We had a very nice "candle light" Christmas Eve service at church. I had wondered how we would deal with the candle part when we can't have open flames in the school gym.... The candles were electric candles :) With the lights off, two or three strategically placed spotlights and the electric candles, we had a very nice mood. We also had treats so I grabbed a baby cheesecake dealie (in a cupcake wrapper) and told many peeps Merry Christmas after we were dismissed and had to make sure I didn't smush the cheesecake into them. When I got home Butler and I watched "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" which was really pretty good - it just came out on DVD this week.
Christmas morning I headed to Pella to be there in time to go to church with Dad. I have to give Dad a hard time because church starts at 9:30 and he always gets there at 9:00....and he lives like five blocks away from the church. Wow. I like to be early but my early is 15 minutes not 30 :) Dad introduced me to the gentleman that worked at Hospice and that had sat with Mom and Dad a while before Mom passed and was in the room with Dad when Mom passed - he seemed like a very nice man and it was nice to meet him. Dad introduced me to some folks and I said "hi" to some that I already knew.
We got back to Dad's apartment and I looked at the Christmas cards he'd received and ordered Casey's pizza. By the time I finished looking at his cards it was time to pick up the pizza. After we ate we opened presents. Dad had used several gift bags for my things but no tissue paper so I could look right into the bag to see what I was getting. I gave him a hard time after we were finished opening presents telling him that the bags were a surprise - I figured my gifts would be in plastic WalMart bags :) There was a box he had wrapped that the tag said it was from Mom that when I saw it, it kind of got to me and he told me to open that gift last. We won't know until we get to Heaven to ask Mom if she just planned ahead or if she had a feeling she needed to get part of my Christmas gift ready before she went into the hospital the first of June, but it was really awesome to get that gift.
My absolute favorite Christmas song is John Berry's (country) version of "O Holy Night" that he recorded a few years ago. I haven't listened to my country radio station since I started attending Living Waters - I listen to a Christian station - and I hadn't heard this version this year. Well, I hadn't needed to use my alarm for a while but had to use it Sunday to make sure I got up in plenty of time to get to Pella on time. My alarm radio is still tuned to KJJY (country) and guess what song was ending when my alarm went off - John Berry's "O Holy Night". Right at the ending with all the great high notes. I was in seventh heaven. Then later Christmas night I was flipping channels on the tv and with Dish TV I have some radio stations with one being a Latino station. As I was going through the radio channels I said to Butler, "you know, I haven't heard "Feliz Navidad" this year" and guess what was coming on the Latino radio station? Yep, "Feliz Navidad". Now it wasn't Jose Feliciano's version (think Taco Bell Christmas song) but I still really got into singing along with it anyway.
Yesterday I called my timeshare organization to ask some questions because I had switched my timeshare from weeks to points this past September when I was on vacation. Well, the consultant had a hard time finding my new points membership in the system and finally figured out it was because M.D. (Mike) and Veronda were on the weeks membership but only Veronda was on the points membership. You wouldn't think I'd still need to send off Mike's death certificate after 1 year, 8 months and 3 days but guess what I was faxing to the timeshare place to link my memberships in the system? They needed Mike's death certificate to take him off the weeks membership so it could link to my points membership.
I don't watch football and I'm not a Cyclone fan but right now I am - I'm watching the bowl game they are playing in that's in Yankee Stadium. But evidently I'm not paying close enough attention because once I looked and the score was 3-0 Iowa State and now it's 6-0 Iowa State and I have no idea when they got the field goals. The Hawkeye bowl game starts at 9:00 p.m. tonight.................
I'm going to meet my one friend for another estate sale tomorrow morning at the actual house and may go with another friend to an early afternoon movie. But no plans for celebrating New Year's Eve. That's one of the "holidays" that bothers me a little - welcoming in the new year without Mike with me. We usually stayed home New Year's Eve because Mike said that was the night all the amateur's were out celebrating big time (read drinking like crazy) that didn't do that the rest of the year and they would be insane behind the wheel of a car.
Wow, Rutgers just got a good non-call to let them get a touchdown instead of trying for a field goal......now it's 6-7 Rutgers.
