have been packed on but not it is not as bad as it could have been. The pecan pie and the pumpkin cake are now all gone via eating or trashing so those pesky snacks are no longer peering at me and beckoning to me.

Our Thanksgiving was lovely and we enjoyed spending our day with a good friend and her family. Samantha and Steven joined us for about an hour during their whirlwind, 3 house tour, of turkey and all of the fixings. Steven's mother has a tradition of making red chili to replace gravy. I have heard it is wonderful but I will possibly wait until next year to try it.

Lewis has decorated the outside of the house, with new LED lights, replacing almost all of our old outdoor lights. I hope to get outside and see the result tonight. Now for the indoor decorating which is nice but I don't have that many places to put Christmas items. I will find a special place for my wonderful Christmas Teapots that my mom has given to me over the years. I love them mom, thank you!

This weekend will begin 3 weeks of activities and then Sarah and Jeff will arrive just in time to celebrate his birthday on the 24th and Christmas. They will leave 2 days before their 2nd and our 30th wedding anniversaries. Sarah has now lost over 50 pounds through Weight Watchers this past 11 months. I am so excited for her and know that she has done a great job of returning to a nice state of health. Steven will graduate from The University of New Mexico on December 18th and we are so proud of him and excited for him. Samantha is only 1 semester away from her graduation from UNM. I can not tell you how much we are looking forward to that day. She has worked hard and long for this upcoming degree.

May your week be wonderful.

I was last on Xanga? I spend much more time on Facebook because it is easier to just push the "like" button or leave a 4 word response.
Life has been good but I must admit that I am going through withdraw as my camera is still in the shop. I did not realize that I enjoyed taking pictures so much even if they are not always great images. I just like the idea of seeing something and trying to capture it on my SD card.
Now all that I need is a money fairy to come my way and for her to bring the Idea fairy with her. I am really clueless as to what to purchase for the major Christmas gifts and feel as if time is slipping too quickly away. I have 2 boxes to ship in addition to the gifts to purchase.
We drew names again for the second year in a row. It still feels very odd not to be purchasing gifts for every member of our family. I know that I will sneak gifts in to each stocking but it does not feel the same. Not everyone will be home for Christmas and that is sad. The blessing is that we were almost all together at Christmas. One of our Son-in-law's could not be with us but he will be with us at Christmas. We will be missing the Ohio family.

May you enjoy your Thanksgiving by realizing what blessings you have been given. May the Dallas Cowboy's play better on Thursday than they did today. May my camera be back to me by next week.

If I did not have my calendar to look at I would feel as if Spring was in the air. The sun is up before 7 AM, birds are singing outside of my window, leaves are on the tree, the sky is a beautiful blue and the temperature seems to be mild. I should state that the only way I know what the temperature is comes after a brief encounter with the great outdoors this morning while feeding the dogs.

Our camera club group of Wednesday picture takers will head out to our Japanese gardens where the leaves hopefully will be a brilliant red. I am not counting on it. I am going to get out of the house and then to pick up Samantha for a lovely lunch before taking her to the University for her lab and to meet up with her husband. If I get a decent picture out of this outing, I will consider it a blessing.

I am still waking up with an Eastern Time zone body mind set. I hope that by this weekend, I will go back to being my old lazy self and stay in bed past 6:30.

Ok, I have now been on Xanga 3 times this week. What is up with that? Happy Wednesday.