That Blur Was the Holidays

(I'm writing this on a new laptop and the keyboard feels very different in terms of placement--it has an extended keypad--and how much pressure to use when you strike keys. There will be more typos than usual. Just a warning.)

First, a few pictures of our December:


The morning we went to get our tree, we made this gingerbread man. I don't know what we did wrong, but he was seriously dry and required dunking/drowning in hot chocolate to be edible.


Eamonn experiencing some technical difficulties with his snowshoes.


Out on the hunt for the tree. We came across this fallen tree. These are its roots.


We're messing around, taking pictures on my phone and waiting for Eamonn who has used a fallen tree to actually cross water to get to The Perfect Tree that we could see way off yonder. We can see him cutting it down in the distance and now we're waiting for him to come back and ford the stream again, this time with our tree.


Eamonn trying to get back across the water WITH the tree. He made it! There was a bit of excitement when his foot went through the ice at one point, but he didn't need 10 toes anyway. Most people can get by without a few, right?


Snowshoeing back to the car. I wonder if snowshoeing is actually a word?


Enjoying hot chocolate and stale gingerbread after the tree hunt



Cookies for Santa


The holidays are nearly over. Is this what happens? Life just speeds up to a pace where I can no longer keep track of time? Truly, I thought I'd blogged last week so I was a little shocked when I came over here and saw Dec. 13. Heck, the kids weren't even out of school yet at that point and now they go back next week!

The holidays were busy and fun, for the most part. The fun parts were baking cookies with the boys and then my mom and Tara once they got here; watching lots of Christmas movies; listening to Christmas music until I drove everyone crazy; seeing the lights and decorations around town; taking a day before the boys were out of school to wrap everything (although our printer died and that didn't go exactly as planned); dealing with the post office--oh wait, that's goes on the UnFun List.

The UnFun was definitely dealing with our post office. Those of you on Facebook know of my loathing for our post office. And really, many people have the same issue, but I feel like it's magnified here because we don't have any home mail delivery at all. And even if you order something and the vendor says it's coming UPS or FedEx, it may STILL end up held hostage at the post office. But I'll stop talking about that because it puts me in a very UnHoliday mood.

The end.

Other unfun stuff--I weighed myself this morning. EEEEEEEEEK! Were you aware that if you don't exercise and eat too many Christmas cookies it's bad news? I was lying in bed this morning playing a little game of "How Bad Do I Think It Will Really Be?" I hadn't weighed myself in weeks. I was in denial. So I made up a number in my head. I shot high because I figured if it was lower, I'd be so happy.

It wasn't.

Yikes.

I'm trying to keep it in perspective. I'm where I was when I finished the weight loss challenge last spring, which is 10 pounds below where I was at this time last year. But still, I had lost more and have jumped up from that. Sigh. It was all in the name of Christmas cookies. Very delicious, yummy Christmas cookies.

I'll be chronicling my attempts to get back in gear on my other blog and also doing a challenge over there, I think starting in two weeks or so if anyone is interested.

So now we're in that post Christmas phase. Some presents have been put away, some are still on the floor. It's a bit here, there and everywhere. I'm trying to decide how motivated I am to take the decorations down this weekend. I usually like to bask in their glow for a bit longer and then take them down a week after New Year's so I'm good and sick of them and not sad to see them go.

Really, what needs to go at this point is the Christmas cookies. I'm going to see if I can go a whole day without eating any.

It's 9:52am. I'll let you know how it goes.

But at this point, as much as I hate to admit it, it's probably time for the boys to go back to school. The squabbling, which probably really isn't that bad, is bugging me. While the weather is lovely and they could get outside to play (if we drag them kicking and screaming), we don't have enough snow to sled or to make the skiing enjoyable. The town's outdoor rink probably suffered mightily in the warm sun yesterday. This happened last year--no snow--and it was such a bummer. We had about 4 inches of snow a few days before Christmas, so that was nice, but nothing else and nothing on the horizon.

So it's probably best for all concerned that school resume. You know, so we don't kill each other. That would be a terrible way to end the holidays, now wouldn't it?