The Christmas Day Post

Merry Christmas!

It was a strange Christmas being in a new home and not even close to unpacked. Several things didn't get wrapped (oh well!), and we're still trying to find presents in the garage. As a tip, if someone is moving around Christmas, wait until they move into their new place to send them stuff. What everyone seemed to do was mail us stuff in early December, so we ended up putting it haphazardly in a box and lugging it to the new place.

Julia seemed to come down with a bug, which was not unexpected since everyone at daycare seemed to be sick earlier this week. It's not a horrible virus (i.e., no puking), but we decided not to go to Christmas dinner at a friend's because she was icky enough to pass it on. And if the situation were reversed, I'd rather not someone bring a sick kid to my Christmas dinner.

I think S and I might be coming down with it too. Or we're just exhausted. Our food intake has been really poor: cookies, peanut butter & jelly and grilled cheese sandwiches. I think my anemia is kicking in with the lack of protein and iron. I took a nap today, and I'm still dragging.

Christmas Eve we went to my mom's for ham, mashed potatoes, and green beans. I don't like ham, but cookies & mashed potatoes make a meal. Right? Yeah, I'm totally iron deficient right now. This morning we had my mom and stepdad over for homemade cinnamon rolls. And tonight we went over to my mom's for lasagna. That was nice. We didn't have to cook much.

This morning Julia opened presents. I really don't want to make a big production about the Santa thing. Just not my style. But she had a few presents to open, and she seemed to like playing with her shape sorter, Mrs. Potato Head, garage. She loves her magnadoodle. And she liked the clothes she got. We didn't really get her a lot, knowing this is probably the last year we can get away with a simple Christmas.

Yesterday was Julia's 18 month appointment. She grew almost 3 inches in the past 3 months!!! 32.25 inches (60-70th percentile, hard to tell on the chart), head size of 18.5 inches (60th percentile), and 21 lb, 4 oz (8th percentile). Skinny little thing. Well, since she just had the increase in height, she's got to start filling out soon. The appointment went just fine. It's hard to believe we haven't taken her to the doctor in 3 months. It's nice to have that long between appointments. Hard to believe she doesn't have to go to the doctor until she turns 2 years old. Doubt we'll make it that long, but you never know...

The house has taken most of our energy in the past week. The house. Oh the house. Well, it's not really the house itself. It's the neglectful owners for the past 8 years. They left so much CRAP in the house, and the house is filthy. Getting their crap OUT is a huge obstacle, and then cleaning the house is another huge obstacle. Throw in us working full-time (at least for part of the week) plus the holidays, and it's just too much. On Thursday the city came to take 15 boxes of their crap, plus the super smelly fridge and freezer. Hallelujah, it was our little Christmas miracle, as S says. :)

Our Christmas gift to ourselves was a Hoover Steamvac. The thing is truly awesome. I've been steamvac'ing the carpet - a room at a time. One more bedroom, the upstairs hallways, and the stairs to go. We still have the basement as well, but for now we're trying to ignore the basement and just focus on the main living area.

We're partway done painting the master bedroom. We have a lot to paint, especially if you include the closet and bathroom. Baby steps.

Saturday, Sunday and Monday we're going to focus on tackling our to do list without overstressing ourselves. I think we've been doing too much for the past week, and we're starting to fade. Gotta balance work with play better!