On Monday, we started putting up our Christmas tree! We didn't really finish it until last night, but me and my mom have been slowly working on it. It's an artificial one and comes with built in lights, so it took us like an hour to get all the sections working. By that time, we weren't in the best of moods and decided to call it a day.

Nonetheless, it got finished! We're working on putting other decorations up around the house, but just putting the tree up has definitely got me into the swing of Christmas. Here's a picture of our tree and some of my favorite ornaments :

I don't know what it is about Christmas, but it is hands down my favorite holiday. I'm almost always in the best mood during the Christmas season (despite a select few songs that make me want to pull my hair out).I love giving gifts to people, spending time with my family, and definitely not least of all, celebrating Christ's birth. :)

If you celebrate Christmas, have you all set up any decorations yet? What is your favorite holiday?

I want to thank everyone for the comments on the last blog about my grandpap. It really helped.

As for how he is doing, he didn't look as bad as I thought. He just looked very old. He was very weak, and we're pretty sure he did not remember us. He was also very quiet. I think we all handled it really well, we saw him on a good day. When the rest of my family went to see him on Thanksgiving, yesterday, he was in a terrible mood and screaming and yelling. So his moods fluctuate a lot. I'm just really glad I saw him on a good day.

He's not eating very much; he's eating about 48% of breakfast, 15% of lunch, and 12% of dinner, which is not a lot. He says he's full. He also thinks that he is coming home, which is not completely out of the question, but the chances are slim. He keeps calling home and asking for my grandma to come get him. :/

Yesterday, Thanksgiving was really good. We went to my aunt's so not to stress my grandma and all the food was delicious and I probably gained 2349087 pounds. ;P I'm so grateful for everything that God has given my family.

Today, me and my mom and dad did a little bit of shopping, but not much. We mainly met up with some other friends, and that was nice. Then, about fifteen minutes after we got to my grandma's, my grandma was having severe pains. She was throwing up and she had to lie down because she felt like she was going to pass out. She thought she needed to go to the hospital.

Soooo, we called an ambulance and then my aunt that lives right next door. The paramedics came and we figured that she had disturbed or done something to a rupture that she had years back that she had surgery on. We're not really sure from there. I have a mentally retarded aunt that is currently staying at my grandma's for the holiday,  and through this whole ordeal she was sleeping, and still is. Me and my mom stayed behind in case she woke up or if any of our other relatives called to ask for information.

We're just playing the waiting game right now. We don't know if she'll have surgery, or if they'll post-pone it for another date and just give her pain medications... we don't know. So I'm just trying to do what I can to pass the time.

Our original plan was to come home Saturday, tomorrow, but we don't know if we're still going to do that. My grandma may need us here, and if so, we'll stay an extra day.

All in all, this has been a really hard week for my family. :/

Almost every year for Christmas, we go to my grandparents in Pennsylvania for Christmas. It's a long drive, about 12 hours, but it's always good to see them as we normally only see them and the rest of my dad's family once a year.

My grandpap (or pap-pap, as we call him sometimes), has not been doing very well. He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's about three years ago, and at first it wasn't too bad. He would forget little things, like where he placed his keys, or if he had already taken his medicine for the day, but recently it has got to the point that my grandma can not take care of him anymore. About a month ago, he fell down the stairs in his house and hit his head and was unable to get back up. So my grandmother, old with age as she is, called my aunt who conveniently lives right next door. They managed to get my grandpap to the hospital and he was placed in ICU.

From there on, the details are a bit fuzzy except for the fact that his health is failing. The doctors say that it's common for Alzheimer patients to become mean, and my grandpap has now reached that point. My aunts and uncles have placed him in a nursing home, but it's only angered him more and they now say he has symptoms of depression as well.

The last time we came up here, last December, my grandpap didn't know who we were. All in all, it's been a rather difficult time for my family up here in Pennsylvania, and for mine back home. The doctors aren't sure how long my grandpap is going to last. My parents decided it would be better to come up for Thanksgiving this year instead of Christmas; it would relieve some stress on my grandma's part and to be honest, we're not sure he will make it to Christmas. It's one of those things that no one is saying aloud, but we're all thinking it.

So I'm in PA now at my grandparents. My grandma seems to be doing fine, though she misses him. She went to see him the other day and he told her that he loved her, which gives me hope, but also breaks my heart. One of these days, he won't recognize the woman he has been married to for more than 50 years.

My dad is attending a meeting tomorrow with his brothers and sisters at the nursing home to discuss what's going on, be updated on information, make sure everyone is okay with the plans, etc. My mother and I will go see him a little while later. I'm really nervous to be honest. I already know that he will not know who I am, and I feel terrible for my dad too as his own dad will probably not recognize him. My dad isn't really one to let his feelings show, but I know he has to be hurting at lieas But, I'm glad I will be able to see him, nonetheless.

I may or may not blog again until after Thanksgiving break, so I thought I would fill you all in with what's happening in my life right now. If not, I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving and gain lots of weight, because I know I will! :)

As some of you may or may not know, I've been taking piano lessons for the past five years, and overall, it's been something that I have really enjoyed. Lately though, I've been growing more and more apathetic about it. So, I'm considering quitting, but it's a hard decision for me to make.

On one side, in a year and a half I'm going to be heading off to college and I'm going to have to quit taking lessons either way, so maybe I should just stick it out for the next year and a half and try to learn as much as I can in that amount of time.

On the other hand, I don't want to continue doing something that I don't enjoy, waste my parents' money on lessons, and waste my time as well as my piano teacher's time. If I really don't want to continue, then I probably won't practice, and I definitely won't improve. So what's the point?

Also, I feel that by quitting taking lessons, I'm disappointing my mom. When she grew up, she didn't have the opportunity to learn how to play an instrument, or really to do much with any hobby or interest she had. I feel like she wants me to keep going because she didn't have the chance to. And I feel like I've just wasted all of her money for taking lessons, and then quitting.

I've considered a reason that I may want to quit is because I stopped taking lessons during tennis season, as I didn't have time for both, and now I'm just struggling to get back in the swing of it. Maybe I need time.

I talked to my mom about it, told her how I felt. She then talked to my piano teacher and said that most students that quit regret it. So we all came to the temporary solution that I will continue taking lessons until after Christmas season is over, and then we would decide if I really wanted to quit or not.

No one likes a quitter anyways.