Moonshine Junkyard

When a new year begins, I basically like to make the laziest resolutions possible, things that I know I would've done anyway, such as: I resolve to have a lot of fun this year. I resolve to savor each moment with my babies. I resolve to at least try to exercise, sometimes. But, I do pay special attention to the transitional time, in my secret superstitious way, to try to get a feel for how the new year is shaping up. The first few minutes, hours, days, and weeks of the new year have a certain auspicious feel to them. While tidying up from the holidays and busying myself with the January birthdays, making fresh starts and going about family life, I am also paying attention to what the rhythms feel like, what the days seem to naturally offer. Whether people are in good moods or bad, myself included, what people are talking about, what kinds of general hopes we generate as a species, as little tribes, as families. Traffic, grocery store tellers, words I hear, repetitions, stories...

I can't just let it go like last year. I didn't realize it until much later, but last year I never put up any pictures of Christmas eve, day, or the nearest festivities. Probably that traces back to the fact that I was just about to pop out a baby , but anyway, this year was really fun and endearing and warm and magical so I have to spend a little time enumerating some of Christmas 2014's many charms. On Christmas eve eve, Nana brought over a special gift for Lucy: a sweet little apron that Nana made especially for her! Lucy likes to put on an apron with me every time she "helps" in the kitchen, so this was perfect.   On Christmas eve, during Polly's nap, we put the new apron to work while making pine cone bird feeders. She worked really hard getting the peanut butter nice and thick, gobbed into the nooks and crannies, and the birds and squirrels have been truly enjoying reaping the rewards. A mist crept in on Christmas eve and it...