10 Things I Love About the Holidays

1. Seeing family
2. Watching the young members of my family get excited about the magic of Santa and opening their gifts.
3. The smells -- cinnamon, cider, Christmas trees, peppermint, fireplaces burning throughout the neighborhood, etc.
4. Sending and receiving Christmas cards. It's the only time of the year when you get more personal mail than junk mail or bills.
5. The food! It's like Thanksgiving but with more sweets.
6. Seeing all the holiday lights on houses in the neighborhood.
7. Decorating the house and tree. We decided not to decorate this year (too much work), but next Christmas we will go all out. The twins will be about 7-8 months old then and there will be a lot of excitement watching them experience their first Christmas!
8. Gift wrapping. In my family it's almost a competitive sport. We don't half-ass the presentation!
9. When I was a kid, I used to love going to Midnight Mass with my family. The church was always decorated beautifully, everyone was dressed in their new Christmas dresses, and I loved hearing the Christmas songs.
10. Baking my family's famous pecan pies for hubby's co-workers. Damn, that reminds me...I need to do that tomorrow!