On New Year’s Day, my son’s tradition is to have a Lord of the Rings marathon. I love the movies, so this year I decided to join him. All of them take about 14 hours, so they have to start pretty early. When I arrived in the morning, my son and his wife had made an impressive, delicious breakfast. We filled our plates with Dutch baby pancake, bacon, sausage, and blistered cherry tomatoes, then headed to the couches and started The Fellowship of the Ring. I stayed for about half the day, making it through 1 1/2 movies. Then I went home, watched another movie and just relaxed. It felt nice to unwind after the busyness of the holidays. The church tradition for today is to honor Mary and tell the Nativity story again, including when Mary and Joseph had their baby circumcised according to their tradition of it being the 8th day after birth. They also gave him his name of Jesus as instructed by the angel. One of the scriptures for today is from the book of Numbers and is one of my favorites. It seems particularly valid as we start a new year:

The LORD bless you and keep you!  
The LORD let his face shine upon      
you, and be gracious to you!  
The LORD look upon you kindly and give you peace!

I Found God today in a relaxing day and prayer for peace.