Quite the party animals we are, it’s 10:00 and everyone’s in bed.  Except me of course, being the hard working mama that I am.  We had our little family thing tonight, you know, let the kids rip into gifts, since that is what Christmas is all about and stuff.  Just sarcasm folks! Here are some pictures of how that went…

Hold that thought, they didnt down load right, so I’ll get to them later….next week or next month or next year..

Now it seems really unnatural to go from what I was just talking about to what I have to say next.  A friend of mine, Kathy Moore died yesterday.  I got to know her when I first moved to PA. Gene was close to her two boys, so I got to know her through them.  Before I had kids I spent a lot of time at her house, and hauled her to a lot of doctors appointments.  She moved to Philly later, and we saw each other about once ever two months or so.  Anyway there’s a whole clan of us ladies that would get together to chat and cluck and swap parental advice whenever she came around.  Last Thursday we were all at our Amish friend, Malinda’s house eating zuchinni casserole and chicken noodle soup and passing out Christmas cards and gifts.  I talked to her on the phone on Friday for about five minutes and then Sunday night after church we recieved news that she had a heart attack and died.  She was not a healthy lady, so in that way it dosent come as a shock.  And yes, she outlived the doctors expectations many times over, but still when someone you know dies it’s shocking in its own way.
You know what’s wierd?  I didn’t tell Elena that Kathy died, because she has always been really timid around her.  She was kind of scared of her I guess.  But anyway, the night she died Elena insisted on sleeping with the blanket and the doll that Kathy gave her.  She never sleeps with them.  I thought Kathy would have loved that!
We’re not sure what this does to our Ohio plans for next weekend, we’ll have to see.

A Merry Christmas to you all