Spencer Family Christmas Letter

 

By Sharon Grehan Howes

 

Hello Everyone! Merry Christmas! We hope you are all hale and hearty!

 

This year we will be heading up to Timmins as usual to visit Tom's Aunt Gertie! I'm certain it will be so much nicer than the ski trip to Aspen Tom promised me! Much better. So much better that I almost want to kill myself but can't, because who else would do half the driving.

 

Aunt Gertie holds a special place in my husband Tom's heart as his family has gathered in her home every Christmas for over thirty years. He says the minute he walks over the threshold he feels like it's Xmas. I agree, nothing says Christmas to me like wood panelling, the smell of feet and crabby old people.

 

It's so cosy with Tom, Kaitlin, Johnny and me all sharing the same room/bed! (We are also grateful Johnny's bedwetting is almost 75% cured.) Tom's relatives from Seabridge will be able to join us at Aunt Gertie's for the full week because none of them have found work since 1979, so...yay!

 

We haven't seen Tom's Seabridge folks (eleven people! isn't that something!) since last week when they came for Thanksgiving. Weren't we lucky that they arrived early (November 10th 7:27 p.m!) and that they were able to stay for 18 days! (and 7 hours! and 12 minutes! ) I don't know how we get so lucky sometimes. Lucky, lucky, lucky. It was long... sorry... lovely to spend so much time together,you learn so much about people. Virginia's feminist views were particularly fascinating. I learned so much as she sat on the kitchen counter with a cocktail and told me about oppression as I prepared the meals for her family and mine.

 

We're almost finished Xmas shopping, it was so much easier this year! Kelly was gracious enough to give us a list of what to buy for her husband and her four children, Emily helped by telling us that they "have enough crap" and that this year we should just send cash and Kevin lightened the load by doing his own shopping for his family at Amazon.com and sending us the link to the shopping cart. All we had to do was insert our Visa number! Whee!

 

This year has certainly sped by! As I mentioned in our last Christmas letter. We had planned to visit England, Ireland and Scotland in May but unfortunately Tom's mother Sadie had a heart incident just before we left (hours before, can you believe it!) And you can imagine our relief when we found out that it was just indigestion! Again! Oh how we laughed when we looked at our nonrefundable tickets and realized that the only thing that stood between us and our trip was a bottle of Tums! Ha ha ha ha!

 

We are all healthy here at least, Johnny is doing well, he sure is growing up fast. (Yes I know Margaret, not as fast as Martin, because nobody on God's green earth is as smart and advanced as Martin) but Johnny has come a long way since we enrolled him in Nursery School. We are grateful that he's stopped eating glue and getting his head stuck in the toilet. As his own grandmother Sadie said so kindly to his teacher this year at his Christmas pageant "You can't expect much, considering."

 

Tom is still working at Signature Investments where he has worked very hard all year to remain exactly where he was last year and the 12 years before that. Ha ha ha. We are hoping that a VP position in napping comes available as it would be dreamy to move to a house that doesn't have "-ette" anywhere in the description. Ha ha ha ha ha.

 

Kaitlin surprised us all last summer when she came home with a tattoo! Yes, she certainly is a mature twelve. I've already started to refer to the guest room as the baby's room. The tattoo is either Clay Aiken or Howdy Doody and ensures that her elder years will be spent hilariously. She plans to leave school at 16 in order to become a nail technician and we are so giddily proud of her we could just vomit.

 

We haven't made any plans for next year as yet- or the rest of our lives for that matter! It looks like this is it for us, we'll just coast till the end. Isn't that fun? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha haha ha ha ha ha ha ha haha ha ha haha ha ha haha ha ha haha ha ha haha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA .

 

Happy Holidays from the Spencers !

 

©2007 Sharon Grehan-Howes