Photo replay: Ah, they grow so fast

It's been only ten days since I wrote HERE about the baby robins hatched just outside my window.

Look at them now. Already, it's nearly time for them to leave the nest.

I'm thankful human babies don't fly away as quickly as robins, with barely any time to get to know them before they're gone.

Happy Sunday to you!

Easter in an empty nest: 9 no longers

1. No longer do I set out Easter decorations. At least not this year. Maybe next year. Or maybe at least a centerpiece for Easter dinner this year. Maybe.

2. No longer do I buy Easter outfits.

3. No longer do I referee arguments during egg coloring over who got the purple first, who dipped their "dirty" blue spoon into the yellow, and who is copying whom on the designs drawn with crayons.

4. No longer do I have three girls in the pew next to me covering their ears so they don't jump at the strepitus at the end of the Good Friday Tenebrae service.

5. No longer do I remind my daughters at bedtime on Easter eve to make "nests" with their baby afghans for their baskets so the Easter Bunny can easily find them for filling in the night.

6. No longer do I nibble on carrots left for the Easter Bunny.

7. No longer do I play Easter Bunny at all.

8. No longer am I awakened Easter morning by little ones—or big ones—tiptoeing down the stairs to see what the Easter Bunny left in their baskets.

9. No longer do I have to say again and again and again to "Put the candy away NOW and go get ready for church."

I miss all that.

Well, maybe not No. 9.

Because I still say that.

Only now I say it to Jim.

Again and again and again.

(Just for old time's sake.)

Today's question:

How has Easter changed for you in the last few years?

Of Indian corn, cranberries, tradition

I'm a sucker for establishing and following family traditions. My family of origin didn't have many traditions, but the family Jim and I created has been steeped in them, especially during the holidays. All holidays, from New Years to St. Patrick's Day to Fourth of July and on into Thanksgiving and Christmas. For each, we have traditions unique to our clan, ones we've followed for years.

Well, at least used to.

The empty nest continually challenges my desire to do as we've done in years upon years past. I'm struggling with creating new traditions to replace the old ones, the ones that required participation of the whole family...or at least its majority. I'm not yet used to not having the majority around for the celebrations that mattered—and continue to matter—most. Yesterday's Thanksgiving celebration, although delightful and enjoyable, was the first time I celebrated a holiday with only one of my three daughters. One had to work, the other celebrated with in-laws. I understand and accept such things, such changes; I'm just not yet used to them.

The empty nest isn't the only thing challenging my commitment to traditions set into motion years ago. Basic changes in our society—specifically, the availability of certain goods and services—take a toll as well.

To wit: I once upon a time created a tradition of sprinkling on the Thanksgiving table the multi-colored kernels of Indian corn. Throughout the meal, family and other guests were invited to place kernels representing the blessings for which they were thankful into a ceramic "gratitude" dish placed on the table. I considered it a way to express our thanks without having to say such things aloud and draw uncomfortable attention to oneself or the things for which they're grateful.

It was a tradition we followed for years, but I'm now unable to find Indian corn anywhere. (I wrote here of one embarrassing Thanksgiving when I had saved the kernels from the previous year, upon realizing the corn was confoundedly difficult to find every year.) Last year we spent the holiday at Megan's house sans gratitude dish, but the year prior, I decided to use popcorn kernels in place of the nowhere-to-be-found Indian corn kernels. I quickly realized it just didn't have the same feel, the same "pop" (pardon the pun) as the Indian corn, that tried-and-true symbol of Thanksgiving. I considered the tradition over.

Until this past Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving. I came up with a brilliant idea, a way to continue the tradition, with similarly symbolic tokens to represent our gratitude. Cranberries! Why I didn't think of it before, I don't know. But yesterday my Thanksgiving table was sprinkled with the festive red berries, most everyone a berry or two or ten symbolizing blessings in the dish, and in no time our gratitude cup indeed runneth over. Success!

Time and the toll it's taken on the commercial availability of Indian corn required me to alter one of the my family's most time-honored traditions. It felt a little funny at first, but it worked. Sure, the Indian corn was missed...and fondly recalled. But the cranberries worked just as well, even added a colorful turn the tradition lacked in its initial form. A new tradition was born.

As we head into the Christmas season—the holiday marked by the most treasured of family traditions—I resolve to hold close the lesson of our altered Thanksgiving tradition. It's proof that despite changes and alterations, new traditions can be just as meaningful, just as important as the old.

As Indian corn can be replaced by cranberries, new traditions celebrated by a family minority—possibly even just by Jim and myself—can be just as meaningful, just as important as those once celebrated by our entire family. I'll be mindful of that, keep reminding myself of that.

Out of habit, though, I'll likely keep an eye out for Indian corn in the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving for a long time to come. Similarly, one part of my heart will always be focused on the traditions that once defined our family, as well. At least until I find something as festive and colorful as the cranberries to replace them.

Today's question:

Which of your family traditions have changed—or ceased—through the years?

Calendar girl

Yesterday I copied all the birthdays and anniversaries from my 2010 calendar onto my 2011 calendar then added the old calendar to my stack of those I've saved for years -- every year since 1997, to be exact.

I abhor packrats and do my best not to be one, so holding onto reminders of dentist appointments and "No School" dates of years past may seem in opposition to my cause. But the old calendars are so much more than appointment reminders: They are time in a bottle. Snapshots of the hustle and bustle of a once busy household. A record of the good, the bad, the scary, the sweet -- an organic record that didn't require me to journal or scrapbook or keep a diary or update a blog to maintain it.

Most of the markings on the grids of daily happenings are in my handwriting. Others are in the handwriting of one or another of the girls, applied in painstakingly perfect penmanship befitting an occasion important enough to be included on the family calendar for all to consider in their schedule.

Each notation holds much more than just a record of where we had to be and what time we had to be there, though. They hold stories, stories that bring mostly grins (birthday parties and school sporting events) and groans (dentist appointments and work schedules). Others cause my eyes to well up, my heart to grow a little cold, and a lump to form in my throat. Those are the notations of occasions that serve as poignant reminders of our challenges, the growing pains that strengthened our family fabric and made it the resilient, tight-knit one it is today.

As I skim the calendars before placing them back on the shelf for another year, here are some of the scribbles that touch my heart:

April 28, 1997: "Closing" - This is the date we officially bought the house we rented for 10 years before finally getting up the nerve -- and the income -- to ask our landlords if we could buy it. It's the house that became the childhood home of our three girls, the place we raised them all, from kindergarten through college.

July 21-25, 1997: "Brianna in Texas" - Brianna went to Work Camp; we remodeled our new house to add a fourth bedroom while she was gone. Andrea and Megan rejoiced at no longer having to share a room, no longer having to divide the space with duct tape down the center. Jim and I rejoiced that the bickering would end.

May 25, 1998: "Andie leaves" - Andrea spent a week at Sea Camp in San Diego and to this day still dreams of working with dolphins. Somewhere. Somehow. Which is a tad challenging considering she lives in the Rocky Mountains.

March 22, 1999: "5:30 a.m. Brianna skiing" - Clinches the heart a bit as Brianna will likely never ski again after the damage done to her back when her (stopped) car was rear-ended at a stoplight by a landscaping truck.

April 24-25, 1999: "Retaining wall" - One of the many "huh?" markings on the calendars, important at the time but now completely forgotten.

October 15, 1999: "UNC College Day" - Our first visit to check out a college for our first-born.

July 18, 2000: "Test w/HR 2:30" - The beginning of my newspaper career.

July 28-29, 2000: "American Co-ed Pageant" - Megan needed college funds and left no stone unturned. She won no pageant money but we both received an unexpected -- and unpleasant -- introduction to pageantry and "pageant moms." Believe me when I say Little Miss Sunshine resonates.

October 25-27, 2001: "Seward" - Our first visit with Megan to what would become her college town. And eventually Andrea's college town.

June 22-27, 2002: "Disney World" - Our last vacation as a family. <sniff>

June 29, 2002: "Marked words: Brianna will NOT be with Eric at this time next year!" - Too funny now. What's not funny is that marking one's words doesn't make things magically come true ... or eliminate the need to keep marking them.

May 25, 2003: "Andie's Graduation Party" - My baby, my last daughter, graduated and soon off to college.

June 27, 2003: "I'm old" - Any guess as to whose birthday this was?

July 22, 2006: "Meg's wedding!"

June 18, 2008: "BUBBY!" - Okay, it doesn't really say "Bubby," it says his real name. An all-caps pronouncement of joy just the same.

December 5, 2008: "D-Day!" - This was the day my layoff was scheduled ... and occurred. The end of my stint as a special sections editor. The end of my newspaper career.

Sprinkled throughout the calendar pages, amidst notes about the girls going on mission trips, attending prom, graduating from high school and college, are red-letter dates of concerts and performances that Jim and I were to attend: Pearl Jam, Live, Tommy, Black Crowes, Rent, Counting Crows and more. Memorable occasions all. But my pile of ticket stubs serves as a better reminder of those particular dates. And, yes, serves as another large stack of paper this non-packrat refuses to get rid of.

On second thought, maybe I am a packrat after all. A sentimental packrat with lots of memories worth holding on to.

Today's question:

What do you do with your old calendars?

Uncharted waters

We did it. Jim and I made it through our first time decorating the Christmas tree as empty-nesters. Meaning, we did it alone. Just the two of us.

After 28 years of tree-trimming being a loud, festive, family event, this year there were no little ones hanging eight ornaments in a space meant for three. No kiddos closing their eyes and holding out their hands awaiting presentation of the annual new ornament from Mom. No more jokes about the carrot, the pickle, the Russian Santa. No more surly teens swearing under their breath at one another as I ask if they could please just get along so we can get the tree done without someone crying. And no more girls home from college for the holiday and savoring the family time they'd missed while away.

This year, the ornaments are evenly spaced, there was no surliness, and there was no swearing. There were, though, a few tears. From me.

This is a huge milestone and not one I hoped to reach so soon. In fact, I hoped to never reach it at all. I hoped that even once my girls were grown and gone, there would be tree-trimming parties. That I'd have my daughters, their partners, my grandchildren running all about as Christmas music played and they clamored for this ornament or that. All the while we'd be sharing memories of holidays and tree-trimmings past.

But it wasn't to be. Not even close.

Maybe next year things will be different.

Or maybe next year will be the same. But at least having been through it this year, it won't feel so darn empty and strange.

Holiday question of the day:

What is your favorite ornament on your Christmas tree?