Hello all my friends and followers.  I’m sorry that I have not posted in over a week, things have been a bit of a zoo here in my world.  We had excitable monkeys, stampeding gazelles, migrating birds and attacking bears.  It has been fun and exhausting.

Cousin Sleepover

This is one of the things that I get to participate in simply because I live with my parents.  Two days after Christmas we had 12 girls at our house ranging in age from 3 – 16.  Luckily, all the children under the age of 7 went home before dinner.  Of course that still left 9 girls filled with the excitement of being together at Grandma’s.

There were all these girls sitting down to dinner and the only man at the table was my father.  It was great to see him interacting with his granddaughters. They talked about what they got for Christmas, what was happening in their lives and what they were planning on doing with the rest of their Winter break.  There was a lot of laughter and multiple conversations going on at the same time.

After dinner it was the “get ready for bed” rush that is a natural part of these sleepovers.  Everyone was sent down to the basement with sleeping bags to get set up for the night.  Stuffed animals were in abundance along with pillows and giggles.  Once the bedding was properly laid out, there was the pajama dash.  Now that everyone was ready I picked out a few movies and we got out the treats.  Everyone was then sent down to the basement where they could play, talk and watch movies without disturbing the adults who were exhausted at this point.

New Year’s Eve

We had talked about everyone staying home for a quiet evening, but it didn’t work out.  We didn’t have a big group this year, only about seven of us.  We played card games, ate treats and had a good time.  The donkey shaped sugar cookies became the highlight of the evening when my brother bit one and said, “What a pain in the ass.”  It went down hill from their.  I got to laughing so hard that I couldn’t breath and was glad that my chair had arms on it.  It was a fun evening.

New Year’s Day

This is the day that my youngest daughter had been looking forward to.  She enjoyed the Rose Parade, but it was going sledding with her big brother that was the highlight.  They went together to a nice little hill in our neighborhood.  When they got back my daughter was laughing, happy and tired.  We have a long toboggan that will fit an adult or 2 children.  My son (on leave from the army) sat down with his sister in front and pushed off the top of the hill.  According to my daughter (9), they had gone so fast that the toboggan flipped when it hit a small bump.  She landed in the snow with her big brother on top of her.  I don’t know how many times they went down the hill together, but she talked about how fun is was to go “too fast” with her brother.  She wasn’t scared because she knew her brother would not letter her get hurt.

Quiet Day?

Yesterday was the last day of winter break.  It is usually a quiet day at our house while we all recover from late nights and too much fun.  Well, it started that way.  Then we had my sisters girls over and my granddaughter.  They went out sledding and were gone for almost two hours.  When they got back they were wet, cold and happily tired.  We stripped off wet clothing putting girls into borrowed nightgowns.  The clothing was put into the dryer while I made hot chocolate for all five girls.  The talking and laughing was great to hear.

I had spent that time being ‘tortured’ by my 6-week old grandson.  He had some awake time for me to enjoy talking with him and singing nursery rhymes.  After a diaper change he pinned me into the lazy boy recliner and made me take a nap with him.  It was really rough.  😉  I love being a grandma!

The Night Before School

Last night, after everyone had gone home, my little girl was ready to drop from exhaustion.  She ate a huge dinner and was more than happy to soak in a nice at bath.  As 7 p.m. came she was wilting so we tucked her into bed and set the alarm for school in the morning.  She was out like a light and slept like the dead all night.

With life returning to normal, I have time to think about this upcoming year.  There are a lot of things I would like to accomplish and I really believe that I can.  I will have to manage my stress levels very carefully and remember to stop when I’m tired.

Happy New Year everyone!  May it be a year filled with laughter and success.