The Days After Christmas

The days following Christmas are some of my favorite days. There is usually nothing at all on the calendar for a span of three or four days, so we are able to spend the whole day however we want- at leisure or at work or some combination of the two. 

After spending the early hours of today quietly reading from the Gospel of Matthew, and some of the book Kingdom, Grace and Judgement by Robert Farrar Capon, and some of Brandon Sanderson's newest book Wind and Truth, I inventoried our fridge and pantries and planned our meals for the week like I usually do. 

Dwayne is in the habit of handling the shopping on Saturdays, so I sent him off with the lists, while I spent the next several hours inventorying and organizing several cabinets, drawers, and closets all over the house. 

As a homemaker, I find it very useful to open briefly inventory/ quickly organize every single space in our house, so that I simply have a better idea what's there. Having a mental picture of what things we have where makes the next several weeks/ months go much smoother, because I simply know what things we have and where those things are. The last several weeks have been so busy with such an intense focus on graduate school that I felt like it was time to literally take stock of my home again. 

But this inventory/ reorganization effort was also prompted by the urgent need to find a new home for all the card games and at least 1/3 of the board games that were piled up in the basement, because they had to come out of the wet bar area and find a new home somewhere else, since we recently got a fancy ice maker installed in the cabinets down there. This was one of Dwayne's Christmas presents to me. I love ice water, iced tea, etc. I use a lot of ice. So this will be a constant blessing. 

We decided to move all the card and board games to the hall closet upstairs, but that prompted a reorganization of all the drawers and cabinets in the wet bar area and the upstairs hall closet, too. 

We collected many items the girls don't use anymore to donate. We're setting things aside for friends, and the girls rediscovered some like-new paint brushes we'd totally forgotten we had in craft supplies rediscovered in one of the cabinets. In all, it was a very productive day, and I feel refreshed having a much clearer mental picture of our home heading into the coming season. 

For dinner, I used my fancy new pot, another Christmas gift from Dwayne, to make a fancy new recipe- chicken with tarragon cream sauce (made without any dairy or gluten). I played Taylor Leonhardt loudly, and sang out loudly while I cooked. Fact: Taylor Leonhardt is my favorite singer/ singer writer at this point. 

This new chicken recipe was amazing; Everyone agreed. It will go on our list of family favorites to have again and again. I served it with roasted carrot strips and with basmati rice to soak up all the delicious sauce. 

After we cleaned up from dinner, we played Cartographers, a game we rediscovered as we were relocating all those games today. While we played, we ate some of the gluten, dairy, sugar free treats I made yesterday- homemade almond joys and peanut butter/ chocolate balls. 

Now I am sitting up writing this post, enjoying the tree lights, while the house is quiet and dark. 

I thank God for today and everyday like it. 

I love reading for hours in my cozy pajamas on the couch under a heated blanket while sipping a cup of hot coffee prepared the way I like it. 

I enjoy spending uninterrupted hours caring for my home, so I can spend the next days/ weeks/ months living and working in well-organized spaces. 

I love having extra time to learn to cook something new for my family. 

I love eating delicious yet nourishing foods I made myself, and I enjoy basking in my family's praises over my cooking. I'm forty-five, and at this point, I've done enough to have experienced esteem and praise from various groups and people in public, but I find that nothing compares to the simple appreciation my family can show for the meals I make them. 

I even love cleaning up after dinner, especially when my family helps, all of us moving together and helping one another efficiently. 

And I especially love board games in this season of life, even when I lose badly like I did tonight. 

These days after Christmas are a blessing to my heart, and even when they are filled with much labor, it is labor that brings a much-needed reset before another busy season begins.