making rather merry, sir

What a funny Christmas.

I had no Christmas Eve service to plan.

I did not decorate my house.

I did not buy a turkey, mash potatoes, make stuffing, plan a meal, fuss over details.

Gifts among our immediate family were all opened by the 17th.

There's not even a chance of snow here.

In some ways, all is so foreign, yet... here I sit, as the girls play in their silly camaraderie among cousins and uncles and aunts, old jokes being dredged up and laughed at yet again, and new jokes being forged as we laugh our way through the holidays. And it's right.

Some of the laughter is because of the jokes, much is just because it's so easy to laugh when we're all together.

More people than ever, yet not quite all. Tonight on the way home the iPod kicked into "All is Well". About one verse in, I switched tracks. "I like that one," said D. "It reminds too much," said I. "Enough said," he replied. What an amazing guy.

What an amazing family.

I am, in so many senses of the word, ridiculously blessed.

Merry Christmas. And God bless us, every one.

nature, sort of

Sometimes we learn things here in odd ways. For example, I found out last week that we have ermine living here on the farm. They're cute little weasels, and in winter their otherwise brown camouflaging fur turns pure white except for a little tuft of black at the tip of their tail (question: why the tuft? answer: I have no idea.) in preparation for the snow that will come.

The odd way we found out? Found one drowned in our pool. Oops. Sorry, little guy.