SO MUCH TO DO SATURDAY

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

My list is made up. There is 11 hours of stuff on it.

Obviously, I'll be shifting some of it over to tomorrow. If dh gets stronger, I might put him to work but nothing he can do is easy, so I probably will leave him out of the equation.

Off to do the first item on the list - finish decorating. I'm allowing 1 hours for this.

[Emptynester]

Yesterday afternoon, DH surprised me by asking if I wanted to go to dinner and a movie. A MOVIE??? We haven't been in over 10 years. So I said yes.

Dinner was great! Lots of friends in the cafe - pretty good food. Movie was a bust - Lincoln wasn't showing. Web site still says it is. But it was The Hobbit. Since that isn't his bag - we went grocery shopping instead. Sill have to get a few things on sale at the other store.

Came home and went to bed. So much for my great evening out. But he tried.

Edited to add: I mailed 3 boxes on Thursday. 1 has been delivered to MI this morning. The other two haven't even gotten to Phoenix yet. What's up with that???

[Nancy]

EN What did you see did you like it?
K in C What is a clementine?

Home work help / teachers here can you put up a link or two in the home work help thread it does not have to be this year. Dgson will be coming here after school from now on. I'm blushingly bad at 4th grade math help; so did what we could and delegated the rest to others who were / are better at it like cousins older bro. and sil!
Dgson had a packet of math he was supposed to turn in yesterday it was not done so he did not turn it in so he'll be working on that over the break the good news is that it's better than getting a zero he had a sub. yesterday and she did not ask for it to be turned in so that might be the silver lining in this situation!

I'm thinking of outside stuff to do like yd. work; H. has some time off so a few things that could use his attn. h. said he would
put up nail or what ever to hang heat lamp in coop but wanted to wait until today. I am concerned about straw and fire so will be moving that out of the way before we plug it in. Don't need it yet but if we get a cold snap I'd like to be ready! Prune apple tree dead branch needs to be cut out.
Move bricks / decide where first not today I guess.
Move old burn wood needs to be delt with. Unload wheel burrows / so I can use 'em they are full of fire wood.
Go to dump at some point between now and spring.

Smoke turkey breast h. will do that. I have stuff thawing for tonight's fam. holiday party.

I did not get to the store to get stuff to make dip that may not happen today sigh oh well there is always new year's. I've felt puny so cutting back on activity when I can.

[lucylee]

Harriet -- thanks for the tip on the haircolor. I checked that site immediately! Unfortunately... they were out of my color, too. Had it listed, but when I clicked on it -- "not in stock."

DH awoke in the night to find that our heat is out. He is watching the man take apart the heat unit at the moment.
We are supposed to be on our way to Nashville at the moment, as well.
We are both kinda exhausted and dh does NOT handle stress like this well. But I'm hoping once we get on the road, and maybe he can take a little nap while I drive... maybe then he'll lighten up and enjoy the day.

Helia -- I love the gag gift/poem tradition! That is just so neat!

My head is convinced I'm on vacation. Apparently it has decided to ignore the schedule and the necessary things (like having clean clothes ) and just do what I want.

IKWYM, OKay!!! My goodness, there is so much stuff that needs to be done around here.

MT -- I VERY highly recommend Lincoln.
Jack Reacher, which we saw last night, and I slept through a lot of -- not so much. DH liked it... and it IS an interesting story, but very violent and a little too long and drawn out.

[helia]

Oh, I hope you're not getting sick too, Kathryn.

We usually have a small crate/box of clementines (small orange, like a mandarin orange) sitting on the kitchen counter. We got through a crate or 2/week.

Yeah, as much as I enjoy Tolkien, I wouldn't recommend The Hobbit to others unless they love his books or like fantasy movies. I'm in the former category. I do want to see Lincoln, later this break, hopefully.

OK, I had to sit in my bedroom while dh, ds, and dd17 figured out my surprise.

Yes, lucylee, the gag gift and poem are a lot of fun! They're as hilarious as we can make them. They are a lot of work too. . .

I am s2sed, am having some lunch, and have done most of the a.m. routine, including updating laundry for ds who is now doing his own laundry. I still need to unload the dw and tidy the kitchen.

Next:
-dh wants to get dd14's surprise made before she returns from synch. swim. I'll need to leave in 40 minutes to do that.
-finish groc. list and get that done. When I took dd14 to synchro, I noticed traffic was already looking awful.
-Walgreens, notebook for ds

[Ivy]

Good Morning, Villagers!

I just wanted to "pop in" to say good morning. I'm a bit "groggy" still- even after coffee! Guess it will take a shower before I'm totally awake. We were up until about 1 a.m. We were making the bed fresh with clean sheets about 12:30 a.m., too. We're just all messed up with our sleep, are sleepy, and have so much to get done, too. So the lead-in "So Much To Do Saturday" was really a great one!

I crocheted a size 0 - 3 months yellow pinafore dress last night. It was very time-consuming, but it's so adorable. I'm making variegated ballet slippers with a white flower on each one now and then variegated tube socks to match it. I might make a yellow diaper cover, yellow sweater and yellow bonnet, too. I made a yellow candy corn hat, but it's more sporty and would clash with the girly-girl look of the pinafore. It's fun to crochet for a baby girl.

It's cloudy and dry here. Christmas Eve will be a dry day for our family traveling down here. It takes 2 1/2 - 3 hours one way for them to get here. Christmas may have snow mixed with rain.

I'm so tired. I'm trying to decide if we should baby-step cleaning today AND tomorrow, or rest today and clean tomorrow or what. They come Christmas Eve about 11:30 a.m. I'll think it over later when I wake up. I need to get myself back onto a decent sleep-wake schedule on New Year's Day. The holidays have gotten me all mixed up.

Everybody have a great weekend! I hope you get all you need to do, done! It's nice we have a weekend!
Take care! TTFN!

[Dove]

I'm procrastinating on all I need to get done today. Dh & I are having tea & coffee together in the office we share, both of us on our laptops. I'm too content & cozy to look for my motivation

Poor Ken -- I hope he feels better soon, Kathryn.

Helia, there is always hagelslag in my pantry & Leyden kaas in my fridge .

After reading Twins & Lucylee's positive reviews of the movie Lincoln dh & I saw it this week. I had to close my eyes during the short civil war scene but the movie was really well done. My hat is off to director Spielberg & Daniel Day Lewis who portrayed Lincoln. It was a little slow here & there but I'm a history buff & enjoyed it.

(Skippable -- last month when we saw the movie Flight, there was a trailer for a gangster movie that showed a group of men shooting at movie patrons from behind the screen. This was the first movie we had been to since the Aurora shootings & I was so that out of a two hour movie THIS was one of the clips they chose to show! It was played again when we saw Lincoln, but also noticed this time that EVERY movie preview showed lots of shooting & violence. No wonder kids are growing up so desensitized. And don't even get me started on violent video games...)

Tea time is over. I've got lots of mini jobs to take care before lunch. Waving ~~~~~ to everyone!

[BookSaver]

Happy Saturday, villagers ~
Enjoyable cuop and reading everyone's family activities.

I did almost all of the shoveling yesterday afternoon. (Paying for it today. Hello, ibuprofin.) By the time I got to the end of the driveway, though, I had to give up. The street plows left large, heavy icebergs that need to be chopped up, and I was afraid that would break the scoop I was using. Also, someone in a big truck had evidently used our driveway for a turnaround, and that left packed-down ridges. Since I didn't really need to go anywhere, I decided to let it go until today.

This morning I saw that DH's car was free and clear, so I used his to go to the post office. DH's and DMIL's gifts were there, hooray! I ordered a spiral bound "perpetual calendar" for DMIL which has 365 knitting stitches, because she likes to knit dishcloths in different patterns. She insisted to everyone at Thanksgiving that she did not want anyone to buy her a gift, but hopefully she won't get mad at us for this which is more of a stocking stuffer.

I found a book for DH which he said he really wanted to read.

DMIL's pizza party has been moved to tomorrow afternoon. We'll take her gift up with us just in case we find out she's unavailable on Christmas day.

Things left to do before Christmas:
1) finish making DMom's gift (because she also said she didn't want anyone to buy her a gift, so I'm not buying it I'm making it!)
2) grocery shopping for milk and fresh produce
3) make a batch of fudge tonight for DMIL's party
4) wrap all gifts
5) make another batch of fudge tomorrow night to take to DSis's on Christmas Eve -- we have a standing joke that she won't let me inside her house on Christmas Eve if I'm not carrying fudge
6) pack tote bag for Christmas Eve
7) test batch of potpourri for simmering in a pan or crockpot
8) if the test works (in other words, smells good and doesn't make a huge mess!) make several packets for fill-in Christmas gifts, and New Year's gifts for friends that I haven't been able to catch before Christmas

That's actually not too bad of a list, as long as I'm not forgetting something major. I think the thing that has helped the most in holiday preparations this year was signing up for CEO's countdown Emails. Although I didn't really do any of her suggested tasks, just the fact of getting a daily reminder kept me better focused on our own plans.

The blizzard this week totally messed up last-minute shopping plans. Since driving is still yucky, unless DH wants to go to The Big City with me today, I will shop here in Tiny Town and figure out substitutions for what they don't sell here.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Things are going more slowly than expected. The decorating is done. The boxes, etc. are put away (except for the box with the Christmas cards.)

The lower main floor is vacuumed and ready for me to mop the floor, but I was going to stop for lunch, realized that no-one had agreed to turn on the heat so raced over to the church to do that (and shovel a path to the door) and then came home and reheated my lunch a second time since the microwave was running as I barreled out the door.

Since lunch I've done the weekly kitchen chores and got our blank Christmas cards sorted and put away. That cleared off half the dining table which I promptly covered with the contents of the kitchen table. The phone rang so my desk area got a deeper clean while on the phone and now I'm ready to put the chairs up and sweep and mop this floor.

Not sure, but I can't see myself getting out to the store as I'm tired and need to nap and stores where I'm heading close at 6, even at this time of year. The only thing I really need is shredded wheat to use as 'straw' for a craft tomorrow. I'm drawing a blank anything else to use. Unlike OKay, I don't have easy access to straw.

The phone call was my senior friend. She's back in her own home now. And then ds, who wanted to know the name of my childhood dog (it the security question on his cellphone account and he was drawing a blank.) He's at work for his first 8 hour shift and is already tired (45 minutes into the shift.) He has another evening shift tomorrow and then starts the overnights on the 24th. The hospital has shifted him around and putting him on bedboard for at least half of each shift since that is a sitting job and usually quite quiet.

The upper main floor just needs the kitchen swept, and I'll do that with the electric broom so I've put away the vacuum. The electric broom will be good enough for the basement as well.

Dh was up but is on his way back to bed. I asked his opinion on some lights and that was more than he physically could manage (standing and looking.) So he's

[Harmony]

Working away here.
Hope Ken feels better, Kathryn, and you don't catch whatever he got.

It sounds like we're all running 100 miles an hour trying to get everything done.

I've been to pick up some church stuff, took all the quilt pictures this morning, chatted with the guys who came to pick up equipment they're using for our church program;

And I went to Tar get, Sports Aut ority, a supermarket for something I can't get anywhere else, though it has moved and wasn't there any more; I got fast food lunch out; I went to w-m and got a load of groceries for my cooking/baking today.

Kitchen's all cleaned up; sauce is on & noodles cooking for the lasagna I'm making to take up; all the gifts are piled on the table for wrapping.

Cooking next
Baking next
Wrapping next
packing next.

In whatever order I can accomplish this. I can't ask DH to help much with anything. His back is giving him fits, it's really hurting. I'm wondering how he'll do with the long trip and sleeping in odd beds. Crossing fingers all will be well.