Christmas is in the air

This week, we attended two holiday parties from work. While we spent the entire year without ever going out just the two of us, my husband and I had two such nights just this week.

The first was his company's holiday party that was held in Pier 29 in San Francisco. The invitation said "Cocktail attire is preferred but not required; come as you are!". I thought this was a very nice way of saying "Feel free to dress up if you like", and that is what I did. After spending the past few years in mom fog, I thought it would be nice to pretend for a night to be like an actual adult in the real world who goes out and does things!

December is always a hectic time, but I managed to squeeze in a trip to Macy's, find a cocktail dress that fit me and didn't break the bank, and bought a little purse to go with it. I fished out my stilletos and decided to brave the night in them. My husband pulled out his suit and tie, and of course, we spent some time with last minute ironing, looking for belts that fit and trying out coats to complete our ensemble. This was all fun, though. We started the drive up to the city blasting our favorite music in the car, and even enjoyed a heavy downpour as we cruised on highway 280. It was such fun!

The party itself was not really our style - think your typical dance music, dancers on stage, people on stilts, stunt performers, photo booths and such. But we had a blast! The food was quite good with different stations named after cities around the world catering to different cuisines. The best part was not dealing with work politics. My husband is new in this company and we could just be ourselves and enjoy the party. The people were surprisingly nice.

Fast forward to mid-week and it was time for my work holiday party. This was really more our style of a party, however my job is one I've been in for over a decade. My company also happens to be my husband's ex-company and where he spent a significant portion of his career (and is also where we met). So the mood was more like a social business gathering, a place to meet people and "talk shop". However, the venue was beautiful. It was at a winery in Los Gatos and it took us only 20 minutes to drive there. There was wine, tapas and desserts and some dancing. We got ready this time in 20 minutes flat - since we wore the same outfits as we did for the other party! We felt like pros at this holiday party thing. And I was rather proud of the fact that I spent a second night out in my stilletos.

Now, onto Christmas planning and shopping. The shopping part, I do not really like. But I probably should get it out of the way soon. And look forward to the next week of organizing and relaxing.

So far, our Christmas activities have been:
- Christmas with Santa at our local cabana club: cookie decorating, ornament and mug decorating, hot chocolate, meeting Santa and storytime with Santa
- Nutcracker ballet: husband took my daughter and our niece for a special matinee performance of the Nutcracker
- Frozen 2: the movie, a birthday treat for my daughter that I took her to at a nearby theater
- Christmas lights in the neighborhood: We went on a few drives to homes that had beautiful Christmas decorations and lights in the neighborhood (some of them complete with choreography and song selection, radio station to tune in to for music, and one even had a website to select songs on!)
- Holiday parties (husband and me)
- Setting up and decorating our Christmas tree
- Putting up a new stocking for our son (his first one)

We want to do the drive through of the Fantasy of Lights at Vasona park sometime during the next week. We have to plan our family meal for Christmas eve (just the four of us), and are wondering whether to make it a traditional Belgian meal this year, so that my husband can recreate Christmas from his childhood a bit for our kids. This is our first Christmas in our own home, and we are figuring out our traditions as a family. We will be meeting my sister and her family for lunch Christmas day. I think the week ahead seems to be fairly low key overall, and hopefully this brings us some peace and joy this holiday season.