I’m going to put your mind at ease to start with. This is not going to be a super spiritual post about reviewing 2018. I trust you will do that sometime this week. My past weekend was the “Christmas weekend” which defies description. It was such a hodge podge of stuff. I look forward to going back to the office to get some rest.  Taking naps in my chair never sounded so good.  🙂 🙂

Thursday morning I worked at our local theater popping popcorn for a children’s movie for a group of school children. Later that afternoon I went to Spencer Elementary School to do my Real Men Read with Mrs. Lee’s kindergarten class. I left them with a treat bag of a gingerbread cookies (I read “The Gingerbread Man” to them), a candy cane, and a “3 Feet Please” bear.  By the way: would you like to have one? I will be glad to send it to you if you will use it as a reminder to pray for me.

Friday I had to take my truck in for service in Terre Haute (an hour away), which ended up taking much longer than they thought.  That sort of threw us off our game a bit since we had to do some shopping for our Christmas breakfast, but we also knew Janna (our daughter), Jason and Braden were coming in to spend the weekend with us.

Saturday I studied early, went to the Y with Jason and Janna, studied some more then met some folks at Abram Farm to set up. We had so many show up to help we were pretty much ready within an hour.  We had our family Christmas Saturday night.

Sunday I was up at the normal time to make my way to the office to study and prepare and to be at Abram Farm at 8:00. I’m not OC by any stretch but I did want things ready to go. We had a wonderful service!  I think people were pleasantly surprised I was done earlier than I normally am.  (They may protest in weeks to come for a return to Christmas!). 🙂  But the real surprise was I had planned on folks being back at 2:00 to put things away. Lo and behold, my early dismissal meant some could not get to their planned family reunion for at least an hour so they asked if there was anything they could do. They started putting chairs away and those standing around talking decided to help. When I left for lunch, everything was done! All I had to do was sweep (someone else did), pick up and load some of our own equipment and was gone by 3:00. That was fantastic because that evening we were heading to our local theater for a sold out showing of The Polar Express.

Monday we had our traditional Christmas breakfast of Jo’s sausage gravy and biscuits, eggs, bacon and friendly banter. J, J & B left about noon and we headed up to the the church building to prepare for the church’s Christmas breakfast at the local Lion’s Club.  Lots of moving and lifting and getting set up. Monday evening saw both Jo & me sort of collapse and not do much moving except to go to bed.

Tuesday morning we were there at 4:30 so Jo could get started. (That’s not counting the 3:10 wake up of “Bill, I think I forgot to lock the LC. And I can’t find the key.” So I drove there (it was locked) and in the meantime she found the key on the kitchen table underneath stuff. WHEW!The breakfast went well. We had 25 deliveries to people; over 30 to service personnel (gas station workers, sheriff and police, etc). We had about 15-20 who came in to eat. Interestingly, I heard several say, “I came for the socialization.” Cool! We took all the leftover food to the local EMT folks.  After cleaning up we went home. I spent some time doing my NMM, reading and then with a sunny 44+ degree day shining through my window I broached the “Is it okay if I go for a ride?” question. She must have been expecting it. She said, “Yes!” After 45 years together she still  says, “Yes!” (I am blessed). So I was able to get in a 14.7 mile ride on a beautiful sunny day on Christmas Day. Who woulda thunk it?

All of the above did truly happen.  And all of it while fighting flu-like symptoms that stole my sleep. Except for the ride of course. You know THAT made me feel better.

Well, sorry. This has got to be the l-o-n-g-e-s-t post I have written in a long time, maybe ever. Nothing earth-shattering. Just a whimsical look at my weekend. So…in a much shorter version…how was your Christmas weekend?