What are your family's New Year traditions? Do you have any that you observe each year? Because of my brother being killed on New Year's, I always liked to keep things low key. We usually stayed in and watched a movie. Two years ago we watched Groundhog Day. I didn't know that would be the last time we welcomed in a New Year together. Last year, Tom was in the hospital and I had came home earlier in the evening to get some rest. So we didn't get to welcome in 2020 together and of course, we won't be welcoming in 2021 together either. 

I appreciate those of you who read these and I hate to sound like a downer. But I use this blog to write about my life and my feelings and right now, I am really struggling with Tom being gone. So I am going to be sharing lots of memories and thoughts along those lines. 

With New Year's Eve approaching, I want to ask/beg of you each not to drink and drive. Whether you have had one drink or more, just do not take the chance. Make your plans before you leave the house that night (or any night!) about how you are going to get home safely. 

My brother was killed in a drinking and driving wreck on New Year's Day 1987. Our family has spent many Christmases, New Year's, birthdays, and just normal every day days without him. Please don't put your family or someone else's family through that same pain. 

I am taking a few days off from posting on the blog and from almost everything else lol. I'll be back in a few days to post my last weekly update and my plans for January. 

Hope you all have a wonderful and blessed Christmas Day!

This week's update:

Walking 25 minutes a day/10,000 steps five days a week: I walked every day and got 10,000 or more steps four of five days.

Write in blog/post in Facebook group: I did both of these every day

Devotional/prayer journal: Did both of these every day

Fruits/veggies: I met my goal four of the seven days

Work on creating new classes five days per week: five of the five days

Track food and blood sugar/drink water: all seven days

De-clutter: five of the seven days

​self-talk/read: five of the seven days

This is a picture of Tom and I together last Christmas. At the time, we did not realize it would be our last Christmas together. Of course, we suspected it might be, but we hope it wouldn't be. 

My point is, you may be spending your last holiday with someone this year. Remember to love. Remember to forgive. Remember that tomorrow is not guaranteed. 

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Monday: 4677 steps (ended up staying in Lawton an extra day and driving home Monday so a lot of the day was spent in the car)
Tuesday: 10,565 steps
Wednesday: 10,410 steps
Thursday: 6695 steps (did a CDA observation that morning and then came out in the afternoon and entered all the information and so a lot of my day was spent sitting. I was pooped by the time I got home and did all that so I gave myself a break). 
Friday: 10,324 steps

​Yet Another Day
Yet another day,
Without you here by my side.
Can’t stop missing you.

What is your best or favorite Christmas memory?

One of mine is from I think the third Christmas Tom and I were married. We had a Step 2 playhouse and wagon to give the kids on Christmas morning and Tom spent almost all day Christmas eve out in the garage putting it together. It was sooo cold and a freezing fog rolled in. We woke up Christmas morning to a "white" Christmas because everything was covered in frost from that freezing fog. It was beautiful. 

Four months ago today, I woke up and Tom was gone. I had been awake with him most of the night and finally fell asleep a little after 2:00 a.m. in the recliner. When I woke up, I knew he was gone. I remember thinking that I wanted to close my eyes and go back to sleep because as soon as I got up, it was going to be real. Of course, that isn't what I did because it was and is real. In some ways it seems like a lifetime since he's been gone, but in others, it just seems like yesterday. I miss you Tom.