This Season's Best Accessory? A Cute Child!

On Friday, I blissfully started my vacation from work (sorry Cath, not rubbing it in -- just telling a story...). This conveniently coincided with my 8-year-old's holiday concert at school, in which she was playing the xylophone! My husband had to work, but I got my girl off to school on the bus and then I got myself and my 3-year-old dressed and out the door in time for the concert. My girl attends a smallish school -- there is a "multi-purpose" room in which they have gym, eat lunch, and have assemblies (my nieces have one of these at their school in Long Island -- my sister-in-law calls it the "cafe-gym-torium"). Ours is small... With all of the kids in there for the concert, parents were left to crowd in around them along the walls, and spilling out into the hallway. My little one and I were able to get in and squeeze in next to a sweet woman who was there to see her grandson sing. She thought my preschooler was a cutie (she was right!) and she suggested to my little peanut that she sit on the floor in front of her so that my girlie could see her sister. No way! My girlie was not fond of that. But it was sweet of the woman to offer. Through the whole concert she was very concerned about us being able to see -- I was very concerned that we were not crowding her, and she was tiny enough that I could very comfortably shoot my video camera over her head and get much of the concert on tape! After saying goodbye and great job to my eldest, my little one and I headed to the grocery store.

I was expecting crowds, long lines, crabby shoppers. I was pleasantly surprised! It was about 10:30am on Friday and while there were still a lot of people in the store, we were able to get in and out relatively quickly and actually enjoyed ourselves! We cruised throughout the store with people smiling at my girlie and she would smile back, shyly. She really is somewhat of a draw at the grocery store, especially with the older shoppers -- they seem to love to say hello to her and try to get her to smile.

Feeling in the holiday spirit and having people around who also seemed in good humor for being in a grocery store a few days before the holiday, I found myself exchanging pleasantries with many of the other shoppers. I think people might have been so engaging because the store was playing holiday music overhead and my girl and I were strolling up and down the aisles singing along to the tunes. A nice woman shopping next to me in the meat department made sure to point out to me that some of the packages were labeled to be used by the next day and others would last a little longer. I helped another woman in the produce section, because she couldn't reach the plastic bags to put her peppers in. There was a very sweet, elderly woman in the bulk candy section who was trying to scoop some of those gummy spearmint leaf candies into a baggie, but she couldn't reach very well (maybe it wasn't my daughter -- maybe people were pleasant because I'm taller than them!) -- I helped her scoop some candy into her bag and she told me about when she was younger and how much she loved the penny candy containers at the store -- she saw her favorite candy at the store that day and just couldn't help herself!

It is so easy to get caught up in the expense and the hectic schedule of this holiday -- it was really a wonderful break to spend that morning to be in the company of some very sweet people with whom my girl and I shared a little of the holiday spirit.