Betsy has invited Mike and me to Christmas dinner with her and Richard. No matter how annoyed with my sister I may get sometimes, her cooking is hard to turn down. She inherited that "good cook gene" that, for the most part, bypassed me. Her meals would make Deedo smile.

In looking through old photos yesterday, I found this one of Christmas 1952. I was 6, the blond, she was 4, the brunette, but appears to be the same size as me. I loved dolls, so I'm smiling; she would have been happier with cap pistols or a BB gun. She's probably wondering why Santa brought her a doll when she didn't ask for one. She was quite a tomboy. Looks like Santa brought us new pajamas, too.

George asked for Christmas stories on his site and I couldn't come up with any. "Drawing blanks" is something I do a lot lately, probably has more to do with aging than anything else. I had that dream again about living in a huge mansion, but all of the rooms are locked except for the 2 rooms where I live. I'm walking through it, trying to open doors, but they're all locked. I remember that I'm the one who locked them, but I don't remember where I put the key. It leaves me feeling very sad.

After I awoke, I went on to imagine that I found the key, and one by one, I unlock the doors. I find incredible beauty in most of the rooms, a few are again locked, they need work, and I'm not ready to do the work. Watching HGTV last night probably inspired some of this.