It’s it funny how when you’re young, the year just seems to draaaaaag by, but the older you get, the faster it seems to pass?

I really need to get my hiney in gear this year with a lot of stuff.  Getting back on our Medifast diet (shakes are ordered and will get here next week).  Try to post more often here and on my other blog.  Get moving on my polymer clay play and start making beads to hopefully sell.  Maybe get back into making jewelry.

For the moment though, now that the Kiddo is napping, I need to dash off to the store and get her some more clothes, and pick up a few more card making things so I can finish making her b-day invites, while her dad hangs out playing games while she sleeps.

When I get back I’ll probably start my new Death Knight on World of Warcraft – he got my other character to level 55 last night so I can now create a DK!  Yay!!

I did quite a bit of baking this week. Cookies all day Tuesday, and a “deep dish pumpkin pie” last night while we were putting the Kiddo’s “Santa” toys together.  I discovered that I need one of those masher/cutter thing-a-ma-bob’s the next time I make one of those pies.  My crust was definitely not “crumbly”, and it still turned out ok, but I wonder how different it would have been if I’d had the right utensil.

Now I get to kick back, maybe do a little bit cleaning up of my baking mess (but not today), and enjoy the rest of the weekend.  I got a couple of seasons of “Supernatural” on DVD from my husband, which is cool because we fell behind somewhere in the first season due to show conflicts even though we had two Tivos, but I think it was on Thursdays and CSI and some other show took precedence.  So it will be nice to be able to get caught up at least to season 2.

I also go Wrath of the Lich King (World of Warcraft Online) from my husband, but I can’t use that until he gets one of my characters to level 55.  Yes, my husband is leveling one of my characters for me since it will take me FOR-E-VER to do it, and I just want a death knight. LOL  But that is why he got me the two seasons of Supernatural, since it will still be a week or two before my character is level 55.  (and I got my new desk chair from him but I already wrote about that previously).  His other present from me was a pair of slippers since his old ones were in pretty bad shape.

I got a couple of magazine subscriptions (as requested) from his mom and an OTT-Lite (a true color desk light).  He got a season of Dr. Who and Torchwood from his mom, a gift card from his brother, and we both got $50 each from his grandmother and his step-grandmother.  The Kiddo got a baby doll and some clothes from his grandmother; a kids table she can write on with dry erase markers from his step-grandmother; some clothes, pj’s and a game for a Fisher Price “cool school” thing that his mom got for the grandkids, AND some Crayola magic color markers, paints and coloring books from her; and a trunk of dress up outfits from her aunt & uncle.

The Kiddo got quite a bit from us – a cardboard house that she can color on and play in; a Melissa & Doug art easle and a set of paints, chalk, paper and paint brushes to go with it; a Fisher Price “grow and know my name” puppy; the Leapfrog Tag reading system, four books and a carrying case for them all; a HUGE My Little Pony Pinky Pie plush; a new pair of Barbie light up sneakers, and in her stocking along with the mandatory candy and such, a Cheerilee My Little Pony.  I loved My Little Pony when I was young but my parent’s couldn’t really afford them so I only had like two or three.  There around SOMEWHERE in our house, either in the closet here in my office or in the garage somewhere, but only lord knows where at this point.  Anyway, ever since they started putting them out again for kids I’ve been itching to buy some but felt a little weird getting them just for me.  Although I have been sorely tempted to get a set of the little itty bitty ones I’ve seen. LOL

So anyway.  A pretty decent haul for all of us I’d say.  I’m just glad it’s overwith.  I like the holidays and all, and I don’t tend to get super stressed about them or anything, but there is still a little bit of pressure there, particularly if I procrastinate and wait until only a couple of weeks before Christmas to actually start buying anyone anything.

How were your holidays?

Maybe after we get home from lunch tomorrow I can finally relax for more than an hour.  Eesh!  I’m really glad I had this week off, I never would have gotten even a quarter of what I had to do, done, if I had to work.

Well, off to wrap gifts.  Happy holidays!

I got a new office chair. I’ve been wanting one for a while because the chairs we had, we’ve had them for what seems like forever, probably at least since just after we moved into our house, and that was nearly ten years ago.  The backs were attached to the seat and the arm rests were attached to both the back and the seat, so the only thing that was adjustable on them was the height.  The arm rests always hit the keyboard tray or even the desk, which does not allow for proper posture when sitting.

My new one has adjustable arm rests, adjustable tilt and the back of the seat adjust up and down and can do a slight recline.  And of course the height of the chair.  I can already feel a huge difference sitting in it compared to my old chair.  So so so so happy to have a new chair!

Hubby’s gift was a pair of quite pricey headphones.   He needs a new chair too (same old chair style that I had), so we’ll look into getting him one next sometime after the new year I think.

The Kiddo’s gifts are all gonna wait until Christmas.  Sorry girly!  I don’t think she’ll notice too much.

I hate shopping in general.  Not so much when it comes to looking for craft stuff at places like Michael’s or Joann’s, since I can also just browse while I am there, but regular shopping, I really don’t like doing.  I don’t even like grocery shopping.

So online shopping is just for me, since I don’t have to drive somewhere, try one store and hope what I want is there, stand in line, drive to another store and hope what I want is there, stand in line again… Or if what I wanted to get was not at one store, find the next nearest one and try again.  Bleh.  It’s even worse if I end up needing to tow the Kiddo along with me, especially if it’s not a one-store trip.

We also still need to shop for the annual family Christmas Eve party.  Uusually we kind of do a “white elephant” type of thing, but this year the hosting family hit some money issues so we’re changing it up a bit and just buying the kids a $5 gift each so each family is only really contributing $15 each for the gifts, and then any food they’re bringing (pot luck).   Our assignment is drinks and desserts.  I’m thinking about making sugar cookies and having the Kiddo help me decorate them.  Since I have all week off next week and will be keeping her home from preschool, I think she’ll get a kick out of it.   I’ll probably make a couple other things too.  I made a pumpkin cheese cake dessert for Thanksgiving and it seemed well received so I may make that again and take it to the party.  And probably one other thing, although I am not sure just what yet.

Geeze.  Somehow even though I will have the days preceeding Christmas off it certainly doesn’t seem like I’ll be sitting around doing nothing… I’ll probably spend Monday doing the last minute gift shopping, then Tuesday (or even Wednesday too or instead, since the party isn’t until the evening) making the desserts for the party… Then Wednesday evening is the party, Thursday is Christmas… Friday will be recovery and I’m not sure what we’ll be doing Saturday and Sunday, if anything.  Maybe more recovery? LOL

At least I already got the Christmas lights up on the house on Saturday.  I used to put up the icicle lights but since it seemed like EVERYONE was doing those, I switched to a simple strand of green lights and on the porch a strand of lighted stars.  Simple, and since I bought one of those stretch poles I don’t need to use a ladder anymore, since I just use the nails I put up the first year to hold the strands that go over the garage.

Which reminds me… the next house we buy, the border over the garage is going to be straight across… no “peak” crap like now.  It was a PITA to use the stupid 10 ft ladder to put up those nails and lights the first couple of years.  And even with the stretch pole now, my neck ends up hurting.

Ooh,  a lightbulb just came on… THAT’s why my neck was hurting last night!! I totally forgot about the strain from putting up the lights with that pole and having to look straight up for 10-15 minutes straight…   Ladder… pole… I can’t decide which is worse anymore!  Probably the ladder, since I don’t like heights very much.  I’ll take a strained neck over height issues. LOL

I just can’t quite put my finger on it.  Maybe I’m just picking up on every else’s mood?  I don’t know.  All I do know is there is a little over two weeks left before Christmas and I haven’t even begun my shopping yet.  I am usually a procrastinator but even last year I had most of my shopping done by now, or at least it was ordered and was en route to my house if I bought it online, which most of my purchases were.

I think it partly may be due to that on Sunday I drove 20 miles with the item that would net us the largest amount of cash in one purchase, and waited for 20 minutes for the guy to show up and he was a no call / no show.  He hasn’t even responded to the email I sent later asking what was up.  Communication just completely ceased.  At worst maybe some unfortunate incident happened, at best I hope he was just a flake.  I haven’t heard anything from him so I offered the item to the next person who inquired, so hopefully that person will not flake out.  It really puts a damper on my mood when that happens.  The extra money was going to go toward getting some extra things for the Kiddo and maybe pad our limit for everyone else’s gifts, too.

Originally I had tried setting aside any leftover money out of my weekly lunch allotment, but I have maybe half as much as I should since I ended up spending some of it at a fall festival we went to in October, and another sum went to some new fall clothes for the Kiddo in November.  Ah well, we can make do but the extra money off craiglist sure will be nice.

Now to pull myself out of this funk and at least get SOME shopping started or risk stuff not arriving before Christmas…  

Wednesday was originally supposed to be a day for me to work from home so I could attend a special T-Day lunch at the Kiddo’s preschool, until she got sick the  night before and I ended up doing my work later that night after everyone was in bed, so that in case she was still sick Wednesday I could give my full attention to that.  Wednesday night I made a dessert to bring to Thanksgiving dinner.

Thanksgiving was at MIL’s house, but when we got home later and got the Kiddo to bed for a nap, I think we ended up vegging out in a tryptophan stupor catching up on some Tivo’d shows.

Friday I kept the Kiddo home from school so she could have a long weekend, and after some morning errands, which did include a stop at W@l-m@rt, but only to get some plastic storage bins and some lunch, the rest of my afternoon & evening was spent cleaning up around the house.

Saturday my husband went to his brother’s house with the Kiddo, while I stayed home and SIL came over to help tackle the mess that was my bedroom, clearing out clothes that neither I nor my husband wear anymore, nor will we probably ever wear again.  Can you believe I dug up stuff from high school, which was over 15 years ago?  Even better, can you believe that I once wore a size 3/4??  HA! Yeah, that is a size I’ll only ever see in my dreams.

Then Sunday, I wasn’t completely lazy, even though I wanted to be.  I probably did about four or five loads of laundry in addition to the normal two or three that we usually do.

The bright side though, is that the piles of clothes that were strewn about the bedroom are now either thrown away (if they were too holey), or packed into a storage bin for a yard sale or to be donated, or washed and folded and put into our closet!  And I can actually GET to our closet now!  The poor garage is about to burst at the seams though.  Ok that is a slight exaggeration, but it IS getting full. Some of it can eventually be thrown out in the recycling, but the recycling bin is full to the brim and the trash man doesn’t collect until Thursday for recyclables.  So that will be a slow going process since we do not have a pickup to use to take stuff to the dump.

I’m just glad to see the floor again and to be able to get into my closet.  Yay for some progress!  Other than that…the weekend was pretty exhausting.

We participated a couple years ago when the Wii was especially hard to find, and we won the opportunity to buy it, and got it for my husband’s brother as a Christmas gift.

This year they have a choice of three PS3 bundles – each with a PS3, a game and a movie, ranging in price from $199 to $229 (the $229 version actually has 2 movies, I think, both of them James Bond movies).  So whichever one wins the vote will be available to 500 people to buy (I think the purchase limit is one per winner in these deals).  The other “rounds” have other different products, round 3 has a 46″ Samsung HDTV for $699 (should it win, of course)!

Not every one will win of course, but hey it’s worth a shot if you’re eyeing one of the products as a gift to someone, or even to yourself, and that product wins the vote and you get drawn to be able to buy it if you want… so go visit Amazon to participate in the voting… You never know, you may win the chance to buy a great product at a super low price! But hurry, the first rounds end soon – as of tomorrow!

But if you own one already, or know someone who does and can’t think of anything to get them for Christmas, there is a site I found that sells loads of accessories geared toward hybrid cars of all makes – Honda, Toyota, Nissan, Ford, Dodge, Saturn, etc., etc.. It’s called Juiced Hybrid, and they even have a special right now where you can receive free shipping on purchases over $99!  Considering how some things like rubber all-weather floor mats and cargo liners can be pretty heavy, this is a great bonus!

Browsing around their site it appears a lot of Juiced Hybrid’s products are geared towards the Prius Hybrid, which happens to be one of the cars my husband and I have considered looking into buying at some point.  But they carry items for other hybrids, like the Saturn Green Line VUE and AURA, the Honda Civic & Insight Hybrids, and even the Porsche Cayenne Hybrid, and loads more!

Some of the items at Juiced Hybrid also appear to be compatible with non-hybrid cars, so if you’re looking for car related gifts, don’t discount this site just because it is specialized for hybrid owners.  Floor mats are pretty universal within model types, so what works in a Hybrid model will probably work in it’s non-hybrid sibling model, so if your dealer is out of stock and you’re in need of new mats, it’s worth a look!

I have a general idea of what I may be getting for hubby and the Kiddo, but that is about it.  Oh, and maybe for my parents too, since there is a company that is giving employees at my workplace a pretty good discount, and they have stuff my parents (especially my dad) like.  So I may do my shopping for them thru this place for the 25% discount.

Otherwise, I do kind of know what I will probably get for my siblings.  Let’s see… for my sister, I will probably get her family a W@l-M@rt gift card so she’s restricted to getting groceries and such (rather than a Visa card she can use to blow the money anywhere).  And maybe some handmade soaps.

For my brother… probably handmade soaps, and a visa card (he is a bit more responsible).

My other brother… I may think about finishing a scarf I was *going* to give him last Christmas until he landed his butt in jail for a domestic fight with my mom & dad.  And some soap.

Yeah, I’m probably going to do soaps again this year (buying them, not making them myself).  Everyone on my side of the family seemed to like them, and handmade soap is supposed to be better for you anyway since it doesn’t have all the harsh chemicals that manufactured soap has.   I did most of my shopping for the soaps on Etsy.

As for my husband’s side of the family… I have no idea yet.  I originally thought I may make the ladies some jewelry again, but I have few – if any – ideas of what to make just using the supplies I have on hand, and I don’t want to spend the money just getting supplies for jewelry just for them.  I think last year I spent right around $200 just on supplies, which isn’t that bad I guess for six people, but I don’t know if I want to do it again this year.  I may stick to their lists this year and go off-list next year.

So anyway.. how’s your shopping coming?