Hello, December

It's December and I have that deer in the headlights feeling. Nothing is ready! Nothing is done! How will I ever get everything holiday-related done in time?!

Some years I don't feel like this, but this year I do. Maybe because I was so uncomfortable during Thanksgiving (all that seems to be over, thank goodness, my intestines are fully recovered), but I feel like I got sort of behind.

Calm down, it's OK. You have three full weeks. Let's look at the tasks we need to accomplish and how we're doing with them.

Cards, calendars, etc. I've got the cards all addressed & stamped, and Rocket Boy signed them while he was here. We've been negotiating the "letter," but we finalized it last night and I made the copies at FedEx Office today. Now comes the fun part: writing the cards. Maybe I can do 10 a day? We're planning to send out 53 this year. Rocket Boy took the German cards back to St. Louis with him to work on, so that leaves me with -- 50. Hmm.

I still have to make our family calendar (with family photos) online, was hoping to get that done by the 14th. Haven't started yet. We'll see. I do have an Advent calendar!

Decorations. I thought I might take the tree out of its box sometime this week and we might decorate it next weekend. We have a wreath, bought through a band fundraiser. I managed to hang it on the porch and I think it looks very nice.

I thought I'd set up my dollhouse in the living room with some Christmas stuff, but I have to work on that. I've made a space for it, but the dollhouse is very dusty and needs a lot of attention.

I also need to bring out the Advent wreath and candles, since this is the first Sunday of Advent, and Hanukkah starts on Thursday, so I should get that set up -- I do have the candles for both already.

Entertainment. Teen B and I went to the harp concert at the library yesterday (it was lovely), but we skipped the Parade of Lights. It was so cold. I felt terribly guilty about not going, though. Maybe next year. If Rocket Boy had been here, he would have gone. I don't know if I have any other "entertainment" ahead, other than my book group coming and watching movies at home. We can think about that later, it's not something to worry about. I probably won't try to go to any church services this year (does that belong in the "entertainment" section?), but I'll see. 

I wouldn't mind going to another Christmas concert. I wish there were still a handbell concert in the area, but that seems to be gone for good. Let's see, just looked it up -- there's one in Denver and one in Loveland/Greeley. Yeah, probably not this year.

Food. I'm not going to start baking yet except maybe one batch of cookies for the kids. I was going to make something for my book group this week, but now I think they're not coming until next week or the week after.  I think I'll start my real baking the week of the 11th (and only 6 batches, not 12). I want to try a new recipe or two this year. I was interested in one of the recipes from the NYTimes cookie week: Gingerbread Blondies. They sound yummy and easy. Other than that, no real food stress. We have Christmas candy in the house, which is cheering.

Mostly I just have to remember to cook dinner! Last week I made a lot of weird dishes using the last of the Thanksgiving leftovers. On Monday we had mashed-potato pancakes, which weren't bad. On Tuesday we had a sort of shepherd's pie with the sweet potatoes on top -- very, very weird. Most of it went in the compost. On Wednesday we had Beyond Meat meatballs in a sauce made with 1 cup of leftover cranberry sauce mixed with chili sauce, over spaghetti -- the twins requested that I write on the recipe "Never make this again," but I actually liked it and ate the leftovers for lunch. On Thursday we had cheese & mushroom enchiladas with sauce made from the leftover gravy plus spices -- and the mushrooms came from the gravy too. I sieved them out of it, washed them off, chopped them up, and mixed them with grated cheese. It wasn't bad. But I think for the next few weeks I have to think of normal meals, not weird things.

Presents, shopping. I've started shopping, online and in stores, though I should really have done the online shopping sooner. I was disappointed to see that the shirt I wanted to get Rocket Boy from Lands' End is backordered until the middle of January. It's OK, he has lots of shirts. I'll think of something else. I plan to go out to stores on Thursday and Friday for the next two weeks -- after that I'm out of luck, because the twins will be around that last week -- they have finals, but they should be done by Thursday afternoon, the 21st.

I'm also working on a genealogy project that is clearly not going to get done by the 25th -- I'll have to finish it after the Christmas rush. Note to self: do not start big projects in late November!

Giving. Colorado Gives Day is Tuesday and I'll probably donate about $500. I paid down my credit card this week so I'm ready to do some charging. I usually do the Humane Societies (Boulder, Longmont, and Park County), Hillside School, the Lung Association, and then I pick and choose. Oh, and an organization called Mission St. Louis -- that's not for Colorado Gives, of course, but I give to it at the same time. I think I may owe the school money, too, or maybe the music department. OK, I'll work on this.

Travel. I don't know when Rocket Boy is coming and I don't think he does either. It's OK. If he drives, he could leave on the 23rd and still get here by Christmas Eve. Not going to worry about this.

Reading. I already feel behind on my reading this month, because I am reading the incomprehensible book group book (The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes) which I forgot to even think about getting until a few days ago. Basically, I turned the calendar to December and thought, oh yes, the book group is coming here on the 6th -- and then, oh, right, the book. What was it, again? Fortunately there was a copy available at the Longmont library, so I ordered it and it arrived Friday and I started reading. I'm already on page 140 out of 307. It will be OK, especially now that the book group is going to come the week after, probably. But I want to start doing my planned December reading, plus Christmas books, so I must get this one out of the way fast. I can't remember who chose it, but I know I agreed to it. It's OK, I'll finish it.

Homework. Not my homework, but the kids'. They both have big projects to do for Language Arts, which we started working on today. And with finals coming up the week of Dec. 18th, there will be all sorts of things to do. I have to remember to leave time/space/energy for the kids.

Writing. Of course, because I have all these other things to do, I'm in the mood to write. After reading the John Gardner book on becoming a novelist, I was inspired to pull out the novel I wrote 10+ years ago to see if it could be salvaged. I don't think it can be, but I still want to try out some ideas for fixing it. I'm also working on my next middle-grade mystery, and I have other projects too. It's actually not a surprise that I would want to do this now, right when I have no time. Having no time always seems to make me want to write, or work on some other project that there is no time for. I must find a way to give in to the impulse, because writing is my life, but not let it take over everything. Friday afternoon I was writing, and I just kept on going, not even stopping to make dinner (we were just having leftovers) until 8:30 or so. The kids were unhappy with me and I thought -- yeah. They have to come first. Writing is wonderful, but I'm a mom, and they need me. Must seek balance.

Yardwork. Ack! This should be nothing at all (can't rake leaves when they're covered with snow), except that last night we had some unexpected high winds and our mostly dead aspen in the side yard blew over (mysteriously, it blew west, even though the winds were from the west), taking part of the lilac bush with it. I'm so sad! No more birds raising families right outside my window.

Now I have to carve it up, at least cut the branches off. Maybe I'll have to ask for/hire help. I tried to get the twins to help me today and they wouldn't. I'll see what I can do tomorrow (it's supposed to be warmer, which would be nice).

Cleaning. I can't lie -- I've been neglecting the house the last few weeks. When Rocket Boy was here, he mopped the floors, which is not my favorite task, and he cleaned the bathroom ceiling/tops of the walls, where a whole lot of tiny little flies had inexplicably attached themselves and died, toward the end of summer. It was the oddest thing. Anyway, he got all that cleaned up, and now the bathroom ceiling and tops of walls look really nice. The rest of the bathroom, though, hmm. Also, he fixed my vacuum cleaner, but I haven't used it yet! So I need to do that, tomorrow or Tuesday.

Self care. My favorite (not). But this month it's important. I've been doing well on getting enough sleep -- by 11:30 pm I'm wiped out, so I turn off the light, and then soon it's 7 am and I'm waking up without my alarm. Seven and a half hours seems to be about right for me. I haven't been walking, though -- I think it's 10 days -- or more -- since my last good walk. At McGuckin's this week I bought YakTrax, those things you put on your shoes to make it safer to walk on ice. I haven't taken them out of the box yet. Maybe tomorrow (it's too late today). Also, I've adjusted to the digestive enzymes and I've been taking them with every dinner, sometimes lunch too.

And finally, I should get my Covid booster and maybe RSV too, though I read somewhere that RSV is peaking. I got my flu shot a couple of weeks ago, no reason to delay the others. If I get sick, which I probably will, because I almost always catch something in December, it'll slow me down, but that's OK. We do what we can, no more.

It's going to be OK. 

Oh! One more thing -- we celebrated Baby Kitty's 4th birthday this week. What a good cat. And he ate his whole cupcake. I wasn't paying attention, was trying to get Sillers to eat some of hers -- she kept leaving because she didn't want to eat next to Baby Kitty. Finally I rotated her so that she couldn't see him while she was eating, and she ate a little bit. But while all that was going on, he ate his entire cupcake, all but a little bit of frosting. I watched for signs of problems, but the only thing that happened was an episode of diarrhea, just one, and mostly contained in the box, and that was it. Still, I'm not sure I'll give him another one next year.