets football ornament, there's that Mets ornament hanging next to it, in which there's a picture of me and my nephew at his first Mets game from two summers ago. This is its first year on the tree.

That's part of what's special about all of these little knick-knacks hanging all around the house this time of year - remembering certain events or certain people or certain situations in which you were given these knick-knacks.

But the other special thing, I'm trying to find the words for it.

I love my in-home decorating. This is my favorite thing:

It's the moulding (I'm not sure exactly what to call it) over the entranceway between our dining room and living room, where we have our tree. To the right is a series of "Our Family" ornaments. Each year we get a new one (I've learned to get them early in the season so we don't miss out…and this sometimes means I'm buying a Christmas ornament in late October or early November, which I have a big problem with, but I need this ornament each year), and pictures of our family throughout the year stretch down that ledge.

To the left, above, and to the right of the overhang is where I tape up the Christmas cards we get. Usually the cards fill both sides of the wall.

I don't know why I love this so much. Probably because of a couple of things: 1) It's a tangible reminder, right where we sit so often as a family, of all of our family and friends, and 2) I really love getting Christmas cards. I love how the collection starts with one or two shortly after Thanksgiving, and grows and grows, and by the time it's today, the Saturday after our last day of school, and we're on vacation, the walls are covered with cards and it's like it's Christmas already.

It makes me happy. Every year.

And it's one of the oldest traditions in the books, I'd bet.

But every year it feels like a brand New Thing.

New Thing #339: A Holiday Light Addition

For a few years my holiday house-decorating routine has been the same: Icicle lights hanging over the garage.

The colorful lights shaped like a tree under the living room, where the sparkling ball hangs at the top.

There's the string of snowmen in the living room window, and the wreath on the door.

I love it, but I was always on the lookout for just the right thing to add to the display.

This year I found it.

It's the snowflake you see at the top. You'll remember, once I successful climbed a ladder last month, that nothing was going to stop me from reaching the previously unreachable parts of my house.

And when I found this snowflake in the store last week, I knew it was going to be perfect for that one spot that seemed a little bit empty among all of the Christmas lights but I just didn't know how to fill it.

So it all came together perfectly, until I got home and opened the box and saw this:

I guess I expected the snowflake to come right out of the box ready to go on the wall. But, alas, some assembly was required.

So I put together the pieces and decided it didn't matter if I messed up (no two are alike!), and went outside to hang it up.

I only planned on putting up the snowflake and not the rest of the lights, but the girls got excited, and once I dug out one thing I figured, why not take out everything, and so it all took shape:

The icicle lights hanging over the garage.

The colorful lights shaped like a tree under the living room, where the sparkling ball hangs at the top.

The string of snowmen in the living room window.

The wreath on the door.

And the snowflake hanging underneath the window.

Perfect.

New Thing #337: An Advent Calendar

When I was growing up we had a simple little Advent calendar. It was a square piece of felt that hung on the wall with 25 pouches, and there was this little mouse that moved from square to square.

We liked having it out each year - well, at least I did.

I think my brother and sister did too.

For a while now, I've been looking for something similar for my kids to enjoy each year around Christmas.

This year we found this one.

I found it at Target - it's not the highest quality, but it'll do for now until I find the perfect one.

As you can see it's shaped like a Christmas tree, and you move a snowflake from pouch to pouch.

The big decision now is whether we count down to 1 (as in days until Christmas) or up to 25 (the big day!).

There were other choices at Target - one was shaped like a tree, made out of glass or ceramic, and another was wood, shaped like a house.

The problem with them was they were both the kind that had doors that opened up.

And my wife and I are in no state these days to come up with 25 little surprises for each day leading up to Christmas. (Or 75, because I'm not sure we could convince the girls to get into a 3-day rotation. Though we'd have to, wouldn't we? Still - we can't even do 25.)

I always envisioned an Advent calendar that hung on the wall.

And that's what we found for now. It's just not exactly what I had in mind.

But the good news is that while I'm out looking for the perfect Advent calendar, at least we have this one to use until we find it.

New Thing #333: Ritz Chips

I'm not a huge snacker. But when I do snack it's usually on something I love, like Cape Cod potato chips.

So I'll go way overboard and eat entire bags at a time.

And that's the kind of snacking I could do on this newest snack food I discovered.

To say I discovered it is kind of misleading - there was a bag sitting open on the counter the other day that I just started to devour.

I didn't even realize what I was eating.

Let me start with a couple of weeks ago - the girls asked for a mid-afternoon snack. They wanted some crackers and hummus. We had some graham crackers, some regular, circular Ritz crackers (one of my favorite children's malapropisms is when my girls ask for one Ritz cracker and they say, "I'll have a Rit." Is that a malapropism?), and some plain Ritz chips.

I had never seen Ritz chips before, but they were pretty good. It was like a Ritz cracker just in chip form. Nothing wrong with it.

But that day I had one and gave the rest to the girls and that was that.

The other day, though, when I came home from school and started noshing on these other Ritz chips that were on the counter, I just could not stop. I couldn't figure out why I found these irresistible, more than the previous day at least, until I finally took a close look at the bag - they were cheddar-flavored.

Delicious. I literally could not put them down.

The last thing I need today, the day after Thanksgiving, is something to snack on.

But I bet the cheddar-flavored Ritz chips go really well with leftover turkey sandwiches.

New Thing #332: Helping Prepare Thanksgiving Dinner

I love Thanksgiving. By far it's my favorite holiday.

This year, we're hosting.

And I love hosting Thanksgiving.

But I know that I've never been all that much help.

Usually when we host I'm in charge of "taking care of the kids"…which basically means "watching the parade"…so basically, my way of helping prepare Thanksgiving dinner at age 30 is really no different from how I helped prepare Thanksgiving dinner at age 7.

The first time we hosted Thanksgiving, I'm pretty sure, was 2006. We had both my family and my wife's family for dinner…and November 2006 would mean we had an almost-two-months-old baby.

I was a great host - I can be quite charming - but I wasn't very helpful with the food. (I am also a great cheerleader - I made sure to tell everyone that day how much work my wife was doing.) I did do a great job of making sure people had plenty to drink.

Another year we hosted I ran a 4-mile race in the morning. I came back just in time to watch the second half of the parade with our daughters - I think there were two that time.

Now we're hosting and there are three children.

I told my wife I'd help. She told me I could help scoop squash out of a cooked squash, or I could boil the cranberries because then apparently they pop and become cranberry sauce.

I picked the cranberry sauce.

Yes, that picture above is the cranberries in a pan. That's what I thought I was doing with the cranberries - cooking them in a pan. I guess I'm not being all that helpful. (By the time you read this on Thanksgiving Day I will probably have made my contribution to Thanksgiving dinner! And then I'll be watching football.)

But it's a step in the right direction.

And let's not underestimate my charm as a host. That's like cooking three turkeys.

New Thing #329: Underneath The Tree

I don't usually listen to Christmas music before Thanksgiving. It's Thanksgiving weekend when I include the all-Christmas-music radio stations in the channel-changing rotation, when I take out the Christmas piano music, when I put up the Christmas lights, for that matter.

But this year, maybe because of how late Thanksgiving is, I've decided today is the right day for a Christmas-themed Music Monday.

I asked my brother what the hot new Christmas song was going to be this year, and he looked at me like I didn't know what I was talking about…because I guess there's not a hot new Christmas song every year.

But it just so happens there will be this year - and it's called Underneath The Tree.

I guess Kelly Clarkson has an entire new album - but it doesn't matter, because this is the song that's going to become the new Christmas standard.

It's right up my alley.

I love Mariah Carey's All I Want For Christmas Is You. I know there's a love-hate relationship with that song - either people love it or they hate it, that is - and when Matthew compared the Kelly Clarkson song to the Mariah Carey song, well, I was sold.

I love the fast pace of the song, the belt-it-out vocals, the 1950s-sounding horns - it all works for me. (It's a bit long for a Christmas song, but right now I'm going to go ahead and call that a good thing. Ask me again in a couple of weeks when the song is in heavy rotation.)

It's November 25th. We're a month out from Christmas. It's time to start paying some attention to the songs of the season.

And - fair warning - if you're not seeking out this song, don't worry, it'll find you pretty soon. I think it'll be everywhere.

And, just for good measure, here's a new spin (I can't believe this was a year ago already) on one of my all-time favorites:

New Thing #304: A Jack-O-Lantern Design

For a long time I've thought about doing something on a pumpkin besides the traditional scary or silly-looking jack-o-lantern. But I've always thought it was going to be just too hard.

This year, though, is all about jumping in and trying something that I always thought might be too hard.

So, I carved a pumpkin with a design on it.

Now, rest assured - I am not turning into a Red Sox fan.

I guess I just find the Red Sox and their logo and their ballpark aesthetically pleasing.

And I love my daughters. And they're very excited about Halloween. And carving pumpkins. And they like the idea of the Red Sox in the World Series.

So all of that adds up to a Red Sox pumpkin.

Let me take you through the steps picture by picture.

 I've told you about my trouble settling on big decisions. Figuring out what to carve was one such decision. I toyed with the idea of something Mets-related, but the 'NY' looked too difficult. (Plus, what would I tell the neighbors. It would invite too many questions, not the least of which would be, "With the Red Sox in the World Series you carved a Mets pumpkin why...?") My original idea was the Boston 'B'. I found this stencil on-line at mlb.com and dove right in.

I was not at all pleased with my drawing. (You can see that picture at the top of the post.) I didn't like the proportions. But, as I joked on social media, I was either going to do a great jack-o-lantern or destroy a pumpkin. I figured it was reckoning time. And it looked like we were heading towards the 'destroy' option.

(I should say here that my daughters and my wife cleaned out the pumpkins of the pulp and seeds. I have tactile issues and hate touching the inside of a pumpkin. My wife rather enjoys it.) I was going to have my wife do the carving, but she didn't think she could do the curves, so it was on me. I think I did a pretty good job, except, as you can see, that bottom piece didn't really have the proper support.

So I threw in a toothpick to prop it up. Success. Here's what it looks like all lit up: