Had a wonderful Christmas with Mister and E. I’m still amazed sometimes at the lack of stress/drama during holidays since making the decision to keep major holidays just the three of us. We played from 5:30 am until almost 6pm, when E finally gave up and settled down in the chair to watch Alladin with dad. I used to get hives on the holidays. Today I smiled so much my cheeks hurt. 🙂
Can’t imagine a better way to spend Christmas.
E has so many cool new things, I’m going to have to get some sort of new storage system in her room. I thought the flying dragon was going to be her favorite, but she spent hours playing with the engineering blocks. And I was worried she wouldn’t like them!
Her cousins seem to have had a halfway decent day in spite of the hell they are going through. It’s just not fair when kids get drug into their parent’s drama. No kid deserves that. You would think, that people who experienced childhood trauma themselves would be the last parents in the world to put their children through the same or worse. Apparently that logic doesn’t hold on illogical people.
So the day was a bit bittersweet. Happy for myself, my husband, my child… Grieving for her cousins and what they are going through.
E’s grandparents here tomorrow.
I’m already making project lists in my head of things I’d like to get done once the holidays are over. I’ve ordered organizers to remedy the shoe situation. E’s room and the tools are next. The clutter makes me crazy. Makes me want to spring clean and have a junk-bonfire.
I need to start thinking about how to set up beehives.
That was rather random…
-B

The eve before Christmas eve. Yule came and went here with little fuss. I am no better at keeping up Wiccan ritual than I was any other religion. I am glad the days will be getting longer again, the warm weather makes me miss my garden already.
I got my first seed catalogue, made a mental note to pick out some things to start from seed soon. Time to start stocking up on empty water bottles again!
Went to Marianne’s for a few hours. Took her banana bread, walked by the creek with dogs, E loves the new puppy. He has loads of energy and likes to fetch. Fed some treats to Stretch and Dena, ran to Wal-Mart. (For the love of all things holy WHY did I let us run out of dog food two days before Christmas?!) Crowds were INSANE. Ran into Jack, George and Lynn. Strange to see some people from the hospital now, almost seems another lifetime ago.
Ordered stuff to get shoes organized. Every time I go to Marianne’s, I am reminded how woefully cluttered and unorganized our house is. …and how badly I need to rip all of our carpet out. One thing at a time I guess.
Tomorrow I will spend cleaning house and getting ready for company Sat. I have to nail trellis back up tomorrow, the wind was brutal today and knocked some down on the porch.
-B

Only to get busy with other projects and forget about it. I was using this site as a journal of sorts, but then school started, I was tired and forgot to write in it for 4 months.

E had her 7th birthday on the ice at Old Kinderhook. I didn’t try to skate, arthritis makes possibility of a fall scary. She had a great time with a friend from school. Elsa, Olaf and Santa all there. 🙂

Been working on some things for Wrong Side Dirt. Thinking of using it as a kind of therapy, writing always has helped. Family accused me of writing a book about them, maybe it’s not a bad idea. I never realized how many ppl out there have to deal with abuse or the fall out from it. I spend a lot of time reading about NPD, the more I learn, the easier it is to cope. So much loss… I miss these people sometimes, yet the people I miss never actually existed at all. They were only masks of what they wanted me to see. I wonder why I have nightmares. Still, determined my daughter will not fall prey to these creatures. I’ve spent my entire life at battle with them, I don’t want her to have to waste hers that way. If only I had the time back I invested in those ‘people’.

Been doing a lot of artwork for the school. Fun, makes the kids happy, teachers happy, great way to channel some energy into something positive. Plus, I got home-canned pickles out of the deal. 🙂

Need to get some house projects finished. Might be nice to have kitchen cabinets done before we build new house.

Christmas only 3 days away. Not sure where this year has gone, except I’ve been so busy @ school, Tom teases I should just work there. But if I went back to college, would likely be for marketing, not teaching degree.

NYs Resolution needs to be stop thinking about people that didn’t make the effort to stay in my life and concern myself with the ones that did. Shoo ghosts, don’t bother me… And stop sending my kid mail.