Another Holiday Has Come and Finally Gone

Well, another Christmas/New Year has come and gone.  Not without more than the usual commotion though.  As I was putting away decorations and undecorating trees, I realized that I commit one month of my life every year to the process.  At first, I got upset.  That is a lot of valuable time!  But then I thought about the memories that come along with the effort.  There are certain decorations that make us laugh and talk about the events surrounding that item.  There are other decorations that make us smile, get a tear in our eye, and make us think warmly of an event or person. 

Of course, being the fanatic that I am, I don't just decorate and undecorated.  I reorganize.  I clean.  I repair things.  I move furniture.  The Admiral, in particular loves this time of year, because everything looks different in the house when I am done.  I wash walls and floors as I clean and try to go room by room without disrupting too much of every day life.  It literally takes me two weeks to set up and two weeks to take it all down.  I get some help, but mostly it falls on me.  My choice.  This year, I decided that praying while I clean is a good use of the time and a way to multi-task and include Christ in Christmas. 

Prayers are answered in different ways.  One in particular that I prayed a lot was "God help me get through this!!!!"  With the virus that swept the family and pending surgery for one in our family, that one got used a lot.  I do not think that in 35 years of marriage and children I have cleaned up that much from a stomach virus.  Why is it that small children just let loose all over themselves and the furnishings.  Seriously, how hard is it to realize that your stomach is churning?  How hard is it to sprint to a bathroom?  We have plenty of them!  If you told them you got them a new toy they would sprint!  But, God is getting us through all of it and in the end we are still smiling.  What else can you do?

Moving the furniture leaves everything fresh. It forces you to clean under things, you know, those areas that you often neglect for a variety of reasons.  The problem with it is that you get used to where things are.  I would like to use that as an excuse for the tumble I took, but I can't.  As I headed for bed one night, I barreled through the living room to my bedroom and noticed a light on at the other end of the living room.  As I looked in the direction of the light, I plowed directly into the wooden box/coffee table in the living room.  I must have  flipped myself in the air, because I eventually came down on my left hip and arm.  It left me with a bruised and bleeding right shin, still bruised left arm and hip.  I lay on the floor half laughing and half crying.  The Surprise came to check on me, which is a good thing because while my husband heard the noise he stayed in bed!  I can't blame the moving of the furniture, that particular piece has been in the same place for a year!

Well in spite of injuries, I continued to clean.  It is hectic enough in our house that sometimes I do my best work when everyone goes to sleep.  Okay, in all honesty I simply get obsessed and cannot stop.  Anyway, the dining room needed to be done and ready for Sunday family dinner.  Everything was clean and ready, except for the hole in the wall.  A big white patch of spackling on a dark green wall from placement of a new thermostat was driving me crazy.  It was one of the chores I left when I headed to Maryland for a surprise visit.  The spackling was done, but not the paint.  No problem.  I have paint in that color.  I got the paint out and started to shake the can....unfortunately, it flew out of my hands!  The entire can hit the floor and the lid flew off.  Dark green paint was in a massive puddle on the wood floor and had splattered all over the dining room buffet, the light green wall and the beams!  NO WAY!  "GOD PLEASE HELP ME GET THROUGH THIS!!!!"  I started to clean this mess up.  It was 1:00 in the morning.  Bad news, some of the paint was drying before I could get to it!  I finally went downstairs and got the Admiral who was up watching television.  Between the two of us we got the paint cleaned up.  And...I ended up painting two walls.  At 3:00 AM, I finally went to bed.  We must have done a good job, because the next morning Doc made a comment about how nice the dining room looked.  He still doesn't know what happened!

The last of the holidays was packed away this week.  The boxes are organized by room and box color.  I managed to give away to the Blonde, one of my collections.  Indeed, God helped me get through another year and to start a new year with an attitude of thankfulness for the blessings I have.  I have been told to be thankful for the challenges that I face.  They will help me grow spiritually.  I think I am growing a lot this year!  I hope you have had a blessed start to the year 2018.  God is always by your side.