Then & Now

When my brother and sister-in-law got married (11 million years ago), they made a deal with each other to split their holidays between their families.  If they're with her family for Thanksgiving one year, they're with our family for Christmas.  Then, the following year, they're in Minnesota for Thanksgiving and with her family for Christmas.  So, when Emily and I moved to Missouri, we decided to adopt the same holiday schedule, making sure that our holiday in Minnesota coincided with Aaron and Angie's so that for at least one holiday a year we are all together in Minnesota with our parents.  So far it has worked, and I think that each of our families likes having us exclusively for an entire holiday weekend. 

The last time we were in Minnesota for Christmas it was 2008 and it was cold.  Really, really cold.

Back then Dane was the baby in the house.  He was just over a year old and he was too little to go outside and play.  He wanted to, though.  Lord, did that boy want to be outside playing with his cousin.  And I think that Abby would have welcomed a companion - a sidekick to wade through waist high snow with.

{Abby & Dane | 12.24.08}

This year, however, he was outside nearly as much as Abby.  They went sledding and built a snow fort and tramped all over my parents back yard.  If the snow had been stickier they would have made a snowman and had a snowball fight, too.  I know that this is probably the last season that Abby really has time and patience for playing with her cousin.  There are 7 years between them, afterall, and already her interests lie more in the Twilight saga and Justin Bieber and boys rather than Toy Story and G.I. Joes and Hungry! Hungry! Hippos.

But for just a little bit over Christmas, she stopped bieng a surly tween and slid back to being a kid.  She snuggled on the couch with Dane and watched a movie.  She let him take her temperature and check her reflexes with his new doctor kit.  And she got down on the floor and played hours of Lincoln Logs. 


{Abby &  Dane | 12.24.10}

She wants to grow up so badly.  She wants to stay up later and do her hair and I'm sure she sneaks tinted lip-gloss to school.  She wants to sit at the grown-up table and have grown-up conversations and she wants to be releveant.  It's not easy being in that middle spot...not really able to contribute to adult conversations but too big for the babies in the house.

She's trying, though, and I guess I should be grateful that she even wants to participate in family functions.  It won't be too much longer and she'll want to bring her boyfriend over for family dinner (Lord have mercy, I think I'm going to have to keep Uriah away from any would-be suitors!  They won't make it out the door alive.) and Friday night will be spent at the movies with her friends.

I wonder what the picture will look like in two years when we're in Minnesota again for Christmas...with a teenager and a 5 year old and a 2 year old.