I'm back!

 Merry Christmas!

grand daughter in Santa hat

I titled this post "I'm back" because I haven't been on the computer in a while... due to:

1. Our old computer crashed  - was kind of wishing it had died, but lo and behold, the Geek Squad at Best Buy resurrected it (??#!%). So we will limp on with it for awhile. 

and

 2. We had to make an emergency run to Baton Rouge, La where DH's mom was just put into a hospice there. We only stayed a few days and even then we weren't sure if she knew who we were. She is 98 and had 5 sons. One died from an overdose of anesthesia during a tonsillectomy when he was 3, but the other 4 all went on to graduate from college - and despite my MIL's age, she has been doing fairly well until recently. But we are very glad that we went. It was nice to see and talk to family.

However,  we were surprised at the traffic in Baton Rouge nowadays. Granted, it's been a long time since DH and I were students at LSUBR, but getting around in the traffic was really difficult. I don't think I'll complain about Dallas traffic ever again. Someone told us that it's been that way since Katrina - when so many moved out of New Orleans and settled in Baton Rouge to stay...(?)

I also find it hard to believe that Christmas is next week! I'm just sending out Christmas cards today and starting to bake rum cakes.

Julie helping me bake.... (actually she doesn't like me encroaching on her space)

While I'm in the kitchen here, I'll post a picture of Rose huddled up to the Aga. It's been in the 30's here and Rose at 21 seems to need to keep warm... as you can see.

Rose staying warm...

and while I'm here, I'll take a pic of my new little addition to my "bird/chicken collection" on top of the Aga. 

The little blackbird and owl were given to me, and I bought the 2 larger chickens... but the little guy in the middle is one of my own ceramic creations.


And FYI... tomorrow I plan to spend part of the day catching up on everyone's posts from the last week! (... and continue baking!)