...on the feast of Stephen--which happens to be today. Also Boxing Day, and a good day to just sit around, eat, and relax, which is pretty much what we've done all day.
Baby J is at an adorable age (okay, what isn't an adorable age?) She "commando crawls," loves to play in the exersaucer, likes the xylophone her uncle, the Kid brought her, and is fascinated by the buttons on my sweater. So much of the day was spent in holding court for her. Mr. LS's family was here yesterday and this morning, and it was fun catching up with them, too.
As I said earlier, Christmas itself was quite lovely, but getting there was hellish. Tuesday and Wednesday were a marathon of activity, but I actually managed to get almost everything done by noon on Wednesday (there are still two packages that need to be mailed, under the "Christmas lasts until January 6 rubric). I was in charge of the Christmas pageant this year--another one of those things that I volunteer for and then say, WTF was I thinking?" but it turned out really well. I decided to do two things differently--to involve the whole congregation and to have no rehearsals except for the readers, since the other cast members just walk on at the appropriate times. I put together a script that was a adaptation of a couple I found on the internet, and I did the brief narration with the middle school youth reading the scripture parts that told the story. We had a young family play Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus, the kids were angels, shpeherds and wise guys, and we made halos, crowns, and shepherd head pieces to give out to the congration, and each group had one line to do (printed in the bulletin and signaled by a bell). And it all worked! Everyone seemed to really enjoy it.
That was at 4:oo pm, and we also had services at 7:00 and 11:00. The choir open house was in between those two services. It was potluck so I didn't have to do too much cooking, and it turned out to be fun. I finally got home for the night around 1:00 am, wrapped the last few gifts, proofed my sermon and fell into bed about 3:00 am. We got up in time to exchange gifts before I had to be back at church for the Christmas Day service. The Kid was a great help. Not only did he help get ready for the open house, he also took charge of packing us lunch and getting the car packed and ready to go so that we could leave as soon as I got home from church and threw my things into my suitcase.
I'd like to figure out a way to get ready for Christmas without having the pre Christmas blues and without things being so crazy, frantically busy the last week, but I don't know if it will ever happen. This year I had the pageant and Blue Christmas liturgy that took a fair amount of extra time to prepare for on top of the usual stuff--but they were two things I really enjoyed doing and woul enjoy more without the time crunch. It would help, I gues, if I shopped and decorated earlier, but I just don't operate that way. So maybe the price I pay is all the craziness.
This is the first year I've traveled for Christmas in a long time, and to be honest, I was dreading it a bit. But it all worked out okay. I was worried about being too tired to drive, and I was really, really tired, but the trip took us less time (by at least 40 mintues) than usual, and the Kid talked to me and kept the iPod going with Harry Potter. And it is nice being here with no pressure to get anything accomplished.
Pictures of baby adorableness and Christmas fun tomorrow, I promise.
1 comment:
Enjoy your family and your time off!
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