Advent-ure in the Busy Season

These fun little Nutter Butter Santa cookies represent the extent of my Christmas baking, and that's really okay. The tree went up over the course of a few days, thanks to Laura who assembled it earlier this week and then another day after school dragged out the boxes with decorations in. The lights went on Friday night, the ornaments yesterday. I enjoyed looking at every ornament this year, remembering who they came from or which of the girls had made them. No presents are wrapped yet. In fact, I am not even sure if I have all the gifts I need to have by Christmas. Cards are not ready. Liz is drawing our card this year--in case you don't get one, it's a picture of a fairy (or an elf?) sitting on the ledge of a rectangular box and it says "Merry Christmas." Have not taken a photo of the kids or of the family to send out with the cards, so that might not happen. Also I have not written a Christmas letter like usual.

It's not at all that I don't want to do these things. The difference is that this year I have done some things in the Advent Season that in the past I did not take enough time for. Laura and I went to the Madrigal Dinner on Dec. 5 in which the Senior High commons was transformed into a castle and we were there for the feast. We, of course, had a band concert for Liz and a choir concert for Laura. The other night we went to see a performance of "White Christmas," which was so well done and inspiring. We also adopted a little girl who needed presents under her tree, had a Secret Santa event at the hospice office, and went to a church potluck today and sat with people we didn't know but now do. Tomorrow Liz and I are helping with the Confirmation project of adopting a family who is having a hard time this season, shopping for and wrapping gifts to give them from the proceeds of one single bake sale held a couple weeks ago.

The rest of it will all fall into place. We'll see wrapped presents under our tree on Christmas morning, news and wishes of the season will go into the mailboxes of friends and families (maybe extending the season a little beyond the Dec 25 date). We will travel to southern Wi and spend time with our families and will rejuvenate our relationships and our connections with them in a whirlwind of Christmas spirit. There's a lot to appreciate about the season of Advent, and this feels way better to me than it has in the past...

Lame Blogging Accusation

This week a person who knows me very well and can hassle me about such things if she wants to told me I am a lame blogger! The fact that she, and maybe others, actually checks my blog from time to time is humbling to me. I have been aware for many months now that I am not keeping up my end of the bargain here--I got well, my life returned in its old familiar form, and I just QUIT writing! Then today my daughter Liz went to a writer's workshop where an author spoke to the students and basically said that if you want to be a writer, then you have to sit your butt down in the chair and WRITE. Actually, I guess he used a more colorful word to express that sittable part of the anatomy, and that did impress the teenaged audience. And it impressed me too, because although I quite often THINK about writing on my blog, I am actually an incredibly lame blogger.

The name of the blog still fits, too. I am actually Beyond the Pillbox. I still use a daily one just to remember to take my allergy pill and my vitamins and stuff, but I don't carry it around with me, and it has one opening per day, unlike that industrial strength one I used during what I now refer to as my "lost year" or my "black period." Recently I had lunch with my friend Sarah and she suddenly said something about it being 1 o' clock, and then quickly, "Oh yeah, you don;t have ot take medicine at 1 pm anymore!" Life after Trigeminal Neuralgia is really just full of normal experiences which don't always impress me as being that interesting to other people. It continues to amaze me that I can reflect back to a certain place in time not so long ago when life was really small and painful for me. I cannot impress upon you how happy and content I am that it is not like that anymore. Liz just reminded me that she achieved the 9 month mark for her driver's license, so all her restrictions are off and she can drive as many people as she wants to. That's a big deal when you are 16. Her milestone reminded me that I am now less than a week away from my own 9 month anniversary of my MVD surgery...how time flies when you're living a normal life.

And that's something to blog about.