Holiday Merge

Well, here we are at the merging of two huge holidays!  Thanksgiving week melds right into Christmas, doesn't it?  It gets earlier every year.   

I can't bear to put Tom away just yet -
Christmas decor will have to wait! 

I've said it before, but I'll say it again - we spend Thanksgiving differently than most at our house.  Hubby goes off to the cabin in the woods for 10 days of deer hunting with my dad, brother, nephews and uncles.  Mom comes to my house and stays, and we shop like maniacs and eat out.  A lot.  Then we make the typical Thanksgiving dinner, and celebrate a casual day with my daughters and boyfriends.  Nothing fancy, but great food and leftovers :) Then it's back to more shopping, but we skip eating out and make leftover dishes. 

I've celebrated Thanksgiving without the men (that hunt) at home all of my life, and without my hubby for 28 of 30 years we've been together.  It's just the way it is.  The men celebrate their blessings with a typical Thanksgiving meal in the woods - probably a truer representation of the holiday anyway.  Can you imagine being in the woods in a log cabin with the smell of turkey wafting through the snow-covered pine trees?   It's good for them to peel potatoes and do all the cooking for a change :) It's really a fun tradition for my mom and I to spend this time together.  This morning Mom headed back home, Hubby should be home soon, and we'll all get back to the usual routine.

Amid all the shopping and eating, I got some bags made for mom to take home with her for gifts.  They make perfect tatting bags, and for those that don't tat they are great for chunky jewelry.  I have a small one I picked up many years ago that was for jewelry, and I enlarged it for a tatting bag.  Actually, I like them for everything because I have an addiction to bags  :)  I guess there are worse addictions.

Mom also brought along these two old sugar & salt bags for me.  She knows how I love old stuff, and thought I could do something with them.  I'm not quite sure how to display or use them, but I have a couple of ideas.

AND, my aunt brought this little collection to me when we met for dinner one evening.  More old stuff that's fun to look at :)

I'll save the contents for another post.

Hope your Thanksgiving was filled with good food and good company!