The Last Christmas

Well, first I must offer an embarrassed apoogy.  Turns out yesterday's entry ws NOT the 5000th.  Somewhere I got my numbers confused and I actually wrote the 5000th entry on December 3rd, so I am now well into the 5000s...5027, to be precise.  I guess it's even more impressive.

Today we finally had the LAST Christmas celebration (the party tomorrow and the one on New Year's Eve are not Christmas parties).  We drove over to Atria at 11 a.m. to start the celebration with Ned & Marta and my mother.  While we were waiting for Ned & Marta, Jeri showed my mother videos from our time with the great grandkids in Santa Barbara.

Ned and Marta showed up with some gorgeous roses for my mother, which she just loved.

Cut flowers are SO much better for her these days.  She still loves flowers, but she has totally lost the desire to garden anything.  I must start buying her fresh flowers every week or so because she loves having plants and flowers to look at.  I also think that as her plants continue to die, I will replace them with good artificial ones.

We went off to the Atria dining room and enjoyed their huge Sunday brunch.  We were joined by a couple of other people, which made "family talk" awkward, mostly for me because I was sitting with them and everybody else was at the other end of the table.

But I was able to get a nice "family" picture after they finally left.

We went back to the apartment for presents.

Jeri played Santa, handing out the few gifts that were there.  My mother was upset that people had given her things because she didn't have anything for anyone, but when she saw her gifts  -- a calendar for next year, Laurel's annual great-grandkids calendar, and especially her favorite gift, a puzzle with the girls' photo on it -- she stopped complaining.

I was tickled with my new 4 gig flash drive from Ned and Marta.

I think it's so cute.  Jeri also got one which is a giraffe.  

And I am very relieved that the book I ordered for Jeri, which had not arrived by the time we left for Santa Barbara, was here when we came back, so I was able to give it to her today.

We made a video to send to Phil, who was sorely missed, and then headed off for home.  My mother was eager to get started working on her new puzzle.

When we got home, Walt was feeling sick, with slight fever, headache, and upset stomach.  He has gone to bed for the night.  Jeri has gone off to Ned and Marta's with their friend Greg and who knows when they will be back again.  I am sitting here, about to dive into the holiday episode of Call the Midwives, so all is calm, all is bright and tomorrow we'll have two more gatherings of people who want to see Jeri before she returns to Boston!