1 Thessalonians 5:18 (KJV: "In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you").

Good morning and welcome. Today is Friday, December 26, 2025, and, we are dealing with what I generally call The Day After situation here at the ole blogger ranch. All those hours of preparation, all those efforts trying to make the day as special as we know how, and, within maybe five hours or less, it's all scheduled for the memory book. Some good ones too! I used to watch our boys play. I then spent time, a lot of time, watching our grandchildren play, and now, I spend the time seeing our great grands do their thing. What do I call someone involved in those slices of life moments? I would say blessed beyond measure. What say you? I cooked up some chicken parts, some pork rib-lets, and, the star of the menu, one dozen good sized steaks, and, I almost forgot, a partridge in a pear tree. The steaks were mostly medium to medium rare with one or two well done. That reminds me of a friend who used to order his in this way, "When you think it is well done through and through, cook it for another 5 minutes and it should be just right." Hearing that caused me a fair amount of grimacing, however, this is America and we can choose how we want our steak cooked. I mean, think about it. There are people who actually pour steak sauce on top of a perfectly cooked steak. While that makes me want to run and hide, it is how they like it. One of the slogans for A1 went like this, "Makes steak sing." It makes me sing too. In fact, it reminds me of watching the black and white version of Titanic from 1953, I can see in my mind's eye those people left on the ship singing 'Nearer My God to Thee' as the ship slips into the icy waters. Okay. I will grant you that might be a little over dramatized, but, it does convey my thoughts on the matter. A word picture, if you will. (And, in answer to your question, we do not have any of those types of sauces on our premises, just so you know.) Here's how we assess having our annual Christmas get together: Twenty of us came together, we had fun, we feasted, we had wonderful fellowship, and, in the prayer I prayed over the day as we all gathered together was that we all would be reminded of our Savior and how He came and how God planned it all so that we might be made right with Him, and, that we might even enjoy a day like yesterday. ("All good gifts come from above..." James 1:17) We've never really had one of those knock down and drag out kind of days and I really can't remember any major difficulties encountered. I return to that theme I mentioned above: Blessed and, again I say, "Thank You Lord for giving us a good day. Amen." 

I think most of us are familiar with what we generally refer to as a good tired. The wife and I were both in the good tired mode when it was all said and done. My grandad used to say, "It won't take long for me to be rocked to sleep tonight." That was exactly the truth for me last night. It didn't take long. And, yes, my friend, I'm very thankful for that too. I am. I really am. Thank You Lord! Amen.