Giving and Receiving

We had a busy weekend but I think it succeeded in finally getting me into a holiday mood.

We had actually gone last weekend to the mall to get some things and the whole thing left me feeling very bah-humbug. We have stolen one of my families traditions of getting a dated ornament each year and we also needed to pick up our next installment of the willow tree creche set which is a bit pricey (hence the buying it in pieces each year) but we had two Hallmark coupons that were about to expire. I'm not sure the $7 we saved was worth the awfulness of the mall on a Saturday anytime between October and January, so next year we are going to have to either find a Hallmark store not connected to a mall or order online.

But sadly, this weekend did not involve as many crowds. Saturday was a day of service for Craig's college and our assignment was to help with a canned food drive. Despite the amazing prizes they were offering for the family that brought in the most goods (1st prize - tickets to the A&M/tu football game!) and the obvious hard work put in by the sponsors, the showing was awful. In all 4 families brought donations. It was just a case of bad location. But it was still nice to see the effort that these families had gone to for their communities and I'm glad we went.

Then we ran home and rested for a bit before making stuffing for an international church group dinner. We weren't a part of it so we left our delightful smelling thanksgiving food with them and headed home - it was sad.

But on Sunday we were the ones given turkey and stuffing and all that good stuff when we went to our church's Thanksgiving banquet. It was a little weird at first because they had rolled away all the pews and set up tables. I think there were ~350 people there, all eating and talking and fellowshipping together in the sanctuary. We ended up sitting with three sets of friends, who we knew from three completely different circumstances and I ended up thoroughly enjoying myself. After eating and listening to a speaker talk about one of the missions programs the church sponsors, we celebrated the Lord's supper together. Much to Craig's delight, it wasn't just a tic-tac sized wafer but actual bread although I must say that my Episcopalian origins emerged when it become obvious that they were just going to throw away the extra. Luckily Craig understood my look of horror and as we were cleaning up the tables, he grabbed our tables leftovers and we ate them although we were already beyond stuffed. I never quite went over to the Lutheran's belief that it is the actual body of Christ, but even I wasn't willing to just toss it in the garbage with all the leftover pie crusts and jellied cranberries.

We also managed to start a fruitcake over the weekend but we have to wait 2 weeks to taste it. I think that is cruel. Also cruel, Craig looking at the cake I slaved over and announcing that he doesn't like food with raisins in it, so he doesn't think he will like it. This despite the fact that he was the one to suggest the whole fruitcake-making adventure before he got too busy to actually participate in the process. I still hold out hope though because 1) I think I will like it, so if he doesn't that is just more for me and 2) he likes rum and this particular cake is getting doused in rum every 2-3 days. The question is, will his love of rum overcome his dislike of raisin-embedded food? Time will tell.