Happy New Year!

I made it through Christmas. I spent time with DH's family on the Saturday before Christmas, and that was nice. I stayed for about two hours, and then I had to leave. I cried most of the way home, then blew my nose and went to my sister's house to visit with the great-niece. I went home after dinner, and my sister called me at 3:00 a.m. Sunday morning and asked me to take her to the emergency room. Her husband works second shift, so he had just gotten to bed, and she was afraid that he would be too sleepy to drive, so I was happy to take her.

When they realized how much pain she was having, they began to move quickly. She had a CAT scan, and it showed the 7 mm (about 1/3 of an inch!) kidney stone that her body was TRYING to pass. She got a morphine drip shortly afterward! She was in a room by 6:00 a.m., and the ER doctor had talked to the urologist on call. The nurse came in at 9:30 for her to sign the surgery release papers, the doctor came in at 10:00 to talk to her, and they took her down for surgery at 11:00. She was back in her room by 12:30 p.m., and my niece had come to take over and let me go home. My sister was home by 4:00, and feeling MUCH better! She couldn't pick up the baby (19 months old) during Christmas, but that was a small price to pay to get rid of the pain!

We left for Destin, Florida, on December 27. My niece, her husband, their daughter (the 19-month-old), my sister, my nephew, and I spent four days on a condo across the street from the beach. We took the baby to the beach twice (she LOVED sand, but did not like the water...probably too cold) since the temperature was in the sixties while were there. We shopped at the outlet mall, ate seafood (we ate dinner at 4:30 in the afternoons so that the baby could go with us without being tired and fussy...easier on us and on the other diners!), played games, and just enjoyed each other's company.

I am back at school, and this year will be over before I know it. I still plan to teach three more years, and then retire. I will have been in the same school for more than 35 years when I retire, and while I have enjoyed it thoroughly (and still do, MOST of the time), I am ready to spend more time with my family and play with my art projects. I may even get a little part-time job or do some tutoring. I've always tutored kids from church for free, but I might turn it into a small for-profit enterprise! My niece is planning to have one or two more children, and I want to have time to enjoy them as much as I enjoyed my niece and nephew when they were growing up.