Gratitude in the Highest

Today is Christmas Eve and I would like to dedicate this post to all of the wonderfully caring people who have read this blog for the short time it has existed and who have given me so much encouragement, support and kindness. You all have given me more happiness and joy than you realize. You have uplifted me during my darkest moments and I appreciate each and every one of you.



I hope that all of you have a wonderful holiday season. I also hope that you have an uplifting and joyous New Year.



Thank you, thank you, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Christmas: A Time of Joy or Stress?

Why does Christmas have to be so stressful? This time of the year is supposed to be a time where you spend with family and friends and be thankful for all of the blessings that have been bestowed upon you. Instead it is a mad rush buying presents, wrapping them, sending out cards, attending events, making a lot of food, and the stress can eat you alive. It's funny because next Sunday I have two family events to attend which means we'll be at one and then have to leave before it's over to get in the car and drive another 40 minutes to attend the next one. By the time I get home that night I'll be dead tired.



I'm a subcontractor at work which means I don't have one work Christmas party, but three! It sounds nice, but currently it feels like a chore.



The Christmas tree is up, thankfully! I still haven't had the time to post pictures. I will as soon as I can.



I feel that writing in this blog for now will be sketchy at best. I'm going to write as much as I can because it has been so good for me and I enjoy it a lot.



I am finally finished with this quarter at school. I ended up with a 98 on my research paper and a 96 for my research and writing class final grade along with a 98 in my UNIX class. Yay! My 4.0 GPA wasn't compromised! :)



I'm going to try and finish my Christmas cards tonight. I certainly hope and pray that I do. I also hope and pray that this time of year is joyful for you and not stressful. It makes you want the season to hurry up and be over, which is really sad and totally against what Christmas is supposed to be about.

My Joy

The new postage stamp



The other night my daughter and I had a photo shoot. She wanted to take some pics to send to a friend named Joey. I say "friend" because it's not official, but any day now I know they will be an item. He told her on the phone that he wants to see her when he asks her out because he thinks it is better to ask in person than over the phone or internet. Very true...and very nice. I like it.







My God, I love this girl.



My daughter met this young gentleman on Thanksgiving weekend. She went to a family event and he was there like a star that had fallen from the sky ...completely unexpected. She was HIGHLY relieved to find out that he isn't family and they have been chattering on the phone and internet non-stop since. She has a private MySpace page where only the people that she invites can access her profile. I didn't want the profile to be public after hearing the horror stories in the news and initially assisted her in setting it up.







She picked out this t-shirt and it totally fits her personality and soul.



She constantly gets the laptop and runs to me to show me the new MySpace messages she receives from friends and Joey. It is wonderful that she does this because I can completely know what is going on in her life and with this boy. I can tell that he is a gentleman and I like what I see so far.



When I was her age I was ultra-secretive. If MySpace existed then I would have NEVER shown my parents ANY message. My daughter is completely unlike me in this regard and I am very thankful. I must have driven my parents nuts.









This is her expression when I said the name Joey....(such a googly-eyed girl) lol



She is my heart, my joy, my life, and my lovely daughter. I love her to bits.



Oh, and the tree isn't up yet...hopefully tomorrow.

Once Again

No Christmas tree. I went home last night thinking that it would be set up and we could decorate it. The tree wasn't set up. It was still boxed away in the shed. The problem is that by the time I got home it was dark outside (it gets dark here around 5:30pm) and the shed doesn't have a light. I searched everywhere for a flashlight and of course I found two but both didn't work and of course I couldn't find any batteries.

I went outside anyway, unlocked the shed and finally located it behind a bunch of boxes. It was in a corner with extension cords piled on top of it and boxes all around it. I tried to pull it out anyway; however, it was so very heavy and there was no way I could do it on my own. Boxes need to be moved from around it in order to pull it out easier but since there are no lights in the shed and things are everywhere, I couldn't move boxes around blindly. I was peeved, locked the shed and headed inside to take a shower.

After taking a shower I saw the backyard light on and the shed door open. He must have gone out there and I hoped that he would have more luck. Twenty minutes later he came to me and asked if I had brought the tree in. I didn't know why he asked me that question since he was just out there, but I told him that there was no way I could do it by myself. I was hoping that he was able to do it and was asking me that question because the tree was inside the house. I went to the living room and no tree. I still don't know why he even asked me that question.

He made dinner. It was very good. I ate by myself in the bedroom. He watched TV and my daughter talked with a boy that she currently likes while eating. Not much of a family dinner, but it was better than having to sit around a table glowering at him and trying to act like everything was OK.

I was quite sad because he knows how important this is to me and I think he just doesn't want to do it. I think this is some type of passive/aggressive game he is playing. I could be completely incorrect. It's just how I feel. Now the whole mood of excitement I had doing this together as a family is gone. I'm just sad now.
Tonight I have an appointment and there is no way I'll be able to get the tree out of the shed and put up tonight.

I think tomorrow I will get to work early so that I can leave early and hopefully get home before it gets dark. I'll then drag it out of the shed, put it up and then my daughgter and I can decorate it. I am going to do my best to get my mood back and enjoy it with my daughter.

It's just that I had this vision of all of us doing it together as a family. Am I being too ideal? Do I have a right to be upset? See, I have realized that over time I question myself constantly when it comes to him and blame myself a lot. It erodes my self-confidence and I am just so tired of it all. Maybe it is my fault. I'm not really sure. Maybe my expectations are too high. I don't know.

This morning he drove me to work because he doesn't have his car back from my Dad. My Dad fixed an oil leak for him while he was gone. We didn't speak to each other the whole way. When we got there I thanked him for driving me and asked if he would pick me up at 4:30pm today for the appointment. He said yes. I gave him a kiss on the cheek and got out of the car. I really don't know what else to do. Would you have done that?

I'm glad to have the appointment tonight. At least nothing upsetting will be said or done during that time.

Plans Don't Always Work the Way You Want

Went to work Saturday. I was very happy because I took my toy poodle named HoneyBunny. She has recently been groomed and is just gorgeous. She has a little bobble in the top knot of her hair that is a dark green and dark red bow. She also is wearing her dark green sweater to match. I'll take pics when I can and post them. She laid on my lap the entire time and napped. I just loved it. That is one reason (out of many) why I would love to work for Google. You can take your dog to work every day there.

Saturday night I was able to visit other's blogs and post an entry of my own! Sunday I worked on my paper and was ready to put up the Christmas tree. It didn't happen.

I have been talking about putting up the tree for DAYS now. It was an event that I wanted my family and I to sip eggnog, listen to Christmas music and decorate together. My husband went to the store to get eggnog and I waited for him to get home. Thirty minutes later I receive a call from him. He got the eggnog; however, he wasn't on his way home! He decided to visit his sister. I was incredulous. I said, "You aren't coming home? I thought we were going to put the tree up." He said, "I'll be home later. What's the problem?"

Ummm...

I don't even need to go further.

He arrived home at 7:00pm. It was too late by then. I very nicely said, "I understand if you don't want to put the tree up if you don't feel like it. Please, next time just let me know and I won't be here waiting and thinking that is what we are going to do." He said, "I got home at 7:00! We could have put it up". I reminded him that the day before I told him I wanted to start decorating around 4:00pm to 5:00pm because it takes a while and I wanted it to be done by 7:00pm. A little later than that would have been fine, but I wanted to put a stake in the ground that we wouldn't go over so that we wouldn't be up all night decorating when we had work and school the next day.

He said, "I don't know what the big deal is. We could have done it."

Ummm...

I don't even need to go further.

He said that he will go ahead and get the tree ready. It is a fake tree with prelit lights. He said that he would set it up and we'll do it tonight when I get home from work. He reminded me that he's not from here and that he doesn't even get excited about holidays in his own country. I told him that if he did get excited and wanted to celebrate holidays in his country that it would be fine with me and fun. All he needs to do is say the word. He said he didn't want to. I told him that just because he doesn't celebrate in his own country doesn't mean that we shouldn't celebrate here. I reminded him that he is now with two people who celebrate Christmas and that we want him to be involved as well. I told him that it's not always about him.

He agreed.

Well, then. I guess we'll decorate tonight.

At least I hope so.

The Blanket Has Lifted

It's a Saturday night and I'm laying in bed with a nice cup of hot Yorkshire tea with a little milk and sugar stirred in and eating a small cookie (or biscuit as they say in the UK) from France. While doing this I smell the aroma of a new perfume I received from my husband's brother wafting through the air. The perfume is from Paris and is aptly named "Paris" from Yves Saint Laurent. It smells completely divine. I love perfume so very much and was happy when opening my present. My husband's brother visited Morocco while my husband was there and gave him a few goodies to bring back to the States for my daughter and me.

After recently going through such a difficult time, you have no idea how tranquil, happy, and grateful that I feel. The blanket of depression has lifted completely today and it's no longer foggy. I feel lighter and more able to breathe. I am no longer swimming underwater. I've been getting better slowly and surely, but today is the first day in almost a month that I feel like myself again. I even put on makeup and did my hair. Before it was a complete chore to brush my teeth! I am so damn grateful.

I've worked the past four days almost 12 hours a day. Today I worked as well. I got through it, thank God.

Tonight I am able to catch up with my favorite blogs and for that I am thankful as well.

Tomorrow will be quite busy. I have to work on the final draft of my paper and hope to have it finished by tomorrow. The deadline was supposed to be tomorrow night at midnight, but was extended to Wednesday at midnight. I plan to get up in the morning and work on it. Afterwards we will be putting up and decorating the Christmas tree together. I plan to play Christmas songs and sip eggnog with my family while getting the tree ready. You have no idea how happy I am about this. Last Christmas was terrible. We didn't even put the tree up for the first time ever. I don't plan to make the same mistake again.

Last year our money situation was dire. We didn't buy any Christmas gifts for the first time. I was terribly depressed about it and cussed myself out every day. I was so depressed I didn't even want to put the tree up because it would remind me of our shortcomings and mess. I realized afterwards how terrible it was to do that. It completely showed how I was all caught up with the mass media idea of Christmas. I forgot about the spirit of Christmas and how the most important gift we had was each other.

This year we can barely afford anything and that is OK. I have set aside some money for my daughter and will really enjoy buying her presents. I will take special care in wrapping them and placing them under the tree. Why would I do that? Because I am so very thankful that I am able to get her something for Christmas. I am so very thankful to be able to watch the smile on her face as she opens her gifts. I am so very thankful that she is my daughter. I am so very blessed. I love her so much.

There is something I realized while writing this post and am about to cry. My daughter will be 15 in January. I have very few years left to enjoy her living with us. I cannot imagine my life without her.