De-decorating

Mike and I spent Sunday packing up the Christmas decorations. Mike took care of the tree and the ornaments and I managed the rest. My part was not necessarily an easy task given that we have at least 5 nativity sets and some decorations in almost every room of the house. The large mantel over the fireplace holds a collection of Santas (some fragile, some not), and I’m always worried that the stuff won’t fit in the available boxes. (Good news. It all fits!) I still have the outdoor lights and the mini-tree in the kitchen to pack up, but that should be no problem.

Instead of carrying everything in the attic, we store the decorations in a large closet in the garage. We keep the wrapping paper there, too. It is pretty convenient, but sometimes I wish that I had that closet for the gardening stuff as I try to find spaces for the terra cotta pots in the fall.


I also managed to send out the Christmas note on the back of the card that we sent. This year it was a photo of all of us in Maine where we spent our late summer vacation. (Check an earlier blog entry for more detail.) The text of the message is copied below.

I hope you are all well. Sometimes it seems like a lot has changed sometime it seems that nothing has changed.

As you can see from the picture the family spent a week in Maine together. It was a relaxing week together. Many thanks to Libby and Allen Harville for their hospitality.
Mike is still at St Francis at the Heart Hospital on the south side of Indianapolis. The commute is farther than he would like, but the work is engaging. It is great to be part of building an organization.

I’ve been working at Eli Lilly for 8 years and last year began working as a training project manager. I work on a variety of training development projects with a number of different departments.

Mollie and Joel live in Chicago. Mollie works for the Feds at the Government Accountability Office as a senior health analyst. Joel works as an environmental engineer for a consulting company. They have a two bedroom condo in Lincoln Park that is a little crowded since Nolan was born. The baby was born in November of 2008 and is now a toddler. Everything is new for him. He’s a cheerful little guy. He laughs and we all laugh along.

Dan spent a couple of years in retail and decided it wasn’t for him. So he is now working for a catering company as a bartender. His passion is travel. This spring when his tax refund arrived, he traveled to Australia, New Zealand and Tahiti.

Nora is working as an office manager for the modern language department at Florida State University in Tallahassee. She gets to take two graduate classes a semester free of charge. Plans are to move back to the Midwest when Ben, her boyfriend, finishes graduate school.
Please let us know if you travel through Indianapolis. We’d love to have you stop by.
Happy New Year! Jody and Mike

For me, the most exciting thing about sending the card is that it went out before Easter. There are so many ways to stay in touch, I’m very grateful for those friends who still send out Christmas cards.

My favorite gift...