Happy New Years!

Hello, friends! Sorry to have been away from this space for so long. The Lappy has been slowly deteriorating over the last few weeks, making it difficult to post anything (photo card wouldn't stay in the slot, Lappy was crashing and melting down all the time), and then finally the inevitable happened -- Lappy just stopped booting up anymore. I'm not really surprised. That computer had a hard, busy life of being stepped on and dropped off of things and having every piece banged around and prodded and bent . . . its not easy to be the computer that shares a house with my boys and their absent minded mom. So, new year, new computer. The one I"m typing on now is actually Dave's school computer. We'll get one for me in a little while. In the meantime, forgive my spelling as my fingers adjust to the size of this keyboard.

We had a good, but silly Christmas. The week before Christmas we were visited by three disasters - the Lappy meltdown, the theft of our credit card number and the stomach flu. The latter was definitely the worst -- there is nothing like tending two sick and one well child while you AND your husband are also both sick, and you are supposed to be driving 7 hrs for a week long visit that evening. We posponed our trip a day until everyone was at least done throwing up (for the first two hours of our trip, Andrew and I had the same conversation every 10 min or so. "Mom!" "Yes, Andrew?" "I didn't throw up yet." "Glad to hear it, son.")

After this we spent a week staying at Dave's brother's house in Cambridge. It was nice to have Dave around for Christmas, and not completely exhausted. The cousins got to have a good long play (they were all done with each other by the end of the week), the boys got out in the forest and snow plenty, and the adults reminiced and visited friends fromt he past until we were feeling old and infirm (at 35, no less). By the end of this time I had caught one of my famous Jill colds, complete with hacking cough and hoarse voice (which rarely stops me from talking, strangely enough)

Then we jetted off to Toronto to spend a lovely couple of days with Kris, my partner in crime over at Clever Mamas. She and her husband treated us to a wonderful spread of apetizers on New Years' Eve. On New Years day we took all the kids (all 6 of them) on a subway ride and a wander around the mall, and that evening I had my first taste of Settlers of Catan. I think I"m hooked. And how great is it that Kris bought the game for Christmas JUST because she knew I would love it, and left it out within view, knowing I would see it and say, "hey, I've always wanted to try that game". I felt thoroughly known and spoiled. Thanks, Kris.

Our last stop was to visit my lovely friend Sharon and her family. Ironically, the Hetkes followed us East and are now living 3ish hrs drive away. We were planning to stop overnight, but by the time we got there, we all really needed our own beds. The boys were getting worn out and my cold was not better, so we spent a marvelous day catching up and then high tailed it back home. It was so good to see my friends beginning to settle into their new space and to celebrate our mutual new adventures.

So, we got home last night, and today I spent the day cleaning (since I didn't get the pre-trip clean done in the midst of all the emergency clean up and packing I was doing before we left). Dave spent the day grocery shopping and getting bills and mail and the like sorted out.

 It is good to visit, but it is also good to come home. I missed my herbal tea collection and my blue kitchen and my sewing machine. I missed the red brick and the rumble of the trains and the sun peeking over the rusty back fire escapes of the appartment buildings behind our house. I didn't really miss the Asian pop music flooding from the basement, but all things considered that is a minor inconvenience.

I have more to say about the new year, but that shall wait for another day. Happy New Years, all.