I guess Christmas season is officially over for me, if not everyone else. I’ve been back at work for most of the past week, although the kids don’t go back to school until next Monday. This is the time of year when the kids drive Beth crazy the most, when they’re all at home and I’m at work. They have to struggle to find things to do to keep the occupied. Going to the library and such. Anyway, we all did New Year’s Eve at the Lancaster’s house last weekend, once again. We had dinner together at La Troje before heading to their house for games and snacks. We played the Game of Things and spoons (for Natalie – that’s her game) and stayed just long enough for midnight to pass by. Monday was a quiet day, I spent a chunk of it getting all the Christmas stuff put away. My resolution for 2018 is (once again) to get the house de-cluttered. Starts now. Anyway, I went back to work Tuesday. It was a very quiet place on Tuesday, a lot of people were still gone. This weekend, on Saturday, I went to Fort Wayne to visit Mom while the girls all had hair appointments. She seems to be doing ok, if kind of vacant. She was just sitting at a table when I got there, and I had some Christmas cards and gifts to give her from Auntie Irene and the rest of the family in England. She read and re-read the cards, put them back in the envelope, took them back out, read them again, put them away, get them out, re-read them, and repeat …for about a half an hour until I took the cards and told her, why don’t you open your presents now. There were some fuzzy socks, and some lip balm and hand cream, and some scented soap, which she opened, put away, got out again, looked over, put away, got out, etc etc. for another long while. It was like she was seeing the cards and presents for the first time ever every time she looked at them. But anyway, she didn’t raise a fuss about going with me when I left this time, which was good because I had to run to the mall to get her some more underwear since she’s apparently bee throwing hers away. So I came back again and left again. Also Saturday, since we hadn’t seen any of the family over Christmas break, Beth arranged for a family get-together at Old Burdick’s in Kalamazoo. We drove up after I got home from visiting Mom, and had a nice dinner there with most of the family (even Ted!). We didn’t get back home until after midnight, and overslept and missed church, again.