As I write this post it is just less than a week to Christmas. This has been a mixed up year and I am soooo behind. I am hoping that we will have the big tree in the living room for our presents. Okay, I know we will have the tree as in between writing this post I am bringing up the pieces of the tree from the basement and putting them in place - but will it be decorated and how much will it be decorated? I have already put down the stand, added the pole and the tree top to it. I am now going to put in the first of the wedge shaped sections.
Why I am so late this year? Well, as mentioned last week, lately I seem to need to do almost everything twice. In addition to what I mentioned last week - on Thursday a gift we had ordered for husband’s niece - a Barbie doll that is a mermaid and lights up in the bathtub as Walmart, our go to source for purchasing just about anything, does not carry it in store stock, so we had to order it for her. The doll shown on Walmart’s site was the traditional Caucasian, blonde, blue eyed Barbie. Unlike other Barbie dolls on the page there was no choice of “color’. When the doll arrived it was African-American in features - not the doll we had ordered. The doll had taken 2 weeks to come - and even if we could reorder her, we had no way of knowing if we would receive the Barbie pictured on the page on the website. Niece actually asked for this doll and her mom had not tried to buy it for her as we were doing so. No one wants to disappoint a 9 year old. (Okay, even though according to her mom she asked for this, I know fully well that there is a good chance when she gets this doll, it will be glanced at and tossed over her shoulder lost in the excessive gifts from her mom and (dad’s mom) grandmother. So we both went online and I managed to find out that Target claimed to have the doll in stock at several local stores. I printed out the information from the two stores we were most likely to get to. We paid $13 from Walmart - the doll was listed as available by order, pick up at the store or buy at the store for $15, so not much more. We went to one of the Targets. To my surprise we did not have to find an employee and plead that the doll which we expected not to be on the floor - or it would be same as the one received if it was on the floor - is suppose to be in the store and please, please find us one - the doll was out on display in abundance. We selected one. We then looked at the shelf and the price was $21 - not only more than the price online for Target, but also $1 over the list price from Mattel. Husband started to panic. I took the doll and my printout and went to the service desk. I explained - employee told me that just because the price was shown on the website (even if it said buy in store) does not mean that the store price is the same as the online price - and even different stores will have different prices for the same item (please remember that when you shop at Target in the future, as well as the shelf price was over the list price), but she would match it (so I didn’t bother to point out to her that their shelf price was more than list.) Almost finished - we then had to go stand in line at Walmart and return the doll received from them. Another day gone. (Putting in the second section of the tree. - right back.)
We have not driven our RV since August as we have not been able to go on a trip. It was having trouble starting when we did maintenance things to it (such as running the generator every month) and husband has been pushing for trip so we were going to drive to Lancaster, PA for a farmer’s market, some other shopping, and dinner for the day on Tuesday. Then we were just too exhausted. So we drove it just to drive it (we could wake up much later and not need to pack any “going out of state stuff”). We drove it for about an hour headed east on the Island we live on. We then drove it around out there (it is the both the fancy tourist end of the Island, as well as the agricultural end of same) for a while. We finally ended up at larger Walmart out there - both so husband could look for some things he has not been able to find and to make a rest stop. (We had lunch at the start of the trip.) We then drove home. It was the start of rush hour - which mostly is in the opposite direction as we are going, but there are a lot of people who commute in the opposite direction - and an accident on the main highway we were on. We are limited in the highways which we can on which we can drive the RV as it is over height for many of them. Husband was thinking of getting off the highway where we were and we knew the roads. I quickly calculated and decided that the back up was after where we would get off - by one exit. I was right. We stopped and refilled the gas tank in the RV and now it can rest for awhile. Another day gone.
I have to go to a client for the month - I was hoping to have gone today, but she had a doctor’s appointment, so it will be tomorrow - the expected busiest traffic day of the season, of course. Either day - it is another day gone. (Just put in the 3rd section of the tree.)
In addition to all of this and my exam (which I finished with a grade of 85 last night, thank goodness), we will be short of time from now to Christmas as our reenactment unit will be doing the candlelight event at the local restoration village. It sounds like a short time - event starts at 5 pm and ends at 9:30. But we have to start dressing before 3 pm to leave at 3:30 to get there by 4 pm (and driving with rush hour traffic on Friday, the first day of the event) to start setting up. Then after the event ends we will need to close up, so we will not be out until 10 pm, drive home by 10:30, start dinner going and change to modern clothes and start eating dinner by 11 pm. We have done this event for at least a decade now and we know how to plan ahead. Today we mailed out payment on all bills due before December 27 - no need to go to the post office or bank (we took extra cash and transferred money to cover bills today). In buying food for Christmas Eve dinner today, I did forget to buy for dinner the 3 nights of the event - hot dogs for him and chicken patties for me - come home, put up canned soup and dinner, change clothes and start eating by 11:30 pm. Husband said he would go tomorrow while I was at work to buy same - and some deli turkey breast for Friday night. We treated ourselves to dinner out tonight as we normally would go out on the weekend for dinner and will pick up takeout tomorrow night.
In and between all of this I have put up the decorations in the dining room and most of them in the living (I have not have the energy to move furniture to put up a double length swag of artificial roping across the back living room windows with an embroidery piece of mine in a hoop in the center of the swag (where it goes back up to the top of the window). So everything on the table below it is in disarray.
Our Christmas tree and lights, skirt, and some of the ornaments are stored in the box that the tree came in - under the staircase in the basement. Two of our other trees, Christmas decorative figures and some other related items are stored on top of the box. Of course to get to the box everything in front of it has to be moved. After we came home from dinner I began sorting this all out. I moved what is kept in front of the box and the items stored on top of it. I then pulled out the stand and the pole - need them first of course - and a junk bath size towel (you know - the ones that are not good enough to use, but too good to toss, and great for things like soaking water from a small flood or such). I put the towel down on the wooden floor first - it keeps the floor from getting scratched if we need to move the tree from where it starts as well as making it easier to do so by dragging the towel, while holding the tree upright. Oh - it is not this easy - I spent part of last night moving husband’s table that he uses for various weaving related purposes into the studio (what should have been our family room) and wedging it (it is a gate-leg, so it folds down narrow) between my studio worktable and chair. I then carried in 7 boxes of yarns and finished woven pieces. (And arranged them in the right order for access to what husband might need while it is all shoved back there.) I put the top of the tree in place. The instructions said to do this last and we did so for years (closer to decades). We are both short and doing so involves reaching across the spread of the bottom tree sections - not something either of us can do without a ladder, which is a rather shaky way to do so. 2 years ago it occurred to me to try putting the top in place and seeing if I could still put the bottom pieces (8 wedge shaped pieces) in place - I could and I now I assemble the tree this way. I am now in the midst (between lines/ sections of this post) of bringing up a section of the tree and a zip bag or two with a strand of lights in each. I discovered that the way to deal with the down and up the stairs for each section is to stretch it out a bit as the sections are heavy and the stairs long. (Going down for another section right now - my fourth of the eight.) Back again. We found that we have to put the sections on so that two which sit opposite each other go on one after another - then the 2 that form the two cross pieces to same, then fill in opposite ones in the holes in between them. If the sections next to each other are put on together - the tree gets too heavy and starts to fall over (yes, we found out the hard way - been there, done that) so the spacing of putting them in is important. I should have the entire tree up before we go to bed. Not sure if I will get the lights on tonight - or tomorrow night. Spacing where it is located seems good. It is a small area, but I can walk around the tree, except for the side facing the window and will deal with that from the sides. We originally would set up the tree in the back, right corner of the room, but the front center works better - and only one piece of furniture needs to moved (and this crazy year past, it was never put back).
A few years ago I came up with an idea for turning on and off the tree. We have several electric cords which allow something to be plugged in at one end (which is also what plugs into the electricity) and at the other end there is an on-off switch. I use this and run the cord up through the tree and it just sticks on the side of the tree that is not as easily seen (away from the room entrance and near a wall) and we just stick our hands into the tree there and turn the lights on or off. This year I put a 3 outlet plug into the cord before the tree and we can also plug in our light up bear (he wears our Santa hat) so both will go on at the same time - we always forget to light him. (Off for section 5 - it will face the window behind the tree.)
I have four large plastic boxes with ornaments in the basement also - behind the 2 empty decoration boxes and the 2 full Teddy bear village Christmas village. They will come up when I am ready to use them. The ornament boxes are labeled one to four. The ornaments in box 1 are basically the ones I want to put on the tree first and the ones in box 4 basically the ones I want to put on last. There are also other ornaments which are kept in the tree box and some in other places. Some of the ornaments will end up on the studio tree - it is decorated with only ornaments we have made - although there are plenty of those also on the main tree. There will also be a tree in the dining room. It gets the ornaments we receive as donors to Colonial Williamsburg - but some duplicate ones will go on the main tree also. There is also a small beaded tree which I made - it is stored decorated, but some always fall off in transit and need to be replaced.
I had cleared out the dining room of extraneous stuff before decorating it. Unfortunately RV stuff that ends up in the dining room in RV use season which I took out and left in the RV for the winter, had to be brought back in when we went on the trip - good thing. The back of the RV (remember this is a Chevy van conversion not a huge RV) has two seating benches opposite each other on the sides and they convert to the bed by filling in the area between the seats with wooden boards and sliding the seat cushions and seat backs into the space. It is set up as the 2 seats for the off season with the bedding in knotted closed huge plastic bags on one of the seats and the seat backs on the other seat. We have driven before with them like this with no problem. During the trip we heard NOISES from the back, Normally we hear noises from the back and we just figured it was because things that are normally packed full when we travel so that items don’t shift around were much emptier. When we stopped at the Walmart out there - everything was lying in the area between the benches - luckily nothing broken - don’t know why. If I had not taken the items back into the house as I did - they would have been broken. So again, I have to repeat doing something and I have to take the items back from the dining room - again - and store them in the (stationary now for some time to come) RV.
At some point - even if it is on or after Christmas - I will set up the other 2 trees down here that have to be decorated. I will, hopefully finish the living room (or just put out my embroidery place and forget about the roping for this year). I will also change the teddy village from fall to winter - this is something that I normally do on Christmas Eve or afternoon or after same.
Do I over decorate? Yes. But we don’t really buy each other gifts (or otherwise get them) and Christmas day dinner with his sister and her family is not fun. Mass, the focus of the holiday is an hour. So other than participating with our reenacting unit in doing 6 nights (3 this week and 3 next week) of interpreting a 1740 house at the event mentioned, decorating is just about all of our holiday. Oh, and of course there are some Chanukah decorations mixed in for me. (Going down for piece number 6, right back.)
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Take time to enjoy the holidays. We often spend so much time decorating, shopping, cooking (maybe some cleaning if people are coming), etc. While I , obviously, go overboard in decorating, I also understand that time to enjoy ourselves and rest is also needed. I push to get it all done, but if it is not, I am not going to be upset with myself. The first year that we were married we did not have a tree for a variety of reasons (none financial). I decided that husband needed something. I bought 2 large sheets of brown oak tag and some paints. I painted a fireplace opening and fire on one and painted the mortar of bricks (see I bought brown oaktag so I would not have to paint bricks - just the mortar between them) for the sides and chimney area of a fireplace. I then tied them to the back of one of his mom’s old kitchen chairs (we had a few of them to use as we had not bought kitchen set yet - table was a bridge table borrowed from my mom) so it would stand. We set it up for years until it fell apart some time after we moved into this house. It was simple, but served its purpose. (Going down for tree December 20, 2018 piece number 7.)
I hope that all of you have a good holiday season - I hate to say Happy or Merry as I know that many people do not. Try to remember what is important and know that the rest will work itself it out. If not everything you plan gets done - it is not a failure, it is just how it is. Something will always go wrong - last year I misplaced a gift card purchased for husband’s niece (same one we got the Barbie mermaid for) and it did not turn up until I started changing the teddy Christmas village into the summer village (for the first time - as in the past the village has only been done for Christmas/Winter). So now we have a gift card to use at a store we don’t shop at. But we gave her cash last year and we are sure that some day we will find a use for the card - maybe a DVD before they stop carrying them? But after going crazy looking for the card last year (and positive I threw it out somehow), I put it aside and went on with the holiday. (I will go down for the last piece and close up downstairs after I post this - see it wasn’t so bad.)
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