Day After Christmas

 Somewhat of a relaxing day, although the registration process for the SAT test was a pain.  But we got through it all, despite the website's best efforts to dissuade us from actually registering.  The last few years, we've traditionally hit the road on this day, heading off on vacation here or there, mostly Pigeon Forge.  This year, we're at home, slowly packing away new gifts and toys, listening to the new vinyl records or checking out books.  Speaking of books, I've been reading that classic edition of "A Christmas Carol" the last few days, reading it out loud.  It's been fantastic fun reading that, as we all know so many of the lines by heart.  

Maddie and I played a game of Super Mario Party at one point, and we set out a new bird feeder too.  The birds have been so numerous out  there, so many of them.  It's a great flurry of activity on the back deck.  Maddie has been using her new Christmas-themed Mad-libs book, getting Mom and I to give random nouns and adjectives until we get a hilarious story that Maddie enjoys reading out loud to us afterwards.

It is the second night of Hanukkah, and so we had Maddie light the candles, using the Shamash and reading scriptures from Deuteronomy, and then the devotional for day two that goes with it.  One gift was a Hanukkah devotional that has eight entries, so we were following along with that.  We'll do the dreidel game eventually, and even a little craft that I picked up some time ago of a stained glass dreidel that you can make.  

Tonight's movie was "Oz, the Great and Powerful," part of a new ongoing "Oz-fest" I think we'll be having this week.  The reason is that we'll likely be going to the theater to see "Wicked" in theaters.  Other than "Moana 2" and "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever," this is the only other movie we are even remotely interested in seeing in theaters.  So yeah, we went to Oz again tonight, and we'll be there again soon with a few of the other movies.  Maddie does not like "Return to Oz" so much!  But I love it, perhaps for different reasons than the other Oz movies, but I still do enjoy it.  Anyway, "Wicked" is on the horizon.

So I've been sick today, though not so much.  But it does make reading the part of DEATH a lot easier in the Hogfather book.  My voice has a lot of bass and scratchiness to it, which adds a good bit more menace to his epic phrase, "HO.  HO.  HO."  We're still reading that story too, which I think we have another week or so left, depending on how the nights go.  We really like this story though.

We had leftover Chinese food for lunch, and of course we're all munching on these sweets left over from Christmas.  I don't think we went anywhere today.  At all.  I mean, I went to the mail box.  And took the trash out.  But that's about the maximum distance covered today, and that's okay.  Maddie's been playing games, and Mom's been testing out her new headphones - I got her some BOSE headphones, and those are nice.  She sat a good bit today, actually doing bills as she listened to her favorite programing using the headphones.  All the decorations are still up and lit, and we're just chill today.

Okay, it's time for bed.  I'm sleeping downstairs tonight, as I'm not wanting anyone else to get this little virus.  It's not too bad at the moment.  We said our prayers before bed, this after all the reading.  It was a good day today, relaxed and pretty quiet.  Tomorrow will hopefully be a bit like that too.