Dec 18: Got the guest room arranged with the hutch and bed frame in it. Seems a little oddly laid out, but the hutch is big and with a queen size bed, that's pretty much how it needs to go. Didn't get the board and batten done, oh well. Project for 2013.
Dec 19: New mattress for guest room delivered. Yay! Need to buy another baby gate to keep Dog out of the room and off of it. Room felt huge until mattress delivered!
Dec 20: After work, I headed to Lowes to grab a couple small things. Came out with 3 drapery panels, 2 drapery rods, a lamp shade, lightbulbs (I finally succumbed and bought those funky CFL bulbs), a bunch of other crap, and a lovely Allen & Roth chair for the guest room. This is it.
I would have rather bought this one, but 1) it was $100 more, 2) I never saw it in the store - only saw it online later. Oh well. The one above works great to put a suitcase on, if needed (with a cover over the chair, of course).
Dec 21: Worked from home today. Holly came and cleaned while I worked. Then, after I was done working, Melon Man and I installed the new tv for the guest room in the hutch, I finished the draperies, we put a round table in the corner of the room with a tablecloth on it, added some decor to it, and then headed out to pick Dad up at the airport. On our way home from the airport, we stopped at Cabela's so Dad could buy Melon Man's Christmas present, but they didn't have any of what he wanted to get, so Melon Man found something else and Dad got that for him instead. Then, we went to Firebirds for dinner. Not a great experience this time. Disappointing, actually.
Dec 22: Went to breakfast at The Coral and Dad got to meet Dave and Linda. Then, Dad, Dave, and Melon Man went to Prescott for the day. Linda dropped me off at home and I worked on my lesson for church and a few other things around the house. I really struggled with the lesson - I was going to be teaching all of the young women, not just my own class and it was to be the Christmas lesson so I wanted it to be really special. I re-wrote it about 5 times. By the time I went to bed, I knew it was what He (the Lord) would be pleased with. That felt good.
Dec 23: Went to church. Linda joined us. The choir performed almost the entire Sacrament program. It was fantastic. Loved that we honored the birth of the Savior that way. I had planned to play the closing hymn with Brother Baumann as a duet like last Christmas Sunday, but it ended up that the choir was singing the song we were going to play so a different song was chosen and I wasn't very good at that one so I didn't get to play for my dad. On the flipside though...the new closing hymn was his favorite - I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day. So, that was good. I then went and taught my lesson. After a few mechanical hiccups that I had done all I could to try to prevent, the lesson went off really well and a few of the girls and leaders told me how good it was. I was happy. Went home, made tacos for dinner. Yum. Melon Man played around with his new camera that he won at work. It's an excellent camera! I love it!
Dec 24: Up and out the door by 6:15 this morning. Headed to the store for the last minute grocery items for our Christmas Eve dinner tonight. Home by 7:30! Had a schedule to work by, ended up mixing it up a little bit and got off track by about an hour. Drat. Caught up, got the table set, got showered, got the platters ready, finished doing the Temple Square village, got the chowder going, got the pictures of everything taken, and was completely ready by the time Jim (Linda's brother) arrived. Soon, the others all arrived and we sat down to dinner.
Dog wasn't too happy that he didn't get to enjoy any of our yummy dinner...
Dec 25: We all slept in a bit, then got up and opened gifts - all three of us in our matching jammies. This year, I decided to surprise Melon Man and Dad by putting colored lights on our tree. They both really like colored lights so I thought this would be a nice treat for them both. To my surprise, I really liked it too. This is our tree after Santa had come during the night...
My very own Yamaha guitar, with lesson book, DVD, and gig bag! And this...
A boat motor immersion blender! Love it!! Dad gave me this puzzle from my wishlist (thanks Jen for checking it out on my Pinterest board!). Love it!
Dog, especially, loved his presents from Santa. He was so cute. Santa had left his bag of presents early and Dog was so good leaving them alone. But, on Christmas morning, he was over there digging around in the bag! So, he finally got them, one by one.
We hung out, chowed down on leftovers (I had a whole bowl of chowder this time), and then got ready to head over to Lisa's for Christmas Day and dinner. I ate a bite of turkey and a small piece of the outer ring of a piece of prime rib. Again, probably shouldn't have - but it was a special day and I have only eaten a tiny bit of meat now 3 times in 4 months. I deserved it. Me with Natalie and Robert's baby, Hannah...
Dec 26: Woke up in horrible pain in my hands, elbows, and knees. Yep...effects of the gout and from making poor eating choices the last two days. Now I see exactly why they say no shellfish and no red meat. Won't be making that mistake again! Dad and I played some games throughout the day and also did some family history research. We had a hard time trying to find some new names on his lines and it frustrated me. We finally worked on trying to find names on Melon Man's side. Then, we had a piano lesson and it was me that ended up getting schooled when Dad sat down at the piano and played a couple songs for me! Surprise, surprise! He has a way to go still, but I was really impressed with how much he had learned at the Senior center. We ended the night by working on the puzzle we gave him for Christmas.
Dec 27: We finished the puzzle today, then Dad and I headed out to see the new Phoenix temple. They were just finishing up work on it for the day. It appears that all of the concrete panels on the main floor are now installed. Soon, they will move up to the top section. After we were done there, we motored over to Sportsman's Warehouse and then to Popo's for mexican dinner. Yummy! Then home to relax.
Dec 29: We lounged around most of the morning so Melon Man could get some sleep before we headed off to the Mesa temple in the afternoon. We had a very lovely time at the temple and I had a wonderfully spiritual couple of experiences. After we were done, we went to The Landmark restaurant for dinner. Again, not a great experience, but Dad and Melon Man got to have Prime Rib for the third time in just 9 days. Came home and worked up my lesson for the next day.
Dec 31: Ran to the store early in the morning to get food stuff for our New Year's Eve party as well as the strawberries and apples for the youth dance tonight. Linda and Dave joined us for the evening. Craig, Auntie, and Uncle Ward were all really sick, so they, along with Lisa, were unable to join us. We fondued steak and chicken, had salad, garlic bread, and I made green chile green onion rice for me, along with sauteed zucchini. We played a bunch of dominoes games and then welcomed in the new year with some cheesecake.
Jan 1: Slept in until about 10 today! I needed it. I am tired and worn out. Last year was a hard year for me. We lounged most of the day and watched about 6 or 7 episodes of Mystery Diners. There were 4 episodes from here in the Phoenix Metro area so they were interesting to see. Then, Dad and I headed off to Lowe's to return a couple things and to buy a couple little rubber washers so he could try to fix my beehive beverage jar. Then, we came home and he had fondue again while I had salad and leftover rice. I finished up the last of 9 loads of laundry that I've done over the last two or three days, then went to bed.
Today...Melon Man took Dad to the airport and sent him on his way back to the frozen land of Utah. It was so nice spending this time with him. I went in to work. It was a quiet, fairly productive day. Good to be back to a routine with my eating habits too. Off to bed now. Work at home day tomorrow.
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