Happy Holidays, everyone!

I hope that you got everything you wanted for Christmas, if you celebrate in that way!!! I usually love Christmas, and I love traditions and creating new traditions, it's my favorite time of year, even if there were no presents!

First of all, I need to preface this with the fact that I gave DH $60 to use specifically for Christmas shopping. To the best of my knowledge, he spent nearly all of that, except for a CD for DD, on himself (pop and cigs, etc.) Later he asked me for more, but I didn't have it, and I didn't figure it would go towards its intended purpose anyhow.

I had a nice Christmas, for the most part, but DH didn't have a great start. He got up and watched DD open her gifts, and then he opened the ones I gave him, then he realized that the CD he had gotten for DD was missing, and he couldn't find it anywhere, and he couldn't remember where he had put it. That stressed him out.

Then, he went to give me my "coupons"--that was what I had asked for, "coupons" for me to have him do various things for me, like take the trash down, etc....he gave me some for my birthday a few months ago, and I just loved them!!! Anyhow, he also couldn't remember where he had put the coupons. When that happened, he looked so upset, I thought he was going to cry. The memory problems are really cropping up lately, and they're really bothering him a lot.
:-(

I told him that was ok, he could just give them to me later....but I still don't have them....the presents I got were: a jigsaw puzzle from DD, hand lotion and $50 from DH's mom, and a $100 gift card from my mom--that's what she wanted to give to everyone on her "list", and since she is still able to decide how to spend her money, if someone helps her with it, I had gone out and bought them all for her. Everyone knows how tight money is for us, so it was nice that nobody bought stuff like pot holders or whatever (not that I don't like pot holders, I LOVE them, LOL), but the money helps so much!!!

I'm kind of disappointed that I didn't even get the coupons (and they don't cost anything) from DH, but I just re-read my post about lowering my expectations, and I'm trying to convince myself not to expect anything. I didn't expect much to begin with, but I guess right now, it's just too much. I do believe that he really did buy a CD for DD and that he really did make "coupons" for me, he was so upset that he couldn't remember where they were, if he was acting, well, he would've won an Oscar. So I just tried to empathize with him and told him it didn't matter.

Christmas day itself was nice, we drove with my mom to my brother's house about 90 miles away, and had a nice dinner, and my mom had a nice visit. She refused to use her walker, though, and she was rather unsteady on her feet, so that was kind of scarey, but everyone was impressed with how well she has recovered from her broken hip. I know that statistically, she isn't out of the woods yet, though.....

Well, hopefully you had fun for your holiday, too, and I very much hope you didn't have to work!!! I know that every hour I have off work is a blessing lately, so I hope you had lots of those kinds of blessings too!