Its the most wonderful time of the year

Today I helped a friend decorate the church for Christmas. This friend is very good at decorating and I have been wanting to "help" him decorate for a while, except he never lets anyone. Today, though, was my lucky day. I love Christmas...the cheesy Christmas movies, the cold weather, peppermint flavored everything, the smell of rosemary...but what I love the most is community. During the Christmas season, people live in community with one another. They help each other, they talk to each other, they shop together, they eat together. We all get to know each other better. Today was community at its best. Christmas decorating, arguing over which ornaments go where, too many ornaments, too few ornaments, the revealing of secrets, making fun of each other and getting scratched arms from the fake Christmas tree. All good stuff...its the most wonderful time of the year! And I'm thankful its here. Does anyone want to decorate my house now? I'm all decorated out :)

Its a stretch

Today I am having to dig deep for something to be thankful for...because I am sick. What could it be? I know definitely what it is not. I am not thankful for feeling awful, not being able to do anything fun while everyone else does fun stuff, getting behind on housework or having to function even when you don't feel like it. The only upside to being sick is that while I can't move off of the couch, Jack snuggles with me (and he's not much of a snuggler) and I can catch up on all of my tv watching. Its not much...what I have to be thankful for...but its something. Here's hoping that I am a little sunnier tomorrow!

My Nana

I have two grandmothers still living...I'm lucky. Nana is my grandmother who will bake you a cake in the shape of Strawberry Shortcake if that's your favorite cartoon character. Every summer I would stay with her for a week and we would sew barbie cloths, crochet long chains because that's all I could do, eat tacos from Taco Bell, pick pecans, shell purple hull peas, and at the end of the week my Papa would set up the Slip and Slide out in the yard. We were also BIG game players. Everytime I saw her we would play dominoes and I would tell her that I was gonna "beat the socks off of her"...and she would let me maybe once or twice...but not everytime (which I appreciate). One time, I convinced her to let me do her hair...I must have used a whole bottle of hair spray. It took an hour. She wouldn't leave the house after that. I wonder why :)She is the best crafter. She has been crafting for as long as I can remember. And she still crafts. I love that I got a love of crafts from her. While I'm still not as good of a sewer or crocheter as she is...and I don't know how to do ceramics at all like she can...I still love to be inspired to make ordinary things into something else completely. She taught me that. She could turn a pair of pantyhose into a potato. She turns rocks into painted animals. Nothing is safe from being turned into a craft when she's around. Broken table...now its a flower arrangement. I am thankful that I got to spend a lot of time with her and I'm thankful that she took time to teach me things that she knew. All of those things that she taught me make up who I am today.