I love it when I get what I expected and it was good!
I came as close as I probably ever have come to doing as much as I had hoped over my holiday week. The week that started out raining has ended with lots of sunshine and warm weather.
As I look back at my list of things I planned to do, I think I did pretty well.
* Amanda and Stacey came home on Tuesday night. Haley and Abby spent the night with us. We all got up and went to Bellville to our friends’ ranch for the day. It was lots of fun, however after the rain for 3 days it was pretty muddy and quite cold. But that did not stop the kids – big or little ones. They had a blast on the 4-wheeler, the go-cart and playing on the swing and in the tree house. Haley hit it off with a new friend, Kelly, who is 2 years younger than her.
* We got home just in time to meet the McCombs who came over to host a Thanksgiving dinner for the Hope House guys. It was really nice. There were about 20 people in all.
* Thanksgiving Dinner #2 was at lunch on Thursday when we had a total of 25 of us – part of our family, our Harbor Church family, friends and guests of those who are in the above categories.
* Thanksgiving Dinner #3 was at Friday lunch in Lufkin with our Herrington/Brasher families. There were about 16 of us there. We came back to Houston in time to pick up friend #2 of Amanda’s, Kayla (aka “Montana” for the obvious reason – she’s from Montana!).
* Saturday brought lots of sunshine and a great opportunity to hit the garage. I am not believing how BIG our garage is after Jim took 2 truckloads of donations to the Salvation Army. I know I could have made some money at a garage sale, but I don’t see any time before Christmas that it could happen, so there you go! My garage sale fortunes forfeited for getting it done NOW!
* Saturday night at church we did the first candle for Advent – the candle of Promise to remind us of the promise God made through the prophet Isaiah that God’s Son would be born. In it was my first sign of “promise” that Christmas decorations would be coming out!
* Ok, my REAL motive for cleaning the garage, remember, was to be able to get my 7 plastic crates of decorations out! After church, I got David and Tom to bring up the huge box that has my pre-lighted tree in it. Sunday morning Jim and I got it put together and Amanda helped us decorate it. It was great having her help, but I sure missed having the other kids here to help with the decorating and getting to tell the stories behind each ornament. I must say Amanda did a great job listening and complaining about Nathan being the favored child because he had more ornaments with his picture on them. (I wonder if anyone will ever figure out that it was his school and church teachers and not me who did those projects. Oh, well, why change an annual argument now, when there were no siblings to argue back about it.)
So the day ends – tree is done. Gingerbread kitchen is done. Angel bathroom is done. All the nativity scenes are out. All of the Santa’s are on their shelves. Hand towels and potholders out. Stockings are hung. Pretty much all that is left is the garland on bows on the stair railing and mantle and getting the dishes out. Since we use the Christmas dishes every day for the whole month of December, I tend to want to wait until December 1st to begin using them.
It is 9:00 p.m. and I have only slightly begun my lesson plans. I think I will wait….there will be time to do that tomorrow. I think I am going to go sit by my lighted tree, listen to the Christmas CD one more time and drink some hot cocoa. I want all I can get out of this week of vacation. It has flown by, but it has been good. I can hardly wait to see my kindergartners. I am gearing up for lots of hugs and lots of chatter all day long.
(As I read back over this blog, I apologize for the mundane-ness of it. But it sure helps to see what I have done with my week and I feel good about it!)
As I look back at my list of things I planned to do, I think I did pretty well.
* Amanda and Stacey came home on Tuesday night. Haley and Abby spent the night with us. We all got up and went to Bellville to our friends’ ranch for the day. It was lots of fun, however after the rain for 3 days it was pretty muddy and quite cold. But that did not stop the kids – big or little ones. They had a blast on the 4-wheeler, the go-cart and playing on the swing and in the tree house. Haley hit it off with a new friend, Kelly, who is 2 years younger than her.
* We got home just in time to meet the McCombs who came over to host a Thanksgiving dinner for the Hope House guys. It was really nice. There were about 20 people in all.
* Thanksgiving Dinner #2 was at lunch on Thursday when we had a total of 25 of us – part of our family, our Harbor Church family, friends and guests of those who are in the above categories.
* Thanksgiving Dinner #3 was at Friday lunch in Lufkin with our Herrington/Brasher families. There were about 16 of us there. We came back to Houston in time to pick up friend #2 of Amanda’s, Kayla (aka “Montana” for the obvious reason – she’s from Montana!).
* Saturday brought lots of sunshine and a great opportunity to hit the garage. I am not believing how BIG our garage is after Jim took 2 truckloads of donations to the Salvation Army. I know I could have made some money at a garage sale, but I don’t see any time before Christmas that it could happen, so there you go! My garage sale fortunes forfeited for getting it done NOW!
* Saturday night at church we did the first candle for Advent – the candle of Promise to remind us of the promise God made through the prophet Isaiah that God’s Son would be born. In it was my first sign of “promise” that Christmas decorations would be coming out!
* Ok, my REAL motive for cleaning the garage, remember, was to be able to get my 7 plastic crates of decorations out! After church, I got David and Tom to bring up the huge box that has my pre-lighted tree in it. Sunday morning Jim and I got it put together and Amanda helped us decorate it. It was great having her help, but I sure missed having the other kids here to help with the decorating and getting to tell the stories behind each ornament. I must say Amanda did a great job listening and complaining about Nathan being the favored child because he had more ornaments with his picture on them. (I wonder if anyone will ever figure out that it was his school and church teachers and not me who did those projects. Oh, well, why change an annual argument now, when there were no siblings to argue back about it.)
So the day ends – tree is done. Gingerbread kitchen is done. Angel bathroom is done. All the nativity scenes are out. All of the Santa’s are on their shelves. Hand towels and potholders out. Stockings are hung. Pretty much all that is left is the garland on bows on the stair railing and mantle and getting the dishes out. Since we use the Christmas dishes every day for the whole month of December, I tend to want to wait until December 1st to begin using them.
It is 9:00 p.m. and I have only slightly begun my lesson plans. I think I will wait….there will be time to do that tomorrow. I think I am going to go sit by my lighted tree, listen to the Christmas CD one more time and drink some hot cocoa. I want all I can get out of this week of vacation. It has flown by, but it has been good. I can hardly wait to see my kindergartners. I am gearing up for lots of hugs and lots of chatter all day long.
(As I read back over this blog, I apologize for the mundane-ness of it. But it sure helps to see what I have done with my week and I feel good about it!)
posted by Betty @ 9:14 PM
3 Comments:
At 12:53 AM,
ELS Houston said…
I like "mundane" posts like this one. There's something satisfying for me about reading about the day-to-day events in your life, especially when they include special events that result in me feeling a little bit homesick. Not excessively, but just enough to remember where home is.
At 6:51 AM,
mrjoshua said…
so dang fun!!
At 10:19 AM,
Anonymous said…
I know what you mean, Nathan. I love reading about the day-to-day events of my friends in Houston. I feel like I'm back there with them when I read them.
Ted
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