Happy 2008!

Well, a new year is here, and as usual, it's cold! Even though I can't really complain because the lake levels need a hard winter, but I want to be warm again. But 2007 is over and the end of it was good.

Christmas was a chaotic time. I made the cinnamon rolls for Christmas dinner and was planning on making them with Grandma M because we always make them together, but I didn't realize what a job this would be as bad as her dementia has gotten this year. First off, we did them at my house because my aunt had the flu and I didn't want to be cooking food that many other people would eat when there's a flu virus running around in that house. So I told my aunt that we'd pick Grandma up at 10am. Dad calls over there shortly after 10 and Grandma had just gotten up so she wasn't ready yet. I didn't know this because I'd run over to the neighbor's house to show Jane the pictures that I'd taken of Cocoa because I knew she wanted to see them. I also wanted Chuck to make me a hair dryer and curling iron holder for my bathroom. I ended up trading the pictures of Cocoa for the hair dryer curling iron holder. I come back home, Jane comes with me and I find out that grandma wasn't ready yet. Mom and Jane visit for a while and then I start making the cinnamon rolls while mom decides to go get grandma. Mom is then gone for over an hour and I'm starting to get worried. I call over there and Mom's just getting Grandma out the door. Apparently Mom had to help her get dressed and everything.

So Mom and Grandma get here, I've got the cinnamon rolls rising already and I've got a batch of fudge starting on the stove. As I'm stirring the fudge, Grandma comes over and looks in the pot. "What kind of candy are you making?"

"Fudge." At this point I'm just boiling the sugar, milk, salt and butter.

She looks in the pot again. "Oh, white fudge."

Later in the day as the rolls are baking and cooling and I'm sitting stirring up frosting, Grandma looks in the bowl. "Is that for the gravy?"

It's funny, but sad at the same time. I find that if I don't laugh, I'm going to cry because it's so sad to see her memory going downhill like this.

Anyways, Christmas Eve was fun. I was baking some brownies for a dessert that mom was making and was feeding egg shells down the garbage disposal, one at a time, when the sink backed up. I told Dad and he checked it out and there was water shooting out a pin hole in the side of the garbage disposal, so he got to replace the garbage disposal before we got together at Grandma M's and followed the usual Christmas traditions. Including, rearranging the table setting to fit all 10 of us at the table, because every year my aunt insists on setting it only for 8 and having Ryan and Liz sit at the small table in the kitchen because the table seats 8. And every year we rearrange the table to cram everyone in to one table. And every year my other aunt brings Sasha with her and tries to feed her turkey. We all vetoed it this year because any bit of people food gives the dog the walking farts, and well, that dog can sure clear a room.

Christmas Day was just pure chaos. After sleeping in from going to midnight mass the night before, I got up and unloaded and loaded the dishwasher because the kitchen was in chaos from the garbage disposal disaster the day before. I'd handwashed some dishes and was wiping down the counter when the dishwasher started to rinse away the first time. Instantly water started shooting out of the back of the sink. I'm standing there hitting the 'cancel' button frantically on the dishwasher to get the water to stop shooting out. Dad came out into the kitchen and I told him what happened and he realized that he didn't knock out the knock out for the dishwasher before hooking up the garbage disposal, so once that happened, we didn't have water shooting all over the kitchen anymore. After all that we headed over to Grandma P's, and what can you say about Christmas spent in a house with 5 children ages 6 and under. It's loud. There's lots of toys. And Ella found Grandma's squirrel that sings "I can't drive 55" and started dancing to it. Except her version of dancing was jumping up and down in circles and waving her hands around. That was fun.

But we survived.

Now it's the new year. Time for new beginnings. We faced a lot of hard times last year, Grandma's cancer returning, her 7 week bout in the hospital with diverticulitis when we thought that we may lose her a couple of times while she was in there. But now she's home and gaining weight, when she's not trying to steal the car of the lady that stays with her during the day so that she can go get some cigarettes. This happened while Judy was pumping gas into the car. Luckily she caught grandma in time. Or when she got caught flushing her pills down the toilet. It's a new year and things will get better.

My resolutions for 2008:
1. Eat healthier
2. Lose some weight
3. Get organized.