I Wonder as I Wander…

I wrote this quite a while ago, but haven't gotten around to posting it. So here goes our Christmas story.

Bob and I were home for Christmas—with the kids (Ross, Richard, Kara and Paul) here too. We had a wonderful time and the weather was so warm and nice. It was in the 30’s most of the time—and clear and sunny quite a bit also--although Ross and Richard did have trouble getting out of the cities on Thursday afternoon. They had rain that had turned to snow and there was lots of traffic. Ross said he decided the dog hadn’t had much of a walk, so he and Alfred got out and walked along side the car for 3 blocks and got back in.

One night we had friends out for Chinese—including Sweet and Sour Chicken, Stir-fried Beef, lemon chicken, vegetable fried rice, and egg rolls. Ross & Richard brought along Sushi, Sake, and some other Chinese wine. Kara and Paul arrived just in time for Dinner. We had a great time, eating, visiting and playing a game called “help Barb & Bob and Sandy and Al get rid of some of their stuff”. It was a gift grab bag.

The next day we cut down some trees and built a bon fire—and did a lot of playing around on the 4-wheeler. The 4-wheeler still had the blade on it—so every once in a while it would catch and stop us dead in our tracks. The first time I came through the snow bank, the blade came down and I plowed up a good sized pile of snow. Later, I was driving with Richard sitting backwards—and we hit that pile of snow and it flew all over us—FUN! That evening we had a good sized bon fire. Although it needed nurturing to keep burning—it didn’t have the small brush and dry wood to really get it going quickly.

Since Christmas Eve was on a Sunday—we had Church all day. We went to the morning service and then Ross and Kara sang with the choir at the 4 pm service and Bob and I assisted with Communication. We all went back to the 10 pm service because Ross played and he and Kara were special music. I love the candlelight service and all the wonderful Christmas Carols! That night we had to stay up late and play Santa!

Christmas morning, we had all our traditions—the egg bake went into the oven and we dove into the stockings—what great treats Santa brought us! Then we ate breakfast and moved into the solarium for more gift opening. As always, the family gave some great gifts—including tickets for Wicked and Avenue Q when we are in NY in April, and mom really outdid herself with a unique bag full of all kinds of goodies. Then it was time for some cards and cooking—and then more food—Turkey and all the trimmings.

Tuesday everyone enjoyed one of their ‘gifts’—a massage—which felt really good—although with six of us getting massages—it pretty well took the whole day. Kara and Paul had to leave that morning to go to St. Cloud for Christmas with his family. Ross and Richard left the next morning and then mom went home—so it was really quiet at our house. We dumped out one of our new jigsaw puzzles, put it together and then dumped out another one, and then another one, etc. We’ve put together quite a few since.