I was thinking this morning about how it is that, the more we're active and busy and up doing things, the more every thing turns into a blur, and, the more that we spend time being still, the more time seems to slow down and be orderly. At least for me, anyway. This Christmas, I had lots of time to pray until the last week, then, with the Open House on the Wednesday before Christmas, singing at our Vesper's Service on Sunday and celebrating the actual holiday (which was celebrated, this year on the 24th, 25th, 26th and 27th consecutively - oy!!), everything turned into a quick march and we slid right on through and, here I am, wondering what just happened. It was a pleasant holiday with lovely memories - lots of small things that I was grateful for. The most stunning part of this Christmas for me was that I had so much more energy than ever before! I did get very tired but there were no headaches and no crises of exhaustion. What a beautiful thing - completely different from the past twenty years and a tremendous gift in and of itself!!
I think that, also, this year, what stands out in my mind is how much fun I had in the kitchen. After a year of cooking without gluten I have much more experience and converting the recipes and trying new ones was a ton of fun. Sadly, there wasn't much time for picture taking but I'll tell you that, at the open house, there were sugar cookies, linzer bars, gingersnaps (heavenly!!), cherry filled and plain fudgey brownies (a special hit), homemade eggnogg, my famous cheese ball and, very prettily, gingerbread spice cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and sugared cranberries (inspired by Linda Lomelino of 'Call Me Cupcake'). Christmas dinner was very, very satisfying, also. The greatest relief being a tasty gluten free stuffing!! Add in a dash of presence of mind and a huge dollop of laughter and it was a lovely Christmas, indeed!!
Wishing us all everything that is merry and bright in the new year...
xo
