Sparks or Sparkling Sunday

[blessedw2]

My part of the Christmas tree is done. I have some ornaments for dd older to put on top of the tree as I am trying to keep my ankles and legs safe.

My mother wanted to get on top of her dining room table yesterday to replace some lights - she could do it easily - she is extremely flexible but I would her rather not do it. I told my brother and he will take care of it on Tuesday . I have to admit I wouldn't be surprised if she did it when I wasn't there.
I decided not to get her bulbs for this chandelier bc I knew she would take care of it.

mom joyfully called me to tell me she was going to stay in bed just to enjoy the moment. She said she was nice and cozy. The joy in her is wonderful to see. She wants to let me know she is ok.

dd older is taking her breakfast and make sure she eats and takes her meds. - she wants mom to come with her for holiday shopping for work gifts bc mom has not gotten out of the house for 3 days which is not good.

listening to muppet christmas
now time for lunch and meds.

-next put ornament boxes etc. into 3 season room. in the family room now - and the kitchen
rest of lights for fireplaces stairs etc. are now up.
-ordered last of dd younger presents -

mom called and said she didn't have food in her fridge and she was hungry - dd older was on her way with brunch and meds. -I have to put food in the fridge even if I end up tossing it.

Now listening to the Best Christmas pageant ever https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icZwm6Aact8 I watch this every year!

what needs doing
vacuum the front room
clean the window in the dining room and hang hangers for lights.

[CathyS]

Today has just been books and "odd" laundry. Like a white towel that the youngest cat sleeps on sometimes. It has gotten dirty from her little paws, so that got washed. I have a new vinyl shower curtain. I washed it to try to get the "new" smell out of it. I put it in the dryer on low with the towel. It has now been hung up. Towel is taking forever to dry because it's one of those massive, thick towels. Dh bought it for me when we moved in together. Very romantic, just like the new sheets he bought with a purple flower design. Also very romantic. This towel is lovely, but it takes 2 hours to dry, which is why it wasn't being used until this cat decided she liked it. I'm going to stick it under a much darker towel once it is dry, so the cat doesn't get it dirty again.

I'm getting tired from walking all over the house to bring books in and out of here because I had a massive pile of Catherine Cookson books which weren't in order by publishing date.

[Nancy]

CI - got the works inked over that I had in the journal prompts to write on later.
I got the pencil words erased.
Dd called we had a good talk.
Had lunch luve having meals I made ahead!
another of my genius ideas! Stuffing.
Saw two doves on the deck.
-----
Walked in the rain with the umbrella saw a rainbow. I tried to go home earlier but ddoggo was not having it she wanted to finish! LOL!
We had fun!
I did more goals journal prompts.
watching listening to the game in the other room.

[lucylee]

Whew! I think I just ran out of spoons.
After a VERY short night -- more on that later -- we went to church, where dgrands sang in the children's choir, a preview of Wednesday night's Christmas program. DGS also sang a solo -- "Away in a Manger" -- but almost didn't get through it because his stomach was hurting again and he was nauseous. Sigh. He was the same way Saturday night during his ballgame. Threw up twice. I don't know what they are going to do about this. He has no fever, no real other symptoms. Can't help but wonder if all this chewing up everything he gets his hands on for all his life has led to this. I told him -- and I was only partly joking -- someday he is going to end up in surgery, and he will be like the Labrador that had eaten 17 pairs of socks.

Anyway -- he did make it through piano lessons after taking some Tums during church.

After church, I did all the "stuff" -- lunch, clean up kitchen, buy/put away groceries, allergy shots... and then finally sent one kid to one bedroom and the other to the other. Too much carrying on while they were playing with the Nativity scene. What started as fun ended in screaming and arguing and I just could not take it any more.

I have been meaning to wish you a Happy Hanukkah, Twins, and I wanted to send (((HUGS))) to LadyM's ds and the gf and I do hope she recovers well.
Always thinking of Harmony.

And NOW... why was my night so short? I am sooo embarrassed, y'all, but I might as well tell you.
Last night, I saw an ad on FB for an "infinity" game table... on sale for $39.99. (If anyone here is as ignorant as me, this is an electronic game table with 50 games pre-loaded -- Monopoly, Scrabble, Battleship, etc. No more pieces to lose, no storage issues, no arguing over scoring.
Y'all, I had never seen one of these before, had no idea what they were supposed to cost, I just thought, "Oh my goodness, this would be PERFECT for dmom to give the dgrands for Christmas... " and yep... I ordered it.
W..e..l..l..
I paused a minute when I saw they didn't take P*yp*l... but not a long enough minute... and pretty soon, I've put my credit card info into their order form.
THEN... ONLY THEN... I started to look at Ariver, etc, to see what these things cost elsewhere. (Maybe a Wmart ad for one popped up, I don't remember.)
Y'ALL -- THESE THINGS COST RIGHT AT $999 AT SOME PLACES, AND THE LOWEST PRICE I SAW WAS $499!!!!!!!
So I'm like

Then, I was just frantic... must talk to credit card company... must stop payment... oh my goodness I do not want to change cards again.
There are a couple dozen places I have to re-do card if this happens, dh medicine renewals, ticket things, on and on...
Last time it happened, through no fault of our own, it seemed like it took two or three days. Lots of phone calls, lots of websites.

At any rate, 24-hour help was NOT helpful for a LONG while... but I FINALLY got a live person to talk to me at 2:00 a.m.
He said, there was no way they could do anything as long as it was a "pending" charge, (which it currently still is) and although he could not FORCE me to change cards, he would advise it. As soon as the charge goes through, he will help us try to get the money back, because yes, he agreed, it is obvious these people are doing something underhanded. They may just want my $39.99 and we will never have any additional problems.
DH and I decided we will watch statement CLOSELY and let this ride for a bit. At the first fraudulent, unrecognizable charge, we will start the process of getting new cards.

The credit card company said this is not "fraud" because we KNOW how they got our number. Fraud is when a charge pops up out of the blue and you don't know how on earth your number got out there.
That might happen in this case, but it might not.

Right now, dh is too stressed about his doctor's appointment Tuesday to have any spoons left for this.
I just feel awful because it was ALL my fault. So stupid. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. But I had no idea this thing was THIS much too good to be true. I thought maybe it should be $100 and it was 60% off or something.
Lesson learned.

[blessedw2]

howdy! howdy!

hello d Lucy! how nice to see grands singing at church! wonderful!!!
(((sweet grandson on stomach hurts and getting sick))))
my goodness - it's not embarrassing as much as frustrating!!! praying you can fix it on your cc!!!! why can't some people use their bad talents for good.
this happened to my d sis in law

wonderful that you had meals set ahead d Nancy
how wonderful to see a rainbow

our christmas decorating is completely done.
dd older finished her christmas shopping.
mom is here watching walker Texas ranger
dd put the vacuum on
front room looks lovely with twinkly lights and holiday sparkle. clean and lovely
dining room looks lovely
family room is clean.
kitchen is eek!

[CathyS]

I have been putting my fiction books in order for most of the day on and off. I started to get tired before supper. Sometimes I would just go in there and sit in a chair and look at all the books, knowing I was the one who had to do the work. At one point I measured the piles of books and I needed to find 36 inches of shelf space. HA HA HA!! I really don't know how it happened, but there turned out to be 37 or 38 inches available once I measured. There are some shelves that won't get dental floss between any of the books.

On Tuesday I will start the paperwork, now that the table is clear. I might move all the paperwork tomorrow at some point. I don't know. Right now I am tired.

We had cold, leftover chicken for supper along with a can of brown beans. You know what the means. Dh is already asking "Did you hear THAT?" It might be a long night. LOL!!

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Long day and I'm heading to bed now.

Dh has overbooked me for tomorrow. It is Monday, my usual houseblessing day (which takes about 5 hours of steady-ish work.) He has us driving 40 minutes away for a visit with folks I want to see but not tomorrow. Then I have 2 meetings in the evening. I need to get to Costco and am driving by one on our way back from the visit but I'm not sure there's enough time in there to get in a quick pickup of 10 items. Onto all that, I've added dropping in on a neighbour.

Church was OK but the tension and frustration there is palpable.

I skipped out after communion and ended up crossing an item off my to-do list because someone I had to talk to was skipping out too. Then I got home and dgs2.75 was being put down for his nap so I missed seeing him.

Ds went to the grocery store, dh went to get dgs7 and Dc(14) was on the couch just playing on her phone. I took that time to pull out the items the ornament box and sort them breakable/kid-proof, on the dining table. I was also making bacon in the oven so was in and out of dining room. Dgs had been vocal but we were hoping he'd fall asleep. Suddenly he was much louder and I looked over to the living room. He was sitting on the floor beside his sister playing. He looked up at me and cheekily said "Hi!".

I texted his father who confirmed he had not got him up before leaving for the store. So now he can breakout from the crib. There was a minor poopy diaper and ds suggested putting him back down after but there was no way that was happening. Thankfully, he's good so I was able to cook up 2 lbs of bacon and get the sorting down while he played happily on his own.

Dgd4 didn't come because she wasn't feeling well and dd didn't come either so we had dgs7 on his own. He's much nicer when he's on his own.

Speaking of neurodivergent, that's certainly dgs7. Possibly dgs2.75 as well.

We had a good afternoon. The tree is decorated (dsg2.75 wasn't interested in helping at all but dgs7 was very helpful.) We saw Santa go by and dgs2.75 charmed everyone. Dgs7 stayed in the lobby with some elderly women until Santa was closer and then came outside to watch. He was happy there by himself and I'm dying to find out what he said to them. (One of them I'd say is neurodivergent.)

We played music, both the ukuleles and then dh played guitar and we sang. Dc sang to and had a lot of fun with some of the songs. She just found out that dh could play a month ago and said she didn't like to sing in public. We asked her if singing with all of us at home just for fun would be ok and she said yes. And she seemed to have fun so I'm glad we had that conversation with her.

Dinner was fine, ds and family left quickly and dh and dgs7 spent an hour going over comics that dh had saved for him over the past 3 months. Dh reads almost 100 a day and puts aside the ones he thinks dgs7 would like. He took dgs home at 7 and I got all but the hand wash of dishes done and all the toys put away.

Dh was upset that dgs won't give him a hug goodbye or say thank you for things. He was going to have a talk with dd about it. I told him that the lack of manners was OK to complain about but the hugging was not. It is no longer acceptable to require anyone to give a hug if they don't want to. Certainly this is part of dgs' neurodivergent behaviour. The thing is, he's affectionate with me a lot of the time. He has always been 'mine' close to me and I have set out to make being with me a safe place for him to be because I suspect the world will be incredibly hard for him all his life. I understand dh's feelings are hurt but dh has been away on dgs' birthday almost every year, he dislikes spending time with dgs and I'm working hard on trying to get dh to understand the little things that dgs does to show he likes him. For instance, asking all the time if there are comics to read, or bringing his tablet over to teach dh a new game he is learning.

As I said to dh, he'll never be normal but you can build a relationship anyway, it just takes creativity. Dgs7 was really wanting to play the ukulele and he can follow some instructions and press the strings down, so I'll work on getting dh to work with him over the holidays. He's happy to work with dgs2.75 but he is ignoring the fact that dgs7 also spent a lot of time with the music, it was just that it was over zoom, not in real life, so he never had a chance to strum the guitar or singalong with us in person as opposed to dgs2.75 who has been doing it for a year now.