Switcheroo New Years Eve!

"Never tell your resolution beforehand, or it's twice as onerous a duty." -- John Selden, English jurist and scholar

For the last few years, Maggie's decided our New Years celebrations should have a "theme" - one year it was "Sporty New Year's Eve," another it was "Old Fashioned Glamour New Year's Eve." We've had "Pajama Party New Year's Eve" (Grandma's favorite) and "Wacky Upside-Down New Year's Eve." This year it was "Switcheroo New Year's Eve" - girls become boys and boys become girls, a theme every fourteen year old can see so much potential in, and a theme that especially terrified my poor husband, Chris, and his Dad, a retired Brigadier General who never thought he'd see a tube of red lipstick coming toward him with such determination and enthusiasm! Grandma was in 100% and dug up "gowns" for the men to wear, while Mag and I picked up enough facial hair (and wigs) at the local party store to scare the Hatfields & McCoys. We were a sight for ... well, very sore eyes!

In addition to our "theme" celebrations, we've always rung in the New Year by throwing little colored pom-poms around the room at each other at the stroke of midnight, a tradition we've been honoring since the girls were 5 and 8. Now, after ten years of pom-pom hurling, the balls are pretty beat up, but as long as we're in Virginia for the holidays, the New Year will start with a frenzy of little colored balls flying across the room in a shower of New Year's cheer!

Maggie recently started another New Year's tradition: after counting down the minutes to midnight at the top of our lungs; after the frenzy of cheering and hugging at the stroke of twelve; after we've spent a good twenty minutes hurling pom-poms at each other, shrieking with laughter; after the champagne and sparkling cider's been drunk and all the kisses have been shared; after we've all collapsed on the couch to pull the pom-poms out of our hair and shirts and pants and shoes; after we've watched Times Square clear out and the concert in LA is underway; after all that, Maggie carefully collects all the little colored balls and spells out the year for us on the living room rug.

This year the 0 in 2013 was Grandfather's wig.

Happy New Years!
Arlington, VA