December Report

This was one of the most unusual Decembers of my life. It started off with lots of plans for fun times with friends and family. One by one everyone cancelled on us for all of our social occasions in December except for one couple. The night we went to dinner with them (the 12th), we hit a deer on the way home. The deer was suddenly right in front of us. We hit it square on its side, and it rolled over a few times, jumped up, and ran off. The only damage we sustained to the car was a broken grill in front. (By the way, there are deer in our neighborhood all year long. We are on a constant watch to see them on the road, and when there is one, there are more. This was a strange experience.)

Then on the 14th, as I was cleaning up after a bridal shower for my soon-to-be daughter-in-law, I got a phone call from my dad that my mom was very sick. I drove over to their place, and we immediately took my mother to the hospital. We brought her home on the 17th and she died on the 18th. All of my siblings were able to make it into town on the 17th and we were all with her when she died. It was the perfect scenario for a hard situation.

My dad was anxious to get everything of my mom's cleaned out of their little apartment (they are in a wonderful assisted living situation). We were all there, so we quickly went through my mom's stuff, divided what we wanted to keep, and took the rest of it to Deseret Industries (like GoodWill). My brother and his wife left to go home, and my sisters stayed a few more days.

Christmas Eve we took my dad out to lunch. It would have been my parents' 58th wedding anniversary. They used to go out to lunch every year to celebrate. After lunch Ray and I delivered 65 gallons of cider to our friends and family. We started this tradition years ago when we lived in Washington. Pink Lady cider. It was so good! We've found a place here, Farnsworth Farms, that makes delicious cider, so we've kept the tradition here in Utah.

Christmas dawned bright and clear. We went to see Saving Mr. Banks, then had my dad over for the afternoon. We had fondue for dinner, and some delicious chocolate cake that I love.

The day after Christmas we went down to see the Hulmes. It was Jim's birthday, and their whole family was there, as were the Wests. I was feeling a cold coming on, and Ray wasn't feeling too great either, so we called it an early night and came home.

Since then we've mostly been in bed, sick. I read four books, and we watched both complete seasons of Sherlock (excellent) and the first two seasons of Psych (very fun). Ray slept through a few football games too. Yesterday we both ventured forth for a couple of hours, but collapsed at the end of the day. I'm hoping we both feel much better today.The kids start arriving today, and we will all be together for New Years Day. What a great way to start a new year!

In short, not the merriest of Christmas seasons, but it was filled with many blessings. The last few months of 2013 have been very intense for our family. I'm looking forward to good things in 2014.