Almost ready for Santa

There has been a lot of Christmas progress around here over the last few days.  And thank goodness for it!  I was in quite a panic up until last night.  But you know how when you have WAY too much to do and you're all stressed out about it but then  you sit down and map out an actual plan, a plan with priorities, a plan with sensible priorities, and then you focus on that plan and start following the steps and it suddenly all comes together and you realize you are actually going to survive as long as you can remain focused...?  Yeah, that happened.  I just hope I haven't forgotten anything because one single missed task and my whole world is going to fall apart again.

Anyway, the tree is up and decorated and Leroy is hanging front and center where he can be seen from the 'good' chair.  I painted Leroy when I was a young kid - six or eight years old, I'd guess.  Dad named him Leroy and he always had to hang where Dad could see him from his seat on the couch.

The gifts are all wrapped.  Well, most of them are.  Okay, 90% of them are wrapped.  But the rest are things that will most likely go in gift bags so not a hugetime consuming issue.

I thought I still needed to go stocking stuffer shopping but I met with Santa yesterday and it turns out I already have more stuff than I need.

Nine batches of rum balls have been made.  I need to make four more batches but I ran out of ingredients and what with the traditional shot of rum between each batch, I wasn't in any condition to go to the grocery store.

This set of miniature stockings has been completed...

And the final knitted gift is on the needles.  I'm afraid to say it but I shouldn't have any trouble getting it finished in time.

There's still 8,000 batches of cookies to bake but thank goodness for awesome daughters who volunteer for that duty.  She even gets the first five or six thousand made without complaint.  Ususally.

So what's left to do?  

I still have to deliver the gifts.

And of course I need to finish wrapping the gifts.

We need to go ride around looking at other's lights.

I need to help Hayden make gifts for her parents.  I really want that to be a tradition.  Have a Christmas Craft Night (or day) with her each year so that (A) we can have craft time together, (B) she can hand-make something for her parents and later in life, her friends or whoever she wants to make for, and (C) it will give her parents an evening or afternoon to go do adulty things.  Growing up, I had that tradition with my God Mother and I have some wonderful crafty memories.  I want the same for Hayden.

I need to do the final Christmas dinner shopping and some last minute baking.

And of course, I need to finish that last knitted gift.

Oh, and I should probably at least vacuum before Santa arrives.

I have two days off from work between now and Christmas.  I should be able to get all that done, right?

Right??

I sure hope I haven't forgotten anything.

And since I can feel the panic starting to slowly seep back in, I'm going to go ahead and make the decision to take next week off from blogging.  I hope you all have a wonderful, safe, fun and happy holiday.

🎄MERRY CHRISTMAS🎄