here a jingle, there a jingle

The Ward Christmas Dinner was a success. There was just enough food which was quite tasty. The decorations were lovely. We had about 8 loaned Nativities and 25+ craft stick Nativities placed around, plus some greenery off a ward member’s redwood trees and some battery candles. Lots of compliments for the craft stick Nativities. One sister is going to have her family do them for their extended family night. The Primary presentation was sweet and meaningful. The children sang well. Everyone seemed to have a good time (except possibly our overworked kitchen manager)

Busy, busy, but not quite as hectic as I feared. I made lots of phone calls – looking for more people to volunteer to help with the food and reminding those who had. I helped deliver “Winner, Winner Chicken Dinner” Kits which had everything one needed to make our main dish except a half (?) cup of milk and oven to bake it in. I didn’t have to go around picking up Nativities or trees. I made two apple cakes and two dinner casseroles. I helped a little with set up on Friday. I was there the whole time, only a little help LOL. It was not as organized as I expected. No clear leader. I had almost accidentally drug Miriam along – we took too long doing one of her errands and so I didn’t take her home first. Good news, bad news. She has a good eye for decorating and setup and she is not afraid to tell people what to do. Maybe she should have checked with the RS President before, but, well she did a good job. Worse news is that between that and a couple other things she got wiped out and was unable to go the actual dinner on Saturday or church Sunday noon. She was able to have dinner with the family Sunday and between leftovers and recreations, we had the same dinner as the ward had Saturday. But not the lovely Primary program, of course.

I had thought that Benjamin, Bethany, and Jacob were coming over, so I skipped a Messiah Sing-a-Long at the Presbyterian church and the Valley Choral Society Concert at our own building to take care of dinner (and try to straighten up a little). Otherwise we would have had tortilla wraps on the run. It didn’t work out for B+1, which was disappointing. We had a pleasant evening nonetheless. I also missed our local Live Nativity on our temple hill . Well, it was chilly outside, anyway. Hopefully timing will work out better last year. We have gone at least 2 years and it is quite well done.

Now I need to finish gathering and wrapping family gifts. Try to get my Christmas cards out. And maybe, maybe do a little to take of myself and home. Or that can wait until next year.