Good grief.

Just when you think you'd see it all.

There's a half a dozen fresh Christmas trees lined up outside the doors with a '$00.00' sign and just inside the doors is a display of valentine candy.

All Christmas items are back of the store but are still at full price.

Do the marketing people at Walmart REALLY think folks are going to buy Valentines during the Christmas clearance sale December 26th?

Wait.

Don't answer that.

I really don't want to know.

All festivity systems are a go here at my house.

I'm hosting a family open house (the first we'll have without our parents) tomorrow afternoon. The house is clean and the pies are baked. All I have to do tomorrow is put warm up the precooked smoked turkeys and hams, peel and make the potatoes au gratin, snow (ice) down the beverages, pour the premade green salad into a bowl and put out the rolls and condiments. I have enough to feed an army (which is a good description of my family) but there'll be potluck dishes too so they'll be plenty to eat. There has been some problems with the settling of my parent's estate and I'm worried the estate executor (the one who caused the problems...she failed to move two hundred acres of my parent's ranch from the family trust into the partnership with my brother. The property value on this parcel of land has tripled since my father died so in addition to hefty inheritance taxes the property most likely will have to be probated. She has hired a lawyer to help her get out of the mess and is trying to pay him from the family trust account but doesn't want anyone to know. However, my parent's estate lawyer (as per my father's directive) sends out yearly reports to all in the family trust and gave her away. Things are just a little touchy right now) will cause some problems. Custer and I have agreed if she does make trouble, comments or, heaven forbid, call a family meeting, we'll just tell her 'no this is a party' and to send us an email. I didn't do RSVPs so maybe she won't come? Most in the family are pretty disgusted with her right now but she was invited. I just hope she keeps her mouth shut as does everyone else. No fighting will be allowed at my party.

The morning of Christmas Eve I will work a few hours in the morning to prepare the hall for a town party that night. We have a Senior Center fundraiser each Christmas Eve; for the donation of a dollar families can come and see Santa Claus and have refreshments. This is a very low labor endeavor and very very popular. Folks are very generous. It's not unusual to find twenty and fifty dollar bills in the collection mailbox and pays a lot of heating bills for us!

My family will go skiing the afternoon of Christmas Eve then we will have supper (leftovers, I'm sure) with Custer's mother. I'm not sure what we will do Christmas day. We may go see my brother in Wyoming of my sister and her family in Logan.

Lori

Shesh!

Lori