Small Successes-January 6th

Celebrating the little things in life that add up.

A lot has happened here in two weeks.  We've celebrated Christmas (all twelve days of it), we've said goodbye to a beloved member of the family, we've completed a home improvement project, we've been snowed in, and I've done a fair amount of Christmas clearance shopping.  Let's just say that I'm set with wrapping paper for a long time.

1. Our goal of having the basement finished before Thanksgiving and then Christmas failed.  Things came up, or the money for the project would wind up having to go somewhere else and the project continually got put on the back burner.  A few days after Christmas day, I misunderstood what Bryan meant when he told me the basement was ready to be primed and I primed the basement.  I took his statement to mean he was asking me to go and prime the basement when really he was just telling me that it was ready to be primed whenever.  Five hours later I discovered that he wasn't asking me to prime it immediately.  So while it was a misunderstanding, a job that needed to be done was completed.  Being that I'm the sort of person who can stop in the middle of a job and be content, we wound up going full steam ahead.  Along the way we discovered that I can't paint a ceiling to save my life.  At the same time, we also discovered that my painting ability is now good enough that I don't need to tape off the ceiling to  paint the walls. That discovery saved me a lot of time.  Taping things off is my least favorite part of painting.

2. We instituted a new Christmas tradition in our house this year.  The children now get little gifts in our Jesus manger for the twelve days of Christmas.  I discovered on Christmas Eve that one of the pit falls of me picking up little things throughout the year for the stocking is we wind up with too much stuff to put in a stocking.  I decided that instead of overloading a stocking I'd put in a few things for Christmas morning and then put the leftover items in the manger next to Jesus for the remaining days of Christmas. The kids have been absolutely delighted with this.  I think it helps them to understand that Christmas isn't just one day, but is actually a season.  Today they were delighted to find perler beads next to the manger along with a box of gold, frankincense and myrrh (Thanks Holy Heroes for hosting your awesome 12 days of Christmas promotion!  The girls are totally thrilled with their prize.)

3. I've survived an exhausting two weeks. (Poor Bryan was so exhausted from his time off that he was looking forward to going back to work.) Bryan was home from Christmas Eve until January 2nd, went to work for one day and then was home for his Grandmother's funeral.  The kids were home for a day or two longer than he was (depending on the kid).  This Christmas break was very busy and packed with plenty to do.  We hosted Christmas dinner at our house which was incredibly delicious, thereby making it a roaring success.  I managed to keep the house relatively clean despite the massive painting project in the basement that spanned a few days.  And as of now, I can officially say that I'm on top of the laundry.  I will not, however, discuss the dirty kitchen countertops that are in dire need of my attention.  You will not find me telling you about the how the evidence that we really do cook in this house is found all over the counter tops.