Winter Holiday Blues

I guess the winter blues have got me down. The past couple of days have been emotionally rough on me for reasons that I don't understand. I have nothing to be depressed or sad about, but yet for some reason I am. I have been crying over silly stuff, tired all the time, temperamental and pretty much angry at everything.

Bill and I had a long discussion yesterday about this and have reached the conclusion that it's a case of winter blues or depression. The culprit is probably due to poor diet intake (more sweets than I'm used to due to all the parties lately and lack of will power), lack of exercise (because I have been a real slacker lately), and a lot to do with not getting the serotonin I need from the sun (because we haven't seen the sun for many days) - or in other words some kind of chemical imbalance within myself.

Anyway, I was a real witch (with a B) yesterday. I yelled at my kids for no reason, pushed my wonderful sweet husband away by saying nasty things, refused to go on a Mother and Sisters outing with my family yesterday. All of which are not like me. So I really have a lot of apologizing to do and hope that each person I hurt will forgive me. I am so sorry to all of you for anything I did or said that hurt you.

Today I have really made an effort to make things better. The sun shining today has helped a lot. I got up early and went out to work, I am focusing on a much healthier diet, and I am going to fit some excercise into my schedule today.

Has anyone else experienced this kind of madness during the holiday's or winter? What do you do or have you done to help get yourself back in balance? I am really curious to see if I am just the only crazy one out there. I would appreciate any suggestions or tips to make sure this does not happen again.

Traditions: Family Party

Every Christmas we get together with all of my extended family on my Mother's side and have a Christmas party. It is always in Delta, where most of my family is from. This past Saturday was our Christmas Party. We always start out by having a nice dinner. We rotate every year, which head of family is put in charge of organizing and preparing the meal. This year we had a Potato Bar with all the fixings. YUMMY! There were lots of goodies and treats afterwards. Santa comes and brings all the kids under 18 a sack full of goodies. There were 29 kids this year. They all get to sit in Santa's lap and tell him what they want for Christmas. The little kids draw names earlier in the year and had their gift exchange. Me and my cousins generation buy a girl and a guy gift and play a game while reading a story, moving the gifts around in a cirle and whatever gift you have when the story is done is the gift you get to open and keep. My mother's siblings exchange gifts and everyone usually gets something for Grandma. We rent a place that is large enough to hold us all... about 75 people... and also has room to play basketball or other games and the kids can run around and have lots of fun. It's always a fun time. Getting together with family that you don't get to see on a regular basis is always something I look forward too. I'm glad that we have had this tradition in my family for many many years for as long as I can remember. And I hope we can keep it going for many more years to come. Because, afterall, isn't that what Christmas is about? Spending time with your loved ones? I am very grateful for the closeness we share as a family, and that we all really enjoy each other's company. I was very bad though, and didn't take any pictures. I'm mad at myself for not having any pictures to post. So... I decided to post some pictures from the party from 2003.



My Grandma crocheted everyone hats this year.


Shellise - Not so big like she is now :)


My Grandma and Santa


My Jessie Boy! A much younger version.

The gift exchange. Grandma opening her gifts.

Elf Dance

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

I saw this on my friend's blog and couldn't resist. You all should try it too! Thanks Michelle!

On a much lighter note...

We have enjoyed getting our home ready for the Holiday's. Here is a slideshow of the decorations.

One of my greatest fears...

One of my greatest fears (not the greatest, but a close runner up) came to fruition today. For those of you that don't know, my husband, Bill, drives the big trucks for FedEx Freight. At 1:00 this morning he left for Las Vegas pulling 3 trailers. Earlier in the day it snowed and then it got really cold but the roads were clear and dry until he reached the Fillmore/Meadow area on I-15. He then hit black ice and his back trailer went flipping into the median, followed by his middle trailer, and just as the truck itself started tipping he was able to pull out of it and stop.

At 5:50 this morning, after startling myself awake when I realized I hadn't heard from him in a while, I called and called his phone and couldn't reach him. A deep dread came over me, but fortunately he called shortly after that and told me what happened. That although it was a huge mess, and he would be there for many hours, HE WAS NOT INJURED and nobody else was involved. That was the most wonderful news for me!!! He said that the Highway Patrol was working on two separate accidents involving cars that hit that same black ice, just as he hit it and went out of control. Luckily no one was injured as far as I know.

There are so many things that could have happened to make this a much worse situation. I am very grateful to a loving Heavenly Father who listens to our prayers every time we pray before Bill leaves on one of his trips. I am thankful to Heavenly Father for watching out for him and keeping him safe. Every single time he leaves I fear for his safety. I worry and I am not relieved of that worry until I know he has reached his destination safely.

Unfortunately, after many hours of being delayed, they still sent Bill on to Las Vegas instead of sending him back home. So, I don't even get to see him or hold him until tomorrow morning sometime. He was pretty shaken up and wanted to come home but the freight that he had in the one trailer left still had to be delivered. Such is the life of a freight truck driver.

It is a HUGE fear of mine that I will lose someone else I love in some kind of automobile accident. After losing my Cousin's 15 year old son in an automobile accident last December, it really scares me to know how quickly a life can be taken in a blink of an eye.

I am very grateful and happy that I was given the blessing of being spared what would be the greatest loss in my life.

Thanksgiving and Other Random Things

Thanksgiving for me was a little different this year. I am used to LOTS of family around, Immediate and Extended Family - Usually up to 50+ people. This year, however, was just Bill and I and my Mom and Dad. Only 4 of us. Everyone had in-laws to go to and my kids were with their Dad's family. It was very nice, AND very quiet. It was Different. I enjoyed the time we got to spend with Mom and Dad, but I think I like the noise of all the family around. I can't believe I said that because I have complained about the noisy chaos in the past. Mom did an awesome job of preparing the food and the pies. I thought my homemade dinner rolls turned out awesome. The rolls and the pies are the best part of the meal!

Later that evening, we took dinner up to our friends, the Bettridge's, at Primary Children's Hospital. We were glad to see that Erik is doing a little better. We hope he can make a full recovery from his injury. See my earlier post for more information. http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=108401111767017590&postID=3177152485798816695

Erik in Therapy petting the rehab dog.

After we got home we finished off the evening by watching our favorite classic Christmas movie "A Christmas Story". Bill had never seen it so I definately had to break him into the tradition. You either love it or you hate it. I am glad to say that Bill loved it as much as we do.

I didn't do any of the madness early morning Black Friday shopping like I usually do. There wasn't anything that great on sale that I needed. So we slept in and went shopping a little later. I was able to get the things I wanted and I didn't fight any crowds. However, I do have to admit that I did miss the years past when me, my mom and sisters would be standing in lines at 3:00 and 4:00 in the morning to get the must have sale items. Those were good times.

On Saturday, we celebrated Bill's birthday (which is today, Sunday) I took Bill to his first ever Desert Star Theater performance of "Miracle on 42nd Street: Give My Regards to Blitzen" http://www.desertstar.biz/playhouse_now_playing.htm. We had front row seats and had a wonderful time. If you have never been, I would recommend to anyone. They have 5 or 6 shows every year. By clicking on the link above you can see the line up for next year's shows. Afterwards, we had family and friends over for cake and ice cream. We also watched "The Grinch" with Jim Carey. We really enjoyed the company and thank those of you who came to help celebrate Bill's special day.

While the kids went to the hockey game with their dad that evening, Bill and I started getting the house all decorated for Christmas. We will be putting up 2 trees this year. The artificial will go downstairs and the live tree will go upstairs. My brother and brother-in-law, every Thanksgiving weekend, gets tree tags and cuts their own trees and usually gets me one if I want. We got the artificial tree all decorated today, while we watched "Elf". The live tree will be decorated in a couple days.

At the close of our weekend, we dreadfully sent Jessie back home to Cedar City and Bill went off to work. Shellise finished off her weekend tonight by watching "Pirates of the Caribbean". And I sit nestled in front of this computer updating my blog, in hopes that I will get to hear from all of you who may be reading this :)

While it was a different kind of Thanksgiving for me... It was very nice. I got to spend it with my favorite people, had a terrific Birthday Celebration for my sweetheart, and was able to get the "Christmas Spirit" started in our home. What more can I ask for?