Reflections of the Holidays

Heavy sigh!!! The Christmas holidays were jam-packed with family and fun. My Canadian family (Mom, Dad, Linda, Marcia) were here from Christmas Eve until New Years' Eve. With seven of us here, quarters were pretty cramped. I really missed my big house in Tulsa. But they were all troopers and made do with the limited accomodations. Lots of cooking...eating...Scrabble games...cooking...eating...Dominoes...cooking...eating...playing with the grandkids...cooking...eating...putting together the annual 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle...a trip to the Aquarium...and did I mention?...cooking and eating? I think I cooked more in the last week than I have in the past two years. I'm not by any means a Martha Stewart, but I actually found it to be enjoyable. Maybe because I was surrounded with people and had lots of help. Never had much of that when the boys were growing up. Maybe, too, because everyone seemed to enjoy eating what I cooked...another thing that was rare during son-rearing days. (Or maybe they just didn't see the importance of TELLING me that it was "good.")

Neal spent most of his "vacation" cleaning up from the ice storm. Cutting limbs, stacking wood, and burning brush. But he didn't seem to mind. I suppose he relished the time of solitude and retreat from the houseful of Smiths.

Now everyone's gone. The Christmas decorations are put away, and the house is clean again. I went to the gym today for my first workout of the year. New equipment--new routine--tomorrow I'll probably have new aches and pains.

Hope you all had a great holiday season. May God bless you abundantly in 2008.