Christmas is over and I am back at work. At least it's a short week since I am taking Friday off.

Christmas was great. Just what I had hoped for. Very relaxing. We had more of an open house type of celebration. I cooked a ham and made some deviled eggs. We ate sandwiches, snacks and lots of sweets. It was an all day event. Started about 1:00 in the afternoon and ended around 10:00. It was great because no one was stressed out. Just lots of conversation, food and laughter. The kids even managed to find time for a nap.

Friday was a day of quiet for me. Reading, knitting and resting. It was perfect. Just what I wanted.

I have pictures but haven't had a chance to download them yet. I will post them soon.

I hope that everyone one had a very blessed Christmas. Guess it's time to start taking down the decorations and preparing for the New Year.

Happy Anniversary Patrick. I miss you.

We had such a wonderful time decorating the Christmas tree on Saturday night. I couldn't have asked for a better time.
Kathy and E came. There was lots of good conversation.
Lots of yummy food.
Serif has gotten so big. She put so many ornamets on the tree. She is at such a great age for Christmas.
She has gotten very good about giving a cheesy grin when you are taking a picture.
She and E worked so hard on the tree.
They worked on the tree so hard that they had to stop and have a tea party. Mommy couldn't stand it and had to come join all the fun. I have no idea why she is using a stool instead of her table.
Here is a picture of the finished product. Isn't it beautiful. They did such a great job. I have always called this my junk tree. It is filled with ornaments that the kids made and those collected through the years. Each one has a special place in my life.

After the decorating we played games and then some other friends stopped by for a quick visit. It was a perfect evening all around. How can you go wrong when you are surrounded by wonderful family and friends. Thank you all for coming.

This is the last of about 6 or so elves that my mother got while my father was in Vietnam. My mother was shopping at Gulf Mart in December of 1968 when she found them. Gulf Mart was the Super Target of the late 60's and early 70's.They were holding a small box of Whitman's Samplers. There were four pieces of candy in each box. She picked up a couple of them and we both enjoyed the candy. We thought they were so cute that she went back on got a few more. They also had a Santa Claus but we fell in love with the elves. Before we knew it, we had a nice little collection. We even sent some with my father's Christmas care package (minus the chocolate) to Vietnam to decorate his place. Every year since then they were been a part of our Christmas decorations. We'll see if this one survivies to see the next Christmas.

My computer is back up so I thought I would share some of the pictures from my Thanksgiving weekend. I don't have any pictures from Thanksgiving Day because I was too busy eating to take pictures. Did I mention that the food was delicious and that I ate too much?

Friday I got to go to my very first "Redneck Wedding". I am not being rude. That is what the bride called it. One of Missy's co-workers was getting married and was kind enough to include me in the invitation.

This is the wedding cake. Get the impression that they are Texans?

Here is the altar. Yes that it hay that we all got to sit on.
Here is a closer look.
The cow bells were on the hay. Everyone shook them when the couple was pronounced man and wife.
The dress was blue jeans and cow boy boots. There was wonderful ribs and sausage with all the trimmings after the ceremony. The whole wedding was great and we all had a ball.
Saturday was the anual baking of the banana nut bread for Christmas. I had a great helper through the process.
She and I had so much fun. We baked while Daddy napped and Mommy and E went out for a girl's afternoon out.
Of course all the baking wears a girl out. Here is my sweet grandbaby taking a bit of a rest before going right back at it. We got 6 loaves of bread baked. Trust me, I couldn't have gotten it done without her.

I know I have been so bad about posting. Things have been crazy at work and then, of course, there was Thanksgiving.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend. Wonderful family and food. It was great.

The weekend was filled but, unfortunately, my laptop is down so I could not upload all the pictures in order to share everything with you. Hopefully I will be able to do that soon.

Right now while we are all resting from Thanksgiving and getting ready to get caught up in the Christmas craziness, I would like all of you to stop and say a prayer for a fellow blogger. Deb has been through so much in the last few years. Just before Thanksgiving she discovered that she had relapsed and her leukemia was back. Deb is such a strong person. If you would like, here is the link to her blog http://www.debutaunt.com/. Go and let her know that you are there for her. Also, maybe while you're out doing your running around this December, you could stop and give some blood. Someone would really appreciate it. Trust me.

That's it for now. I need to get back to work. Hopefully I'll have pictures for you soon.