Holiday Recap

Christmas is over and the New Year is approaching.  This year has flown by. Overall, it has been a good year.  It's just ending on a sour note.  My mom isn't doing well.  If she doesn't show improvement by the end of January, she and her children will have to make decisions about her care. It's not something I'm looking forward to, but I'm preparing myself.  It is part of life.

For now, though, I'm trying to recoup my energy.  The past couple weeks were very busy.

We hosted Christmas Eve for my husband's family.  Because my father-in-law doesn't like to drive at night anymore, we had an early dinner. It actually worked out quite nicely.  The guests left early enough for us to go to the 6:30 mass.  After mass we drove around looking at Christmas lights.  This was a tradition my dad had when I was young.  Of course, my favorite lights were the ones on our house. When we got home, the five of use watched a movie together.

Christmas morning we opened our gifts to each other.  The kids still like to have Santa bring their gifts.  It is a little extra work for me to keep them out of sight until Christmas morning, but I didn't mind.  Santa wraps each child's gifts in the same paper but doesn't put on any tags.  The piles are identified by the stocking placed with the pile.  This year the stockings weren't filled with candy.  Sure, there was a little candy, but since the kids are young adults, some of their favorite foods were inside:  tea, coffee, cocoa mix, scone mixes and gnocchi.  I little different, but they liked the idea.

After lunch we headed to Cincinnati to spend Christmas with my family.  I gave my siblings mug cozies, reusable travel mugs and coffee.  

Mom was able to join us for the evening.  She was very tired, but sat quietly and listened to the festivities.  The crowd was mostly adults, but there was one little guy there.

I'm back home now.  I'm not going into the office this week.  Resting and knitting are on the agenda.

Getting back to my niece's shawl is the my first priority.  Her wedding is in about 4 months.  Time to get moving!