Haiku Friday AND Yet Another Rushed Update

Christmas is coming
Cookie icing on my shoe
Sprinkles ev'rywhere

Up 'til 2 am
Shopping on the Internet
Express shipping, please!

Our Christmas tree fell
Lots of broken glass on floor
Now it's tilted back

Cookies for breakfast
School holidays coming up
Dad home for a week!

Between the two big
Holidays, I mean, of course
Cozy fam'ly time

Except for the teeth
Which need to have three fillings
Be brave, our Sweet Pea!

The cats keep trying
To get in my closet now
They can smell their gifts

Catnip mats for them
to play on, maybe keep them
entertained a bit

Shopping still to do
No rest for the weary, right?
Must wash dishes now

You know, every year I want to either be more organized for Christmas and have all our gifts for other people ready by the first of November, or - and this is what I REALLY want - to MAKE something that people can use rather than giving them more stuff. I had planned last year that I was going to make soap this year and that's what we would give family for Christmas (though we probably still would have bought for the kids in the family). Well, I never prepared even though I kept talking about it and when it came time to really get down to business, I couldn't find all my ingredients. I wasn't about to buy more because what I was really missing was the essential oils, which I buy in bulk. I am not about to buy more of those until I run out. SO, that means that in 2008 I really must find everything (I think I'll set myself a deadline, like March 1st or something) and if I start early enough, I can make this a leisurely thing throughout the year and be ready so far in advance for Christmas! That's what I thought last year too, of course. I'm hoping that since I didn't pull it off this year, I will have that much more inclination to follow through in 2008 - especially since so many people in our families are burned out with the gift giving. Nobody needs anything and most people don't want anything either, except for the kids. That's why I want to do a gift they can use up. Because most, of not all of them, really liked my soap when I was making it regularly.

ANYWAY - that is neither here nor there. Here's what *has* been going on. Last Saturday I took Sweet Pea to a birthday party - her first for a school friend - at a gymnastics school. It was a great idea - the kids want to run around like loonies anyway, right? So why not have them do that in a guided and super-fun way? They all had a great time. The next day Grandma S. and Boopa came to our house early in the morning and we all got ready to go for a drive. Then our neighbors followed us (we had Gma & Bpa in our van with us) to the Santa Cruz Mountains. We went to a Christmas tree farm that was pretty far away and had to drive on lots of twisty roads, but it was fun. Sweet Pea had begun acting strange first thing in the morning - whiny and didn't want breakfast (she had had a little something to eat upon waking, but it was still weird for her to be acting that way). When we got to the Christmas tree farm she got two rows into a very large field of trees and stopped, announcing that she wanted the little 2.5-foot tree in front of her. She wouldn't hear that it wouldn't look right in the living room because it's so small, or that we wouldn't buy her her own tree just for her room (which she doesn't spend that much time in). Boopa stayed with her while we walked around the farm looking for that perfect tree. The one we got must be 8 or 9 feet tall. We've never had a tree that tall before, but the ceiling in the house above where we were going to have the tree is two stories tall, so it didn't matter how tall it was - yay! However, I believe that the tree holder we have is not big or heavy enough to hold such a tall tree, and that is why the tree fell over a few nights ago. Oh well... live and learn...

After we and the neighbors chose and cut our trees and trussed them to the tops of our vehicles for the long drive home, most of us were quite hungry and decided to go to a restaurant for lupper (it was 3 or 4pm - too late for lunch but too early for dinner/supper). Sweet Pea whined and said she wanted to go home. She didn't eat at the restaurant but had fun running around, dancing, and hamming it up on the restaurant's stage with Speed Racer.

On the way home, however... Not long into the drive Sweet Pea acted a little weird and wouldn't answer me when I asked if something was wrong. I was in the back with The Bug, directly behind Sweet Pea, so I couldn't see her face. It was dark out but her light was on next to her seat and Boopa was watching her too. Presently he said, "OH, she threw up." Lemme tell ya, it smelled great. Blech. We were still in the mountains but Slipshod found a turnout pretty quickly and we wiped Sweet Pea up (she hadn't yakked too much, but it got all down the front of her shirt) and helped her rinse out her mouth and take a drink of water. She slept the rest of the way home. We formed a tentative concensus that Sweet Pea had probably just had a bit of car sickness because she had been looking down drawing before she got sick.

At bedtime The Bug, who had only napped for about half an hour all day, fell asleep hard and fast. Sweet Pea, however, was very awake and I decided I would rather just have her be awake downstairs with us than me stay up in the dark with her trying to get her to sleep when she didn't seem tired (which was not surprising, since she stopped napping nearly a year ago so now if she naps bedtime takes forever). I went to work taking the extra seats out of my van, moving the back seat up, and redoing the annoying seatbelt-through-the-carseat (our car was made one measly year before the LATCH system became standard in all vehicles) thing. While I was fighting with the seat belt and The Bug's car seat, Slipshod stuck his head out the door and said, "she's really sick - she just puked all over the couch and the carpet." So that was lovely too. From then on, for the whole next day, we made her carry a big bowl around everywhere with her so that if she couldn't make it to the toilet to throw up, she could yak in the bowl. If only we had done that earlier. Yeesh. But, hey, we can remove the couch cushion covers to wash them, and we have a carpet shampooer (although it's really making the rounds right now - was across the street last night for a coffee stain emergency, and now it's been picked up and taken to Slipshod's sister's apartment, which she is trying to get nice and clean before her parents-in-law spend Christmas with them). Whee.

So if you're counting, that's three illnesses we've had in our house in the past, what, 6 weeks? Two colds and then the stomach bug. Luckily, Sweet Pea was the only one who had the bug. WHEW!

We've got another birthday party (Speed Racer's) to attend tomorrow and part of me is wary of being around a bunch of kids again - who knows what Sweet Pea or The Bug might catch this time... I'm just hoping that everyone will be healthy and we don't end up with any new illnesses before Christmas.

Other than that - just lots and lots of chasing the kids around going on, lots of cookie making and decorating, Christmas shopping, oh, and of course we decorated our tree (before it fell down - now it needs to be redecorated), strung popcorn and cranberries, all that good stuff. Sweet Pea and I still want to make some paper chains. I think we'll make some just for fun, to hang around the house, and another that has enough rings to count down the days 'til Christmas.

I think that's about it. What's new with you?