What a Christmas Season...

My Dad came and visited for an extended weekend just after my birthday, which was really nice. He got to see the house for the first time, and we had a great time spending some time together and enjoying some of our favorite small town activities (like a living drive through nativity at one of the country churches).

Shortly after Dad left, I came down with a serious bug. I'm beginning to believe that my body thinks that Christmas is the perfect time to get sick, because I'm pretty sure this is the third year in a row that I've been sick on Christmas.  As a result, I missed ALL of the Hineses Christmas gatherings/events, which was a huge disappointment.

But it only got worse.  I got sicker and sicker until I finally had to throw in the towel, call out sick over my assigned weekend to work (which I have never done before), and went to urgent care. Two hours later, I left with a prescription for prednisone, an antibiotic, and codine syrup.  Two days later I'm feeling better (the sinus pressure is down, I can actually hear out of my ears, and I don't push tears out of my eyes every time I try to blow my nose), but definitely still not at 100%.  Just folding my laundry and making the bed left me sweating.  But I'm going to head into work this afternoon, simply because I feel terrible for not being there.

Despite the fact that I missed a lot of the Christmas festivities and have been sick as a dog, I can't help but have a heart that is overflowing with gratitude.  Gratitude for the generosity of our friends and families with their gifts (hello new Shark vacuum and some significant cash that will allow us to get the stumps in the back yard ground down to eventually make way for a fence for Cooper). I'm overwhelmed by the biggest gift of all, the biggest sacrifice of all -- Jesus.  A child born King.  King of the world, king of hearts, our savior.  What a gift he is...