Sunday, Jan. 1

New Year's Day, 2012. It'll take a while getting used to writing it and saying it.

Got up late, around 8:30 on this sunny, but sharply cooler morning. Skipped my exercises. After breakfast, I put a pork roast, onions, carrots, and small yellow potatoes in the slow cooker. I also started a pot of black eyed peas (for good luck), simmering with onion, ham, and seasonings. Then I seasoned a dish of acorn squash (preserved from last summer's garden) to put in the oven later.

While I was doing this, Hubbie went to Mother's house to accompany her over here. Spent the rest of the morning taking down Christmas decorations. Mother participated by helping pack away mugs, candles, and small collectible Santas. She was able to do this while seated in the comfortable rocking chair in the living room.

The morning also brought happy news, when Daughter-in-Law called to announce that Granddaughter is expecting her third child in late September or early October. This will make 28 great-grandchildren for Hubbie and me.

Lunch was very good. Afterward, we continued packing away Christmas decorations. I washed a couple of loads of Christmas-themed table clothes, dish towels, etc., and now about all that remains is to take apart and box the large Christmas tree in the sunroom. The winter village is still on the mantel. We'll take it down in February.

About 3 p.m., Mother was ready to go back home. I accompanied her. Before she went home, I had her fill her pill carriers, so I could observe that she did it correctly. She did. We've been contacting her each morning to make sure she has been taking her medications at the proper times. She has.

It was a pleasant day, and Mother was in very good spirits.

Hubbie and I spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing, including watching a 2010 movie on DVR, "Hereafter," starring Matt Damon. The lives of three people, a blue-collar American, who is a psychic, a French Jounalist, who has a near-death experience in a tsunami, and a London schoolboy, who loses his twin brother to an accident, intersect based on their beliefs about death and the afterlife.