Fresh Starts

We woke up this morning to the sun shining in the window of the room through the cracks in the window slats. The first thing I do in the morning is open those window coverings and soak in the view. I've mentioned I could get used to waking up to that every morning. You're in a large, stately house on top of a hill overlooking "your" rolling pastures with grazing horses and the Tennessee hills in the background. The weather is better here and so is the view, both of which I could definitely get used to! :)

Kaylee played with her cousins all day long. They spent a long time out there on the trampoline, which is of course not only excellent exercise but a lot of fun. Indoors I don't even know what all they played. Dolls and barbies and pets. Some day in the not-too-distant future, she'll realize how blessed she is to have four "kids" that much older than she is willing to play so much of her stuff with her for so long so patiently!

We watched some football, most of the men and a few of the ladies took a nap, Cathy took me to Barnes & Noble to spend my gift card, I got into an aluminum ball fight with Morgan until Steve made me quit, and we took turns playing the piano. At one point Steve and I played together on the same piece of music. It started off pretty funny, actually. He plays by ear and I play by reading music and those two methods don't always work out well at the same time. So we had to pick songs that we both knew the tunes to, and I played the upper octaves and he played the lower octaves on the piano. Then he would start improvising and I'd get lost on where we were on the real music, we'd start laughing, and then we'd be totally off. Finally we started getting the swing of it, and we played a couple of songs pretty well, actually, with him improvising by ear and me playing the music each on our own half of the piano. His mom sat on the couch behind us and clapped and cheered with the completion of each song, whether it was done well or just done. ;) I have to say, I play pretty pathetically compared to how I used to play, but at least I still remember how-so far. Kaylee needs to start taking piano lessons soon here too...

Richard & Ann had brought several gifts separate from Christmas, set them all out on the big table, and had all the grandkids gather round and look at each of the items. Then each grandkid (hard to call a couple of them "children" or "kids" now that they are 16 and 18 but you know what I mean!) picked a number out of a box from one to five. Whoever got #1 got to pick first amongst the items on the table, and so forth through #5. Then they went backwards and #5 got to pick first, backwards through to #1, and back again. This way each person got a chance to choose which of the gifts they would like. It went like clockwork and everyone had fun and enjoyed their gifts and the process.

We also played a game, the name of which is escaping me right now, (it came to me: "Mad Gab") where one person reads off these nonsense words on a card, and everyone on their team has to figure out what the name or phrase really is. "Eye Mull Lotion" might be "I'm a Love Machine" for example. It was girls against boys, but the girls had 7 to the boys' 4, so Cathy defected to the men's team to even it out a bit. The girls still creamed the boys and I found out I'm not half bad at that. Wow, a new skill to hone. ;) Kaylee even took a turn reading the cards, and she did really well, only needed help with a couple of the weirder or biggest words. But then things fell apart at the end. Ann was reading off the cards, and she was doing a good job, and it made Steve start laughing. Well as soon as Steve started laughing, Ann started laughing, and she couldn't read the cards, which made Steve laugh harder, and pretty soon everyone was having trouble. The next round when it was our turn, the guys on the couch had a rousing round of...extra noises...that I think they planned on purpose to derail us. Again we girls took a hit on how many we got. The last card we had was "Don't get mad, get even", so that's what we did. They had 3 minutes to get as many cards right as possible, and Kaylee walked over there and started burping the ABCs, people's names, all manner of things, which of course made the boys start laughing. All's fair in games and war. Girls won in the end by a pretty good margin, Steve and Ann hurt themselves laughing, Kaylee was thrilled she was allowed to use her burping skills in "public", and Cathy will probably be grateful if it's another couple of years before we make it back down here. ;)

One thing I forgot to mention from last night. Kaylee decided that when the new year rolled around, we should all get in a "conga" line and go through the whole house, all the rooms and all the floors singing "It's two thousand ni-INE! It's two thousand ni-Ine!" kicking our feet out and attached by the shoulders and all. Now you can just wonder if we really did it or not. ;)

Well, the house and everyone in it has gone to bed, so I guess I should too, even though it's only 11:11 p.m. here. We head back home tomorrow, even though it's in the 30s at home and will be almost 60 over the weekend here. Bah. I have truly enjoyed wearing a t-shirt again and soaking up a little extra sunshine to carry me a little further through the winter. It's been a great mini vacation and a nice way to bring in the new year. I must say, the first day of 2009 was juuuuust right. :)