Life is what happens when we're too busy "making plans"....

I feel like the last few weeks I've been on somewhat of a rollercoaster ride....... up, down, up, down..... It hasn't been the easiest ride at all, and the "best" part or should I say the most stressful part is that all of this is happening right around the holidays.... GREAT!!! I have a feeling that this is going to be the year of nontraditional holidays for my family. My dad ended up in the hospital the week of Thanksgiving, so we got to spend Thanksgiving day in a hospital room/waiting room, my brother brought some tostadas and ceviche and my brother-in-law's family sent us some leftover thanksgiving food..... we were all together with my dad though, and really that's all that mattered to us. Thanksgiving marks the official start of Christmas festivities for us, the weekend after we always decorate, we do lights and a tree, and tamales, ALWAYS tamales the weekend after Thanksgiving..... This year everything has been different, there was no tamale making/decorating weekend, and to add to the busyness of the year my sister and her husband moved to a new place and planned a Christmas Party for 3 days after getting the keys, talk about stressful..... that marked the dbeginning of the holiday season, we ended up doing tamales and tree decorations during the week, and then my dad ended up in the hospital again... pheew.... at least we got some decorating done and tamales, that was the most important part for my mom!!! then we were back to the hospital again, for another week..... they let him go home on the monday of Christmas week, and he thought he was feeling better, as did we.... we spent Christmas Eve and Christmas day surrounded with family and friends, he seemed to be doing well until right about Christmas Day night, and sure enough yesterday, 2 days after Christmas, we were back to the hospital again, and here we are.... at the beginning of another week long stay at the hospital, I do feel like I got some answers though..... but it's going to be a long process, at least this time we know what to expect and how long it's going to take to "fix" the problem..... but that's a whole other blog!!! :/
It's funny though, yesterday at work I told my friend, isn't it weird that Christmas kinda came and went this year?? I feel like it literaly passed me by, there was no baking of cookies this year, no family was "adopted", which I feel badly about, and although there was holiday related things that I did with my friends, it still doesn't seem like the holiday was here as long as it should of been..... It's weird, but now I have a completely new understanding of people who spend the holidays in hospitals.... who knew..... that while everyone was going to be planning holiday parties and shopping for presents I'd be spending days working and then driving to the hospital.... there were people in there who never got visitors, I felt so sad for them, but at the same time I was "selfishly" grateful that there was people visiting "us", and yes I mean us..... because we were there too!! I also felt grateful that people called and txt messaged just to check in and see how things were going.... And that is what Christmas is all about, caring about one another and being together with those that we love, wether it's in a hospital waiting room or at home, it's really not about all the presents and the baking.... although that REALLY helps!!! ;) so in a nutshell that's how my holidays went..... :) Now I'm ready to bring in a new year full of new beginnings and hopefullya year in which my dad is all better.....