The after holiday blues have set in. After all the excitement of Christmas and New Years, it is back to a blah routine of work. Oh well, I guess you have to have the blah routine to make the holidays more fun. But was it hard to go back to work today! I just didn't want to go to work today. I think part of it was the the post holiday blahs and part of it was the weather. I woke up this morning to -45 wind chills. Burrrr. Governor Dayton had called off school in all of Minnesota. That is the first time since about 1997 that that has happened. and on top of the weather, the furnace isn't working correctly. I came home at noon and again tonight and it was 57 in the house. I had to go down both times and hit the reset button to get the furnace to kick in. I hope my husband called the repair man! Or I may wake up to ice sicles on my nose tomorrow morning. Tonight should be quiet around the house though. A chance to rest and relax. Just gotta keep the furnace going.

Well, after a busy but wonderful Christms, I am relaxing for a bit. The little ones loved their gifts. I made each of them a cowboy outfit. Logan got chaps and a fringed vest. The girls got skirts and fringed vests. The big kids seemed to really like their gifts. I spent today cleaning. It was a nice change - stress free go at my own pace. My next project is back to the sewing machine. This time I will be quilting. I love quilting. It is relaxing and yet alows me to be creative. When I retire, that is what I will spend a lot of time doing. Quilting and gardening. I have spent a lot of time thinking about retirement lately. I don 't want to wish time away, but I do have a plan. A 5 year plan! In 5 years the house will be paid off, Leon will be old enough for social security and Medicare and I will be old enough to get social security. I will not be old enough for Medicare yet, so that may be the bad part. I will have to check out some sort of insurance to Cary me over. Well, back to cleaning!

Earlier this past week I was feeling a little frazzled. It has been crazy busy at work and I was not near ready for Christmas. I had lots of gifts yet to buy and wrap, Christmas Cards/letters to get out, groceries to buy, meals to plan and a couple of outfits to make for the grandchildren. I was overwhelmed to the point that I was not sleeping at night. I am happy to say that the gifts have been purchased and wrapped. Leon and I went to Sious Falls and got most of what we had on our list. Sioux Falls was hectic as we expected, but we managed to find nearly everything. The Christmas cards are finished and in the mail. Most of the meals have been planned. I will get groceries after work tomorrow. so, now all is well with the world. I am feeling much calmer right now. A good glass of wine helps with that as well. And now it is time to enjoy Christmas. Think about the true spirit of Christmas - the reason for the season. I want to find things I can do to help others - kind of a "pay it forward" thing. That is my goal tonight. To figure out what I can do for others to help in some way. I already have done a few things - i gave a bag of food to the food shelf, bought lots of toys for the local Christmas Project (they give toys to the people in the are who have children and can't afford to buy them Christmas gifts. I also have made contributions to Salvation Army and other worthy charities. That isn't exactly what I am trying to do though. I want to do something meaningful for someone else. Something they can't do for themself. And they can't know that it was me who helped them out. I will think of something. My hope for everyone is to slow down and enjoy Christmas. Enjoy time with family and friends. It doesn't have to involve gifts. Just being together and enjoy the season. Blessings to everyone!!!!!

Well, I am officially at the end of my vacation time. I got a lot done on those days off. Almost everything on my list was completed. I also had a lot of time to think. Amazingly I had an epiphany! It did not happen because of church or anything like that. It was because of an episode of "The Doctors" and a Halmark Christmas movie. The episode of "the Doctors" was all about menopause. While I always knew what menopause could do to a woman's body, it never occured to me that what was going on with me had that much to do with menopause. The almost bi-polar mood swings, the desire to cry without reason, the weight gain, the inability to deal with some things and all the rest. All of a sudden it became clear. It has everything to do with my hysterectomy! Okay, now that I know the issue, I can deal with this. So what does the Halmark Christmas move have to do with this? It was about a situation that I thought I knew how I would react to. As the movie went on, I started to question myself. It became clear that I have a long way to go to become the person that I want to be. It also gave me the path to follow to become that person. All is well with the world. On another note, we were able to enjoy Thanksgiving with my family and my husband's family. Both occations were very nice and I am thankful that we all had this time together. We all enjoy each other's company and had a great time. I had a whole different perspective this year. Loved it. And now - back to work tomorrow. I am thankful to have a job, but not too excited to go back at this point. I just enoyed my vacation too much.

Well, I had such a good start to my vacation days. I spent yesterday in my sewing room. Leon was watching football. I enjoyed every minute of it! Great therapy. Today started out the same way. I was being creative at the same time as I had a lot of time to think as well as plan what to bring for Thanksgiving. Then something happened - pretty minor in the grand scheme of things. HOwever it bothered me the rest of the day. It "festered" in me all day long. By tonight I have a headache. Why do I let things like this bother me so bad? I don't think the other person thought twice about it. But it ruined my entire afternoon and it shouldn't have. I have to learn how to let those things go. But how? How do I tell my brain to stop thinking about it. This is the main reason I don't always enjoy what is going on in my life. The most important thing to me right now is to ejoy every minute of the rest of my life. Okay that is what I will be contemplating the rest of my vacation. On a side note, I think I have to stop posting from my Kindle. On top of the auto correct, it is very hard to do any corrections at all.

I am so excited to have the next week off. Ifound I couple hardly toleration.g getting up in the morning to go to work. I just need some time off. Today I went to the craft show I Files and got a few Christmas gifts. Next week I intend to sew up some Christmas gifts. Sewing is very theraputic for me. I really need that therapy. I am also looking forward to being home by myself for several days. I love the feeling of cacooning myself here kn the house. On another note, I had a day of continuing ed this past week. It was very interesting. I hats to wish my life away, but this class made me very anxious for retirement. I want to retire while I am still in good health and can do traveling. In the mean time I want to really enjoy life. The next week I am going to figure out how I can do that. How can enjoy every day as tjhough it could be my last. Life is too short to waste it away!

This past week has been a little stressful at work. I am glad that is all over. I am not sure if I caught a cold from one of the kids or if I am just so worn down from worry that I was an easy target for a fold bug. Anyway, I have spent the last two nights sleeping in my chair because I was having a tough time breathing. It also gave me more time to think - yes I have been doing a lot of thinking. This time I thought a lot about stress. They say you make your own stress. I guess I do understand that. If the same thing happened to two. Different people, it might be very stressful to one person and not the other. So, it is my goal going forward to not let things at work make me fell stressed. I think I mentioned this before, but this time I am going to try extra hard to not let things bother me.