our Sixth Day of Christmas

This is my living room, empty except for my cheerful son on our faithful brown couch. Last week this cozy room was full of Brett's second year students. In fact, at one point I looked over and saw six of them (cheerfully) squeezed onto that very couch, and concluded that Brett was right when he said not to worry about the fact that we didn't have enough seats for them all.

We spent a whole day getting ready -- baking cookies, making up the posole, cleaning the bathroom, etc. -- and then when the big day came, I woke up sick. So we put the soup in the freezer, gave the cookies away to friends, re-scheduled with the students -- and I wondered how many of them would come on the new date. I was surprised when almost all of them came; they stayed three hours, they ate up all my soup, they devoured my cookies, they were appropriately appreciative of everything, and then they left left en masse at 7:00 to go study for their history test.

 

The evening reminded me of the Smiths....of the many times in Spain that they purposed to have people into their home...and of the Luke Newtons....who every year have Luke's residents over for dinner, the day after Thanksgiving.

 

So here's to using our home to love people!