A Different Kind of Christmas

Just wanted to let you all know what is going on in our family and ask for your prayers. We had planned on spending Christmas in the mountains with my (Missy's) family, but yesterday as we were loading up the car to leave my grandma tripped over an uneven part of the sidewalk and slammed face-first into the bumper of the car and then the cement. She stopped breathing and her heart stopped three times in the course of the morning, and we spent most of yesterday in the emergency room and the ICU. Praise God, though, last night she started to flutter her eyelashes in response to our visits and tonight she had her eyes open and was nodding her head furiously and grabbing for our hands.

We crave your prayers, as she continues to heal and the doctors figure out exactly what happened. Today they determined that when she fell she also had a heart attack (caused by the fall, apparently), and there was some damage to her spinal cord. At this point her legs are paralyzed and it is likely she will undergo surgery after her heart is strong enough. She's still in pretty tough shape and still critical, but the improvement today was phenomenal. It is already incredible to see how God has worked--yesterday the doctors told us that they were losing her, that she had massive internal bleeding, and by the time they transferred her to the hospital with the trauma unit they found no bleeding at all. It is awesome to remember that we have a God who is absolutely, completely in control of life and death.

And we've had a good Christmas. Not what we had planned, but we are all here together and we all took turns singing Grandma Christmas carols (whichever ones we could all remember the words to!) in her room. How thankful we are for family and friends who have called, brought food, visited, and prayed! The ridiculously large pile under the Christmas tree seemed pretty irrelevant when it came to celebrating Christmas this year.

Well, forgive my rambling here (though if you can't ramble on your own blog, where can you?). I hope your Christmas was wonderful and that you, too, were able to celebrate miracles.

mjs

Unfestive

Very unhappy about the following news from the House Majority Whip's office.

SATURDAY`S FORECAST:

On Saturday, the House will meet at 9:00 a.m. for legislative business.

*Members are advised that a Sunday session is possible this week*

mjs

"God Bless Us, Every One"

This weekend we took in what has become my favorite Christmas "tradition" (shh, I'm hoping that if I just secretly keep buying the tickets every year it will become a tradition) and went to Ford's Theatre to see "A Christmas Carol." If the name of the theatre sounds familiar but you can't quite put your finger on it, think the infamous night that President Lincoln went to the theatre. (And yes, it is pretty sweet to live in DC sometimes.) Ford's Theatre, btw, is one of my favorite tourist spots in Washington (though I do get ridiculed for that preference from time to time) and every time I sit there and listen to the story I hope just once Lincoln will decide to stay home for the evening. Does it ever boggle your mind how powerfully single events shape history?

Anyway, Dawn, Brian, Jason and I went to the afternoon show and traipsed around downtown for the early evening. If you haven't seen or read "A Christmas Carol" for a while, you should head to the library and pick it up. It is funny, frightening, heart-wrenching, and pretty much makes you want to be a better person. And may we, like Mr. Scrooge, know how to keep Christmas well.

fa la la la la...

As promised, here are some photos of our "decked halls"--as well as some of the not-so-decked areas of our house, in case you want to see where we live. I will note that though someone DID set up a blow-up snow globe complete with Santa, Frosty, and constantly blowing snow outside our condo building, I have not photographed it. You will have to use your imagination.

This first photo is our living room, which looks much larger than it is (see, Marbs, this is what our house looks like with furniture! :)). We had to do a bit of rearranging to get the Christmas tree in, but all is well...for a month or so!

Next we have our pretty spare room, recently completed (thanks to Mom!) and eagerly awaiting your visit! Mmm, comfortable bed, calling your name...

And here is our green-and-red bedecked dining room.

And our fabulous new kitchen--we are deeply indebted to Jason's dad, who sacrificed the tip of a finger for this room.

And our bedroom, in cranberry. Of course. (Please ignore the messy packing, Jason's leaving for London this afternoon.)

Whew! That was a lot of uploading!

mjs

deciding

In my head a debate has been raging regarding this blog--will it be a breezy Small Family Newsletter, rife with weekend updates and picture-tours of our little home, or will it be more introspective, a writer's journal to fill with the random thoughts flitting through my head during the day? I still have time to lay a foundation, as no one has yet been invited to view the blog (and I suspect Jason himself has not yet seen it, as the internet was "undergoing construction" when he tried last), though the Christmas letters with its mention should go out by the end of the week. But I have spent the morning diverted by some of your blogs and writings and have concluded that I am certainly no writer, though I like to pretend, and I should stick to family Christmas letters and constituent mail.

(btw, does it strike anyone else as odd that we use words that go with very physical things (construction, etc.) to describe something so cyber and (in my mind, anyway) theoretical? I find the idea of tearing through a website with cranes and backhoes quite amusing, but perhaps that is only because it is Wednesday morning and I am bored.)

So breezy newsletter it is. On the way to work this morning Shaanti and I swapped stories of pulling out really awful Christmas decorations bought at Walmart after Christmas when the pickings were slim and shared a resolution to spend that money this year on one nice decoration instead of fifteen plastic snowflakes that we will never, ever put up. We spent the weekend Christmassing--two parties on Saturday, then a Christmas tree and decorating the house on Sunday. If only I had cranked out some Santa-shaped cookies... Our tree, I swear, grew between picking it out at Home Depot and arriving in our living room, and we spent some time debating whether or not we actually needed a couch for the month of December. After moving it, the furniture, and ourselves 4 times and vacuuming the floor 6 times, we finally have it in place. Pictures will certainly follow.

Until then, let's watch a subcommittee hearing on college football...

mjs

P.S. It also strikes me funny that the spellcheck on blogger doesn't recognize the word "blog." Okay, so I have a lame sense of humor--for the love, we are doing a Congressional hearing on college football!

and we're on our way...

The first blog entry. So intimidating, so critical, so "first-impression," so...well, so finally started , after three tries. I really don't think we can put off entering the "blog world" any longer, especially since I find great joy in other people’s blogs. Though I have the underlying fear that no one will ever read this, perhaps there is one other person among our acquaintances who, like me, gets a big kick out of seeing Thanksgiving pictures.

So here you go--a first class ticket to our life, courtesy of blogger.com. Check often, post comments, and generally feel that you have an open door to our little home. Enough for now: we are bloggers. I'll inudate you with pictures later.
mjs