Friday, Dec. 9

Birthdays so far this month: two daughters, two granddaughters, two great-granddaughters, and a grandson. Happy Birthday to all! More coming up throughout the month.

Up at 6:30 on this crisp late fall day, so I could get ready to go to water aerobics. Only nine of us showed up today, though. The water was a little cooler than the last time I attended a couple of weeks ago, but it was okay once I got used to it. I was just so glad to be back in the pool that I didn't care what the temperature was.

The last I'd heard, today was to be the last day of aerobics until after winter break at the college, but the athletic department has granted us one more week of aerobics. Yay!

Back home at 9:30, I learned that the head nurse was to visit Mother at 10 a.m., so I had to hurry to shower and be dressed before that time. Fortunately, the nurse was ten minutes late, and she arrived just as I got back downstairs again.

The nurse put Mother through her paces, including observing all of her exercise routine, and then checking to see if her balance has improved. It has, but she still tires after only a little exertion, like walking around our house a few times.

Both the nurse and Mother's therapist are pleased with the way our house is laid out, which allows Mother to walk about 65 steps in a loop through the den, the living room, the dining room, and the kitchen. They are also glad to see the stairway, which the therapist will soon be using to help Mother strengthen her leg muscles, so she can get in and out of our van more easily.

The nurse's assessment is that Mother should continue physical therapy until at least the end of December. She also recommends assistive devices to help Mother put on her pants and socks without needing help from me. For this, she will need to be visited by someone to show her how to best use the devices.

We will need to purchase the devices next week. We don't know yet if Medicare will cover the expense of the devices with a prescription from her doctor.

Just before 11 a.m., I went to the "Water Babes" Christmas party at a local Italian restaurant. About twenty of us attended. The event included a "Dirty Santa" gift exchange that seemed to drag on forever. Maybe it seemed particularly long, because I'd agreed to get to-go slices of quiche for Mother's and Hubbie's lunches, and I'd hoped to be home by noon.

No such luck. It was nearly 1 p.m. before the event ended. I called to alert Hubbie that I'd be later than I thought, and he said neither he nor Mother were starving, and would have no trouble waiting a while for lunch.

"Dirty Santa" gift exchange: I chose a gift that included a quart jar of local honey, and I wanted to keep it, but drats, someone stole it from me. The next gift I chose was a sparkly Elvis Christmas tree ornament.

Fortunately, one of the ladies asked if I'd be willing to exchange the ornament for what she'd drawn, because her grandson is an Elvis impersonator, and she thought he'd love the ornament. I agreed, and in exchange I got a stuffed snowman meant to sit on a shelf, and two pretty Christmas kitchen towels.

I gave the snowman to Mother to display in her bedroom. The kitchen towels are a welcome gift, since I needed new ones to use when guests visit over the holidays.

Our aerobics leader always gives each of us a Christmas tree ornament. This year, we could choose from sparkly red poinsettias, red birds, or reindeer. I chose a red bird for myself, and a poinsettia for Mother.

The leader related a Christmas story today: a teacher had a student in her class, whose mother had died, and whose father ran off. The boy was being raised by his aunt, his mother's sister, who found the boy to be a burden and never let him forget it.

The teacher was very kind and motherly to the boy, so that the boy was willing to do anything to help the teacher with chores around the school.

Near Christmas, though, he quit staying after school to help the teacher, and the teacher asked why. The boy said he was spending his time making a Christmas gift for the teacher.

A few days before Christmas, the boy presented the teacher with a crudely built box, made of various scraps of wood. The teacher heaped praise on the boy, but said it felt pretty light. Was there anything in it? "Yes," the boy said, "It's filled with love."

For many years, the teacher displayed the humble box on her piano. When folks asked why she didn't discard it, she said, "I can't. It's filled with the most precious of all gifts...love."

Back home, Mother and Hubbie were grateful to at last get their lunches. The quiche the snowman, and the poinsettia ornament cheered Mother and made her feel she was participating a little bit in the festivities.

Later, at 3 p.m., Hubbie and I went to an office downtown for a by-invitation-only drop-in event that included a buffet of food. Neither of us was hungry, but at the host's urging, we filled a paper plate with brisket, a few dips, and grape salad to bring home.

Before we left for the event, Hubbie asked if I had something we could give as a gift to the office assistant. We give her something every year, but this year, my scrambled brain didn't remember to find something.

I did remember, though, that I had put a baggie of homemade chocolate/peppermint bark in the freezer a few months ago. I retrieved it, then went through my Christmas totes and found a new-looking tin with a red lid to put the candy in. It made a very attractive gift. The assistant said she was going to hide the candy so her teen kids couldn't find it, since they'd eaten a batch of fudge that someone else had recently given her.

Back home, we relaxed for a while, and I answered a newsy e-mail from a friend. Like us, she and her husband have family members with medical problems. I realized when I got the e-mail that I hadn't alerted her about Mother's problems. She will definitely want to know about them.

Today, I got Christmas photo postcards from two other friends...one was a friend posing with her Shih Tzu dog (this one made me both happy and sad), and the other was of a friend and her husband. Usually, picture postcards are of friend's children. It's refreshing to get photos of the adults.

Around 5:30, I fixed Mother the other half of her quiche for supper, and then Hubbie and I went to a local church fellowship hall for the home medical services Christmas party.

This year, it was a family event, so there were a lot of folks there. The event included games for both adults and children, as well as a photo portrait session. A staff member insisted that Hubbie and I take advantage of the photo session, so we did. But I feel like I shut my eyes as soon as the shutter snapped. We'll see.

We didn't take part in the adult game, which was a take-off of the popular TV show, "A Minute to Win it." Sixteen people volunteered to participate. The game began with all sixteen putting cookies on their foreheads and then trying to work the cookies down to their mouths without using their hands.

Next, the eight remaining contestants had to pull facial tissue out of two boxes as fast as they could. The four remaining had to keep balloons in the air with just their hands. The two remaining had to bounce pencils by their erasers into glasses.

The next group had to do the cookie thing, then pull crepe paper out of rolls, then use open pizza boxes to fan Christmas tree balls in attempt to guide them inside a circle on the floor. The last two had to race back and forth hanging candy canes on a stretched string. Each round of the games happened in just one minute.

The buffet meal included deli meat sandwiches, hot wings, chicken fingers, barbecue chicken, ham and chicken roll-ups, veggies and chips with cold and hot dips, meatballs, bruschettas, pigs-in-a-blanket, and an array of desserts.

Again, once everyone had eaten, staff members insisted that we take plates of the food home, since there was so much left. So we did. Looks like I won't have to worry about Sunday lunch...we'll have a potluck of foods from today.

We were back home around 7:30. Mother was already in bed. She said her back was bothering her. Maybe she exercised too much today. I gave her a couple of Tylonol capsules for the pain. Hopefully, she'll feel better in the morning.

Hubbie and I spent the rest of the evening watching TV. We understood that Niece was to come sometime this evening to spend the night and visit tomorrow, but she never did arrive. Nor did she alert us that she wouldn't be coming after all. Maybe she'll be here tomorrow.