But there are presents to wrap.
Friends to see.
Socks to knit.
Books to read.
Shows to watch.
Children to snuggle.
A husband to be brought up to speed (and to bring me up to speed).
And sleep. Never, ever enough sleep.
Life. Busy and messy and full and a little bit hard.
Because this time of year is always (at least) a little bit hard. And we have no snow. And I set aside a Christmas gift spot only to not put ONE gift in it because I had to ship it out right away anyway and sure enough it would go missing and I’d have to order it AGAIN because I spent two days looking everywhere at least 5 times. (And gagging as I dug through the trash because even though Jesse offered I knew if he told me he couldn’t find it in there, I’d have to do it myself anyway just to be SURE – and of course it wasn’t.) And I deactivated my Facebook because (politics, disasters, death, heartbreak, stupidity) I didn’t need the distraction (somewhere my friends who have watched me leave only to return 5,897 times are rolling their eyes). And oh my word, sings and parties and gatherings and people. All. The. Time.
It’s just this time of year.
But my cooktop is in. And my dishwasher. And one of my two showers is fixed. And my tub is operational again. And my other shower should be fixed by the end of this week. Emphasis on should. And I have almost every single Christmas present done. Emphasis on almost.
So it’s mostly good despite the little bit hard.
And I’m looking into 2016 and (best laid plans) I’m thinking about what I’d like to accomplish and what my priorities need to be and the person I want to be and the legacy I want to leave (Hi, my name is Kate and I’m an INFJ.) and how I’m going to go about doing that because…life is so damn short and precious and special and…
This time of year.
I promise to be back writing in 2016. (You luckies, you.) But probably not at all before then.
(Violet drew this picture and we made it into our Christmas card this year and I wanted to share with you as well.)
I hope this time of year for you is a whole lot of very, very, very good and hardly any little bit hard.
XOXO.
Love this post, Kate, and oh my gosh, the drawing Violet made which you made into your Christmas card … SO CUTE!!!
Had to laugh over the digging through the garbage story, because that is so “me” as well (I keep hearing about these 4 letters for personality; I really need to take one of those tests myself), and although your Facebook friends might be rolling their eyes over the 5897 deactivations, I am thinking, “Good for you!” (I have all of 3 friends on Facebook, and never post anything myself, but the other day found myself sucked into the click-another-thing vortex … I emerged an hour later, more than just a bit disgusted with what I’d seen, and completely regretting that time I’d never get back, when I could’ve/should’ve been knitting socks instead!!).
I won’t lie — the very good and the little bit hard have come in nearly equal measure this fall and December, which is mainly why I too, keep meaning to write, but don’t.
Have a merry merry Christmas, Kate 🙂
Thank you so much, Marian! As for FB, I kept finding myself down the rabbit hole more and more often and I HATED it. So much better not to have the temptation at all.
And I hope the end of your December is filled with all VERY GOOD and no hard so the balance tips in the good favor. I miss your blogging (but completely get it!) 🙂
Well, I missed this one when you posted. (I follow you in Bloglovin’ but still somehow missed it. Although there was about a week when I didn’t look at it at all because *this time of year*. 🙂
I will share with you my gift debacle, because misery loves company. (And it wasn’t really a debacle. I just like a little hyperbole every once in awhile.) I ordered most of my gifts from Amazon (even though they are a corporate monster) because I just needed the gift of free shipping and everything in one place. I thought I had everything all done, and I sat down one night just to check on the status of the orders and I discovered that I had not, as I thought, bought my daughter’s main gift (a leather backpack). And, I was right on the edge of being too late for it to get here before we were leaving town! I had gone back and forth on a number of bags, and though I was SURE I’d ordered it, clearly I hadn’t. Much scrambling and gnashing of teeth later (because none of them seemed quite right), I ordered another and crossed my fingers that it would arrive in time.
And it did! And the very next day, so did another one! Because I HAD ordered a bag–but from Overstock, not Amazon. Which meant there would now be a return to deal with. 🙁 Luckily, the return was easy. I guess the moral of the story is: If you don’t use the place you’ve set aside to store all your gifts (real or virtual) that system just ain’t gonna work! 🙂
Looking forward to some quiet times (and, I hope, snow!) in the next few weeks. Glad to year your house is nearly back in order, too.
Oh Rita! I laughed aloud at your gift debacle because that is EXACTLY something I would do!!
We did finally get snow yesterday and today. Hopefully Mother Nature will share the bounty and send some your way as well. 🙂