This Week and Yesterday

This is a chatty, way too long post. I warn you now in case you have better things to do!

Monday began with it's usual fuss, only from me as I hit the snooze alarm and everyone else snoozes.

It was a busy day at work as we are into the flu and cold season and everyone wants to feel better now and "prevent" things from developing further. Since the field of medicine is not about predicting the manifestation of symptoms, that usually means that people go home without an antibiotic which somehow they think is a miracle drug for every virus known to mankind. Pre-holidays are always filled with last minute refills as well, making for what we call a "roller skate" day.

Monday afternoon involved the unsuccessful and frustrating search for the proper color of Advent candles for our wreath. With the advent (couldn't resist the pun) of the candle industry you'd think finding tapered candles in the appropriate colors would be easy. NO! I visited 6 stores before going to the mall and Yankee Candle where I found green and cranberry colored candles, which are not the right colors. This was my capitulation to time and energy and a mental note to myself to buy blue or purple candles in the spring and save them for next year's Advent.

I had my 8-year old in tow, and as we tried to exit the mall she saw an earring store and wanted to shop. I said OK. She asked so sweetly. We left the store with me getting my ears double pierced again.

Then we went home to put the labels on the homeschool newsletter for our group meeting that evening, only labels were not to be found so I did a hodge podge of things including using up the new Christmas labels I had bought last weekend. I also needed to prepare to share with the group about Advent (thus the desperate search for said candles earlier in the day) and the 12 Days of Christmas. Most of the group members are non-denominational folks so I wanted to get it right. A few ladies came up to me after the meeting and wanted to know sources of where to find Advent wreaths and the books I had mentioned.*

I dashed off to the meeting not in the best of spirits due to being so time crunched with the label disaster... but soon my focus was not on myself but on the ladies whose company I enjoy and who were soon sharing about their various trials with teaching a child, or an ill parent, or a friend in trouble. It was a nice meeting. We have a tradition of going out afterwards, and I had every intention of leaving by 11 pm, but I arrived home closer to midnight. :-)

In the middle of the night our youngest woke up and was throwing up for over 20 minutes. Poor thing! She said she'd been dreaming of throwing up and then she woke up and she was. It was frightening to her. A complete change of bed linens was in order and then very light sleeping for me after that as each turn in the bed or noise awoke me as I worried she might be throwing up again.

Tuesday dawned and somehow we frittered away the day and didn't get to go shopping for our final Thanksgiving meal needs until the late afternoon which is DARK! Mostly I think I was waiting to assess whether R would be sick again. She wasn't. I was concerned it was a flu virus and would make its rounds with us all. But she had no fever, or aches.

Because of our late start we battled the after work crowds (I am so spoiled to shop during work hours!) We were successful in finding a new vacuum, YEA!!!

Wednesday I awoke to go to work with a literal pain in my rear. This has happened before, with the most severe instance on the day of my father's funeral. Although I have a high tolerance for pain, this particular pain just wipes me out! So I went to work and received an injection from the doctor which did not produce the immediate pain relief as it had after my father's funeral. I went home worried about how Thanksgiving dinner would get done and took some pain medication which I knew would prevent me from doing anything meaningful.

Then, as I "wallered" in my bed in pain, my friend dropped by to borrow something for their family picture they were taking on Thanksgiving Day. She graciously talked to me about things as we haven't been able to see each other for a while due to our competing schedules, most of which I do not remember since I was under the influence of pain medication. :-)

Thursday dawned and much of the pain had dissipated and I was overjoyed knowing I could direct and help out the planned meal. As per tradition in my family, breakfast is nuts and tangerines so that the cooking can continue without much interruption. We didn't get quite the start we wanted to and so we nixed plans for an early afternoon meal and decided to shoot for between 6 and 7 pm. (We started eating at 6:05 pm!)

Around lunch-time, R was hungry and wanting something. She got into the rolls and said to K, "Can you zip the bag up for me because I don't know how to do that zip." It had a twisty tie on it. We all laughed.

We had

turkey with home-made gravy (made by hubby and I)
mashed red and yukon gold potatoes (made by Sarah)
yams (made by K)
home-made stuffing (made by Sarah and I but not cooked in the bird)
corn
rolls
a relish tray (two kinds of olives, two kinds of pickles, celery sticks and carrots)

Dessert was a variety of

pecan pie (store made)
pumpkin cheesecake (store made)
gingered pears (Sarah made!)

We'll be taking left-overs to the in-laws later this weekend and to a friend of the girls at the AFA who may be facing expulsion and is quite understandably disturbed by this.

Before the meal we shared our reasons for thanksgiving this year and R again said something which delighted us. She's at that stage where she can't keep a secret and doesn't have the discretion to know what is OK to discuss and what isn't. So during the time she was sharing what she was thankful for she said she was thankful for her big sisters most of the time. "Except when they are mean to me."

K kept mother-henning it over R reminding her to move her glass away from the edge, to use her fork, to wipe her mouth, to not stuff her mouth. K used phrases I used with her and Sarah so it was nice to see that some of what I say is being ingrained, I just pray it's the right stuff. :-0

Sarah broke a wedding gift to us in the preparation of the mashed potatoes and it scared her to death. She was breathing funny for quite a while after the glass dish exploded when cold water from the sink was poured on it and it was still warm from being in the oven.

It snowed off and on without accumulating throughout the afternoon but as evening came it started to stick. We all were overjoyed and R went outside and played in it for a while even though it was dark. She told her daddy she had to do it while the snow was there. We haven't had much to speak of this fall.

We thought we might end the day by learning to play cribbage, but when we found the rules online, we were overwhelmed and instead watched movies on the Hallmark channel.

I wish I had a prize for you for reading this far!

How as your holiday?


*Some of the resources I shared at the meeting were: Countdown to Christmas; The Very First Christmas (visually stunning); and Saint Nicholas, The Real Story of the Christmas Legend.