Author's Note: This blog post was written sometime around the end of November 2019. I decided to keep it the way I wrote it instead of updating it with everything that has transpired this year because I want to vividly remember and share the joy of last year.
Holy Snow, Batman, this is my fifth annual published White Friday celebration!!! I've been avoiding shopping the day after Thanksgiving for at least two decades, and for five years now, I have shared how I celebrated my version of the heavily commercialized day the following year. I look for photos with white, I craft with white, or I play with white. No Christmas shopping allowed.
I have a little confession about my 2019 observance. Lizard had a blood draw that day, and we were right near the grocery store, so we actually did shop on November 29, the day after Thanksgiving. We bought toilet paper, paper towels, Vicks-infused tissues, Epsom salts and pain-reliever. All white, and all needed. Not for the holidays. The divergence resulted in being able to stay home (or with family) the remainder of my four-day weekend, and that was a huge blessing. I was very glad we didn't have to make another trip into town to buy toilet paper, not something we can easily go without. Ha ha!
We got SO much snow in November of 2019, it lasted clear into December. I didn't have to go anywhere to find snow! We enjoyed a few hikes near home throughout the four-day weekend, and we didn't have to go to the mountains for snow. Yippee! We actually celebrated a White Saturday, and White Sunday, a White Monday and several more white days before all that snow finally began to melt. No complaints here! I'm almost always ready for more snow, especially when it results in a snow day, which one particular storm did, just two days before Thanksgiving!
Once again, my white amaryllis was not ready to bloom, and in 2019, the white (and pink) Christmas cactus had already put on a show. The reds were getting ready to burst, and one one opened a couple of days after Thanksgiving. It sported a touch of white.
One branch of one white Christmas cactus decided to try to bloom one more time. The flower didn't open until the week before Christmas, but at least there was an itsy bitsy little bud the day after Thanksgiving!
One tiny little ghost pepper bloom showed up, but there must have been about 100 more blossoms forming on the ghost pepper plant and all four indoor ancho poblano plants.
One big indoor garden surprise in 2019 was a single stalk of white hyacinth blooms the day after Thanksgiving! I hadn't even noticed that blossoms had formed!
A second surprise came in the form of three gorgeous blooms on one of my two indoor rosemary plants. This one had never bloomed, I hadn't noticed it was getting ready to bloom, and now I wish it would bloom every day!
We had the most enjoyable hikes on the greenway and at Chatfield Reservoir because Lizard was able to walk with me (after being scheduled to work full shifts almost every holiday the previous two years) and because we could walk as long as we wanted. I didn't have to be on the commuter train to downtown before 8 a.m.
Oh, did we have a glorious white walk!
The biggest white surprise of the day was an immature bald eagle nest-building right before our eyes at the conclusion of the day's walk!
Official White Friday family festivities ended with 500 tiny little pieces of Christmas successfully assembled by the whole family. Everyone pitched in. Even Lizard (who is not a fan of tiny-piece puzzles) found a piece! (It was on the floor after the entire puzzle was complete except for one little hole.) Okay, you're right. It's not white. But it's not Christmas shopping, either!
I would happily stay home and not go anywhere for the rest of this year. Did you have a white Friday this year? Are there white days ahead of you? Here it is GREY, no snow in sight.
ReplyDeleteSigh. It seems so long ago, doesn't it? We lived in a different world then.
ReplyDeleteWhat beautiful photos and happy memories. And that is one handsome bird!