Thursday, December 18, 2008

Busy, Busy




I realized last night that I haven't blogged in a while. I'm sure everyone understands that at this time of year! It seems that every day is speeding by, even though we have been staying home a fair amount. I foolishly left all my holiday shopping till after we got home from Boston this year, and with Rachel's birthday on the 8th I didn't have time to really even begin till after that! I began my shopping online, which made me feel better because I was able to spend a few hours and get a good chunk of shopping completed. Then we had Rachel's birthday party, which was a sleepover, so there was shopping, cleaning, baking and cooking to do for that, and in the aftermath there was rest!

I began shopping again this week, this time in person because I didn't trust ordering things anymore and didn't want to pay extra shipping fees. Matt and I went out together on Sunday evening, leaving Rachel in charge at "night" for the very first time (it was from 5-7:30 pm, so it was dark but not late!) That went very well; the kids had a good time and Rachel didn't worry about us dying en route to Target. Matt and I were able to shop in peace and we had fun being together. I spent some time wrapping gifts, too, so finally we have boxes under the tree. I went out alone last night to three stores, and got another group of gifts taken care of. One of those stores was Linens N Things, and I have to say that was a creepy experience! The chain is going out of business, so I went in hoping to scoop some good bargains....but unfortunately, everyone else has been there before now, because the store had maybe 4% of its inventory left--it was a barren wasteland and they are even trying to sell the shelving units they used to have their stock on! What they had left was mostly useless, damaged or too ugly to be believed, so I left empty-handed.

On Tuesday night Matt and I had the sublime treat of going out to dinner with our friends Dan and Trisha. Just the adults! Their daughter Chloe helped Rachel wrangle the younger kids for the evening, and we went to Tweed's, which is just a mile away on East Main Street, so we would have been home in 5 minutes had anything gone wrong. That went very well, too--I am proud of Rachel for overcoming her fears of babysitting at night. It's nice to know that we can go somewhere close by for a while and she's all right with the responsibility. We had a fantastic dinner, great conversation, and lingered over after dinner coffees. While I enjoy eating out with my children, it is very nice to be with adults and talk uninterrupted about anything that comes to mind without concern! Trisha and I spoke the next day and we want to make this a monthly event....sounds great to me!

Tomorrow will be a wonderful day. We are going to Trisha's to make gingerbread houses with friends, and then Matt and I will go out to one of our favorite restaurants for dinner to celebrate our anniversary. Sixteen years tomorrow--I can't believe it! Seems like a week ago we went to the city to spend a weekend for our fifteenth, and here we are with another year gone by. Rachel's babysitting skills are getting a workout this week! We will enjoy Greek food at Athens on East Main Street, which will be especially nice because we won't have to explain the menu to the kids, figure out what they will possibly eat, or listen to any remarks about the poor lambs that died to make this meal....we are planning to talk about only romantic, loving things and generally act like sixteen year olds in love instead of kind of middle aged parents for a change.

Over the weekend I plan to hopefully finish the shopping, do the rest of the wrapping, and bake up a storm. We usually make gift boxes for neighbors and many folks at Matt's office, but because the season has escaped me this year we are going to bake several dozen cookies and maybe some sugared nuts, candy and quick breads or cakes and send that in to the office with Matt so that people can have some treats and know we care....I feel sort of guilty but I'm letting it go! The neighbors I still want to make sure I give to because they are nice people, and several are elderly with not much family so I think it means a lot to have a treat sent over.

Then next week we will go to Mom and Dad's on Christmas Eve and spend the long weekend with them, ending in the big family Christmas at Susan's on Sunday. I am looking forward to that--when all the work is done and it's just time to enjoy ourselves....and the week after that we will have fun, plain and simple. Still vacation time, no more pressure. Matt may take some of that week off and we are looking to do some fun things--I am hoping to go ice skating in Greenport too.

I am wishing you all a healthy, peaceful and joyous holiday season as we close out this year, which has been wonderful and terrible and interesting at the very least. Enjoy your friends and families, enjoy the giving of gifts, enjoy the wonderful food and drinks, and try not to stress out too much! xoxo

--Jen

1 comment:

Anonymous Mommy Blogger said...

Happy Anniversary!!
Merry Christmas!!
Happy & Healthy New Year!!
Enjoy and I will see you guys in a few weeks!!
:-)